For weeks and months, perhaps, Ilingsworth had seen this coming, had known that it was inevitable, and here it was, thrust into his face in scare headlines that smelt to heaven! It smote him as with sudden lightning shock. But the public announcement did more than shock him, it turned him almost into a raving maniac. For an instant he stood silent, regarding the clamorous morsels of humanity all about him, clamorous for the smallest coin known to the Union. Then, with mighty swings of his arms, he swooped upon them, shrieking: "Get out of my sight, get out of my sight, you ragamuffins!" The newsboys fled as far as the next corner. There they stopped, clustered once again and jeered at him. Turning, Ilingsworth again faced the house of Wilkinson. "I'm tricked--tricked!" he cried. "Why did I give up so easy; why didn't I force the girl...." For a moment he checked his half-frenzied words, then he went on: "Peter V. Wilkinson, I'll even up with you, somehow, yet!" In a few moments he had turned the nearest corner and disappeared. Back in the Wilkinson household, Leslie, almost exhausted, sank into a chair. As she sat there, she perceived one of the footmen passing her, bound from the rear to the outer entrance. "Jeffries," cried the girl, springing up, "tell Jordan that it will be quite unnecessary to mention Mr. Ilingsworth's call to anyone. He came to see me." "Very good, ma'am," returned the footman, passing on. "And Jeffries," she continued, "have you anything to do just now?" "Nothing, Miss Leslie," answered the man, "except to obtain the latest extras for Mrs. Wilkinson. She's that particular about it." "Are there any extras now?" inquired the girl. The footman inclined his head toward the entrance to the house, through which Ilingsworth had just made his exit. "Don't you hear them, Miss?" he asked. And indeed, at that moment, the yelping of the young street wolves of Manhattan could plainly be heard. Leslie placed her hands over her ears and fled incontinently up the broad stairs, disdaining the services of the man at the lift, who rose expectantly as she started past him. On reaching the first landing, she met Roy Pallister--little Pallister, she always thought of him, and noting the consternation on his countenance, she could not refrain from bursting into laughter. "Why, Mr. Pallister," she cried, "you look as if you had been shot out of a cannon!"