She learned from Freebody at the door that her mother was dressing and was to be out to tea, but was to be home to dinner. Lita walked straight to the library, and having looked up Dacer's number called the office. The office nurse answered. Yes, the doctor was in. Who wished to speak to him? Miss Hazlitt? Just a minute. There was a long silence. What would she do if he refused to speak to her? Go there? "Oh, Doctor Dacer, I wanted to tell you that Miss Barton told you something that wasn't true, though she thought it was. You know what I mean.... I want to see you, please. I wish you would.... Now; the sooner the better.... Yes; good-by." She hung up the receiver with a hand not absolutely steady. He was coming at once. She took off her hat and dropped it on the sofa and stood still in the middle of the floor. If only her mother would keep on dressing for half an hour or so! It couldn't take him very long to get from his office in Sixty-third Street near Park-- Now he was putting on his hat, now he was in the street, now he was coming nearer and nearer every minute-- Exactly eleven minutes by the watched clock after she had hung up the telephone receiver the doorbell rang. The doorbell could just be heard in the library by straining ears. And then Freebody said from the doorway, "Doctor Dacer to see you, miss." Dacer was standing now in the doorway, looking at her darkly. Severity was evidently going to temper his justice. "Well?" he said. The main thing was that he had come. "Didn't you think I could write a better love letter than that?" she began. "Unfortunately I have had no opportunities of judging." "What does a head mistress know about girls?" "She tells a pretty well-documented story." It came over Lita that they were quarreling--almost--and that she liked the process, but liked it only because she knew it must come out right. Her case was so clear. "The letter and the photographs belonged to Aurelia," she said. "I hid them for her when she was taken ill. That was why I was in such a hurry to go that first day--when you patted me on the head. And if they told you about a mysterious man who brought me home in a taxi--that was you, and--" "You never wrote to Valentine?" "Never!" He took a step toward her. "Never sent him your photograph?" "No!" He took another step. "Never saw him except on the stage?" "No!" Another step would bring him to her; and what, she wondered, would happen then? What happened was that the door opened and Freebody said, "Mr. Valentine." And there he was, the man himself, more beautiful than the posters. Never before had the chairman of the self-government committee found herself deserted by the powers of speech and action. She stood helplessly staring at the great artist before her. And even then the day might have been saved if Valentine had not been so kind, so determined to put everything straight.