If a man is awake and hasn't anything else to do, he must think. He began by thinking about Frances, and wondering what she was doing, until young Schuyler intruded himself,--Schuyler, as it happened, had taken the same boat, having been sent abroad to convalesce from typhoid,--and after that there was not much satisfaction in wondering what she was doing. He knew how sympathetic Frances was, and how good she would be to Schuyler under these circumstances. Not that he mistrusted her in the least--she was not the kind to lose her head and forget. But, at the same time, it did not make him feel any the less lonesome to picture them basking in the sun on the deck of a liner while he was adding innumerable little figures beneath an electric light in the rear of the cashier's cage in a downtown office. It did not do him any good whatever. However, the conclusion of such uneasy wondering was to force him back to a study of the investment securities of Carter, Rand & Seagraves. Right or wrong, the ten thousand was necessary, and he must get it. On the whole, this had a wholesome effect. For the next few weeks he doubled his energies in the office. That this counted was proved by a penciled note which he received at the club one evening:-- MR. DONALD PENDLETON. DEAR SIR:-- You're making good, and Farnsworth knows it. Sincerely yours, SARAH KENDALL WINTHROP. To hear from her like this was like meeting an old friend upon the street. It seemed to say that in all these last three weeks, when he thought he was occupying the city of New York all by himself, she, as a matter of fact, had been sharing it with him. She too had been doing her daily work and going home at night, where presumably she ate her dinner and lived through the long evenings right here in the same city. He seldom caught a glimpse of her even in the office now, for Seagraves took all her time. Her desk had been moved into his office. Yet, she had been here all the while. It made him feel decidedly more comfortable. The next day at lunch-time Don waited outside the office for her, and, unseen by her, trailed her to her new egg sandwich place. He waited until she had had time to order, and then walked in as if quite by accident. She was seated, as usual, in the farthest corner. "Why, hello," he greeted her. She looked up in some confusion. For several days she had watched the entrance of every arrival, half-expecting to see him stride in. But she no longer did that, and had fallen back into the habit of eating her lunch quite oblivious of all the rest of the world. Now it seemed like picking up the thread of an old story, and she was not quite sure she desired this. "Hello," he repeated. "Hello," she answered. There was an empty seat next to hers. "Will you hold that for me?" he asked. "They don't let you reserve seats here," she told him.