"We can't help that," said Maud. "Business is business. And this wretched, shocking piece of mischief spells success. I feel it in my bones. There's no use being silly about ourselves. We've got our way to make in the world--and, as a sextet----" She lingered over the picture. "As a sextet, there's no use denying that we are rather lovely to look at." Phyllis put in a word blindly. "Maud," she said, "among the applications you have received, how many are from women?" Maud laughed aloud. "None," she said. "There wouldn't be," said Eve. "Well," said Mary, "compared to the rest of you, I'm quite an old woman, and I say--so much the better." V Even on going into the open air from a warmed room, it would not have struck you as a cold day. But thermometers marked a number of degrees worse than zero. The sky was bright and blue. Not a breath of wind stirred. In the woods the underbrush was hidden by the smooth accumulations of snow, so that the going was open. The Adirondack winter climate is such that a man runs less risk of getting too cold than of getting too warm. Arthur, moving swiftly in a great circle so that at some point he should come upon the tracks of his culprit sisters, shed first his mittens and then his coat. The former he thrust into his trousers pocket, and he hung the latter to a broken limb where he could easily find it on his return. "There would be some sense in running away in summer," he thought. "It would take an Indian or a dog to track them then, but in winter--I gave them credit for more sense."