“We think Mr. Barrison is in danger. We are going to see what we can do for him. Now remember, there isn’t a reason in the world why you should come too, only——” The Jap spoke in his elaborately polite way: “Honorably pardon, sir! There is reason.” “But——” Tony was beginning, but he never finished. He saw the reason too plainly. Tara, like himself and like Willie, was too fond of Barrison to stay away. That was reason enough. “All right, Tara, you come along!” he said, turning away. And his voice might have been a bit husky. “Where, first?” said Coster, as they entered the taxicab. And there were three of them, too! Tony gave the name of the hotel where Miss Templeton lived, which was not so far away. Once there, he left his companions in the taxi and went up alone to interview the lady. In his hand, tightly crumpled with the vehemence of his intense feeling, he kept the telegram which had come for Jim Barrison, signed with her initials. He penciled a note to Miss Templeton which made her send for him as soon as she received it. They knew each other, but she was so excited that she did hardly more than acknowledge his hasty bow. “Mr. Clay,” she exclaimed, “what does it all mean? I know you would not have sent me this message without a reason! You say: ‘Mr. Barrison is in grave danger because of you. Will you help me to save him?’” She confronted Tony with pale cheeks and wide eyes. “Now, Mr. Clay, you know that such a thing is impossible! How could Mr. Barrison be in danger on my account without my knowing it? And I swear to you that I can think of nothing in all the world which could subject him to danger—because of me! Nevertheless, I cannot let a thing like this go—no woman could! If there is danger to Mr. Barrison, I should know it! If it is, in some way, connected with me, I should know it all the more, and care about it all the more! What is it?” Suddenly she dropped the rather haughty air which she had assumed and clasped her hands like a frightened child. “Oh, Mr. Clay, you know that I would do anything to help him! What is it? What is it?” By way of answer, Tony handed her the telegram. After she had read it, she held it in rigid fingers for a moment; it seemed they were not able to drop it. She looked at Tony Clay. “And, receiving this,” she murmured faintly, “he—went?” “He went,” answered the young man, “so fast that we could not stop him; though I, for one, suspected something shady, and had warned him he must be on his guard.” It is probable that in all his life Tony Clay never understood the look that flamed in the woman’s face before him now. In that strange combination of emotions was pain and fear, but there was also joy and triumph. “So he cared like that!” she murmured. And then, before Tony Clay could even be sure that she had uttered the words, she had changed again to a practical and utilitarian person. She seized a long raincoat from the back of a chair and said immediately: “I am ready. Shall we go?”