“Look here! Didn’t Miss Enderby say anything? Isn’t there any sort of message for me?” “Nothing that I know of. The servants have gone to bed, but I’ll ask them, if it’s anything important.” “No!” said the voice. “Don’t! No, never mind! Good-by!” “That’s queer!” said Lexy to herself, as she walked away from the instrument, and then she dismissed the matter from her mind. “None of my business!” she thought, and returned to her puzzle. Suddenly an inspiration came. “It _is_ ‘fix’!” she cried. “And it’s not ‘tocsin,’ but ‘toxins’! Hurrah!” This practically completed the puzzle, and she began to fill in the empty squares with the peculiar satisfaction of the crossword enthusiast. It was perfect, now, and she liked things to be perfect. As she leaned back, with a contented sigh, the clock struck twelve. “Golly! I didn’t realize it was so late!” she reflected. “Queer time for any one to ring up!” She frowned again. Her special problem solved, she began to take more interest in other affairs; and the more she thought of the telephone incident, the more it amazed her. Caroline Enderby wasn’t like other girls. The mere fact of a man’s telephoning to her at all was strange and indeed unprecedented. “And he was badly upset, too,” thought Lexy. “He asked if she left a message for him. Think of Caroline Enderby leaving a message for a man!” She began to feel impatient for Caroline’s return. “I’ll tell her when we’re alone,” she thought; “and she’ll have to explain—a little, anyhow.” Lexy wanted an explanation very much, because she was fond of Caroline, and very sorry for her. Mrs. Enderby was a Frenchwoman of the old-fashioned, conservative type, with the most rigid ideas about the bringing up of a young girl, and her husband—Lexy had often wondered what Mr. Enderby had been before his marriage, for now he was nothing but a grave and dignified echo of his wife. Between them, they had educated Caroline in a disastrous fashion. She had never even been to school. She had had governesses at home, and when a male teacher came in, for music or painting lessons, Mrs. Enderby had always sat in the room with her child. Caroline never went out of the house alone. She was utterly cut off from the normal life of other girls. She was a gentle, lovely creature—a little unreal, Lexy had thought her, at first; and she, at first, had been afraid of Lexy.