"Git out o' me kitchen, or I'll tak' the procker to yez!" shouted Mary. "How dare I! Indade! Ye'll find it ain't best to gain the ill will o' Mary MacGrotty afore you're t'rough." Jane went slowly up the stairs revolving many things in her mind. She was even considering the advisability of confiding her whole story to Mrs. Belknap, when that young matron's cold, even tones fell upon her ear. "I wish to speak with you, Jane, for a moment," she said, with an air of severity, which stiffened Jane's pretty upper lip into haughty indifference. "Yes, Mrs. Belknap," said the girl with a perfect propriety of manner, which aroused a wholly irrelevant resentment in the breast of the other woman. "I wish to tell you, Jane, that last evening after you had retired a strange _man_ came here--to the front door--inquiring for you. Mr. Belknap, who answered the bell, referred the matter to me, and I told him to say to the man that he could not see you." Jane stared at her mistress in silence, indignation tempered with a certain speculative curiosity looking out of her bright eyes. "He appeared"--Mrs. Belknap went on, with rising irritation--"quite like a gentleman. But _why_ should a man--any man--come to my front door to inquire for _you_? I am sorry, Jane, but this circumstance, in connection with others, looks very suspicious to me. I do not _approve_ of a girl in your situation attracting the attention of a man--more particularly of a man in a higher station of life. It is not at all proper; you ought to know that." "Proper?" echoed Jane inquiringly. "Perhaps I should have said _suitable_," amended Mrs. Belknap. "But I insist that you shall be quite truthful with me. Who was this man?" "I'm sure I don't know, Mrs. Belknap," said Jane. "I don't know any men." Then she blushed guiltily. Mrs. Belknap bristled with matronly dignity as she observed the girl's conscious face. "You may go now, Jane," she said, with an air of stern virtue. "But I wish to remind you once more that it is _always_ best to tell the truth no matter how unpleasant the consequences may appear to you. If young girls in your situation in life could _only_ learn that!" Jane's eyes flickered and a shadowy dimple appeared at the corner of her mouth. "Suppose one does tell the truth, ma'am, and it sounds so queer that other people will not believe it?" she asked. "That," said Mrs. Belknap, magnificently, "is not apt to occur. A sincere person can hardly be mistaken by another sincere person. And the _truth_, Jane, _never_ sounds _queer_!" Which aphorism may be accepted for what it is worth. The Hon. Wipplinger Towle, for the time being, had taken up his abode upon Staten Island, in a certain pretentious hotel which overlooks the bay, and quite undaunted by his reception of the previous evening he again presented himself at the street and number furnished him by Bertha Forbes. On this occasion the door was opened by Jane herself in cap and apron.