THE PRIVATE 'DETECTIVE.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2489, 12 July 1909, Page 7

THE PRIVATE 'DETECTIVE.

(By Arthur Stanwood Pier.)

'“And that the defendant did unquestionably sound his horn and. that he was proceeding with due caution on the right side of the road is unquestionably established by the testimony of these witnesses. Broxton Bryce, pacing back and forth in the law office, delivered the words ponderously to the pretty young stenographer, whose pencil made quick jottings in her hote-book. ‘‘Wait a minute, Mass Ivelly; how many times have I said unquestaontimes in the last three sentences,” reported, the stenographer. “Funny how positive we get about a t these things,” Broxton muttered. ‘Well, never mind now; I’ll change that later. He paced in silence white the stenographer’s eyes followed him with a certain doleful attentiveness. Suddenly he turned to her. “Look here, Miss Kelly,,where are vour flowers to-day ?” , * She looked startled.; a flush overspread her face ; then she dropped her eyes without making any answer. “I can’t dictate to you unless you ha\e flowers to play with —to take your mind off me when I’m stuck. ’ Broxton continued “I’ve felt there was something wrong in this office all day ; now I know -what the trouble is—John ! He summoned the office boy and slipped a com into his hand. “Go down to the flower shop on the corner and get me a dozen pink carnations; bring them to me as quick as you can. After they well i'o on with the dictation, Yliss Kelly. ° With a wistful little smile the young stenographer rose and returned to her desk in the outer room. Broxton seated himself at bis own desk, meaning to straighten out his thoughts. But Miss Kelly intraded upon his mind. In the six months that Broxton had been in the office o Starr and Parsons, Miss Kelly had displayed' daily a bouquet of some sort; and ' Broxton‘s dictation had often been facilitated by her habit of burying her nose m her flowers and seeming perfectly restful and contented while she waited for ms words. She had always radiated gaiety and cheerfulness —until this morning, when she had made Broxton aware first of her listless melancholy and next of her lack of floral adornment. . . ■Soon the office-boy returned with the carnations, and Broxton called : "Now, Miss Kelly, I’m ready. She came to him with, a shy, reluctant smile; he put the bouquet into her hand. “That makes you look more natural, he said. "Now we’ll begin. ‘That the plaintitfs contention is wholly at variance with the facts—’” Broxton resumed, pacing back and forth. There wore frequent interruptions, during which Miss Kelly held the carnations to her nose and sniffed them appreciatively, but her eyes retained their disturbing expression of gloomy attentiveness. Afterward when she had returned to, the outer room and was seated at the typewriter transcribing her notes, Broxton could see her through the open door. And soon, glancing up from his law book, he observed that she was holding her handkerchief to her eyes; although she was turned three-quarters away from him, she was unquestionably —us Broxton would have said'—crying. He watched her with anxiety. It was quite unlike the gay, merry little girl to cry. He felt relieved when she put down her handkerchief, and, after passing a tidy little hand over her tidy brown hair, resumed her swift clatter on the keys. But just as Broxton was beginning to think that her troubles could not have been very deep, the clicking of the typewriter ceased ; she had reached for her handkerchief* again. She did not, as before, indulge in a prolonged swabbing of wet eyes; it was a brisk, irritated dab that she gave them, and might have been accompanied with advice to herself to sit up and be sensible. Then she pounded once more upon the keys. But twice after that, from his ambush of piled-up law hooks Broxton saw her resort to the handkerchief—as if, do what she would, her eyes would till with tears. The flowers that he had given her stood forgotten In the glass on her desk; she did not consult them for comfort. Y’et Broxton had a dim impression that on every day before this she had paused in her work every few moments to regale herself with a breath of h'er flowers, and to indulge in a smile. Being himself sympathetic by age and experience, he had connected her daily bouquet with romance. But if romance did indeed exist, she had never allowed more than the symbols of it to cross the office threshold with her; Broxton could not remember that he had ever seen Miss Kelly engaged in conversation with any young man. Her private grief, whatever it was, ceased' to bother him when he left the office. He took a train to a station ten miles out of town; a young laciy in a broad-brimmed straw hat and a white muslin dress met him and drove him to a house with terraced lawns and a sunken garden; and on the piazza overlooking the garden Broxton Bryce achieved that evening the happiness which for two years he held been pursuing. Why it should have taken him two years was something which the young woman- —the moment after it had happened—confessed herself now unable to understand; and why he should ever have achieved it at all was something which the young man —in the same wonderful moment—confessed himself wholly at a loss to explain. Having thus acknowledged a complete reversal of the positions which each had stubbornly maintained during that long period —but we must not become involved in the trivial intricacies of these young people’s minds. It was nearly midnight when Broxton took the last train to the city. He had resisted the invitation to spend the night; it was imperative that ho should interview a witness at seven o’clock the next morning. At one o’clock, just as it was beginning to rain, Broxton arrived at the door of his temporary home. This was a small apartment house in. which he had for the past month been sharing Francis Shveve’s apartment. His own house was closed and boarded up, during his family’s absence in Europe. The outer door of the apartment house was locked. Broxton felt in his pocket and found his keys not there. He had had them during the day, for he had unlocked the drawer in his desk where he kept certain private papers; he must have left the keys hanging in the drawer. He pressed 1 the bell and waited ; he held his linger on it until the finger was numb; but the janitor never came. Evidently the boll was out of order. The janitor’s windows below the street, were so protected by iron gratings that Broxton’s efforts to pound on them were futile. The rain came down harder. He had less than fifty cents in his pockets; it occurred to him that he might be unsuccessful in negotiating at any hotel for a night’s lodging. He thrust his hands into his coat pockets and stood pondering; his right hand closed upon a large key. He drew it out and looked at it ; and then at the mirthful thought which it suggested he smiled. When his family had gone abroad, he had first taken lodgings in a hoardinghouse not far from Shr eve’s apartments. He held' been there less than two weeks when Bhreve had rescued him. By some oversight on the part of the landlady as well as of himself Broxton had escaped without giving up his key to the house, and only a few days before, being pricked by a dilatory conscience, he had removed that key from his key-ring, thinking that when, he next passed the house he would stop and return it. Then he had forgotten to cany out that honest purpose. Slow he thougnt: “There s a chance that nobody’s occupying my old room. I

that’s so, they’ll think in the morning they’ve been entertaining ghosts.” So, highly amused at the thought, he turned up his coat collar and ran through the rain two blocks west. He came into a narrow street, dark, quiet, and empty, tiptoed' up a flight of steps with an iron railing, and inserted the key in the lock. For a moment he hesitated; there was something burglarious about this entrance which chilled his blithe spirit; then, secure in the reflection that he was doing no wrong, and that the landlady actually owed him two weeks’ lodging, he turned the key and entered. The door groaned and rattled when he closed it, and he stood for a moment apprehensive. Then he thought to himself: “How absurd ! As if they weren’t used to having boarders come in late!” and he proceeded boldly up the stairs. His room had been up two flights at the back. The door was open —an encouraging circumstance. He entered softly. Through the dark he felt his way to the bed and touched it with, a gently inquisitive hand. No one was inhabiting it. Elated, Broxton fumbled round on the mantelpiece for matches, but finding none proceeded to undress in the dark. He opened the windows and raised the blinds so that the morning light should awaken him at an early hour, and then in his underclothes crawled into bod. In a few moments he was asleep. It was not the morning light which awakened him. He opened his eyes to blink at the flare of the three naked gasjets of the chandelier. A young man with a straw hat tilted on the back of his head sat on a trunk smoking a cigar and stared at him in silence. "Hello,” aid Broxton from the pillow. “Is this your bed?” “Be shot if 1 know,” returned the stranger gloomily. “So many things that 1 thought were mine seem not to be. I’ve lost my girl and my job to-day; keep the bed.” “Say,” said Broxton, putting his feet out on the floor, “I’m sorry. I'll tell you just how it happened.” And while he dressed, he explained the circumstances to the sombre young man on the trunk. “That’s all right,” said the young man. “But what are you going to do now?” “1 don’t know. You might give me a piece of your floor.” "Sure; I wouldn’t turn you out. We can match to see who'll take the bed and who'll take the floor.” “No, we won't. The beds yours. “After you, Alphonse. All right. Have a cigar?” “\es, thank you.” “My name’s Perch,” said the host. "What’s yours?” “Bryce,” returned Broxton. They sat quietly smoking. “Sure you don't mind sitting up a little while? asked Perch. “Til sit up as long as any man if 1 have something to smoke,” Broxton answered. "And drink.” Perch produced glasses and a bottle of whisky from a cupboard. "Pour out your drink, and then I'll take it into the bathroom and fill it.” "Full up,” said Broxton, and a moment later through the open door he heard Perch letting the water run. "I’ve been sitting in a poker game tonight,” Perch said when he returned. “Here’s looking at you. Seemed as if I ought to hold wonderful cards after what had been dealt me through the day. Say, you never saw anything like it. Along about one o’clock 1 held four jacks against four kings. That put me out all right. 1 guess I have about thirty-one cents left in the bank.” Broxton glanced at him. wondering if lie was preparing to ask for a loan. He must have betrayed bis questioning thought, for instantly Perch said : "But that doesn’t worry me. My credit's good, and 1 can get a job tomorrow—if 1 want it. The thing is, do I want it ?” He meditated so gloomily that Broxton was impelled to ask: “Why not?” “1 don't know whether to stay round here any more or not. Maybe I’d better light out for the West or Mexico or the Klondike —I don't much care.” He paused, and after a moment he added, as* if talking to himself, unconscious of another's presence; “Well, I don’t want to stay round where I’ll keep running into her!” “Maybe you're quitting too soon. Muj’ be she doesn’t know yet what she does want.” This sympathetic suggestion seemed to win Perch’s confidence. “It’s not my fault if she doesn’t,” lie said. “I used to walk downtown with her every morning. We’d stop at a flower stand at the corner of Walnut and Third, and I’d get her a bunch of flowers; the kid that kept the stand always had one ready for us at half-past eight every morning. Well, it went along that way, and I’d keep asking her every few days and at hist every few hours if she wouldn’t marry me. And every time she’d say no, certainly not, but with a laugh and a look that 1 thought meant not yet, but soon. That’s all a man can tell about a girl’s laugh and look.” Again he relapsed into moody meditation, and again Broxton prompted him with the suggestion : "M ay be you’re quitting too soon.” ‘‘Wait till 1 tell you. I made up my mind I .was giving her too good a time ; she’d have to realise this sort of thing couldn’t go on. She knew me as well as she’d be likely to short of marrying me. So last night 1 put it to her straight. 1 said this was the last call and if it didn’t connect E was going out of business for good. She said she was sorry to hear it and she would try to get along. Then 1 asked her if she felt sure she could never marry me, and she that perhaps she might if I grew a, foot taller and developed a sympathetic voice like the man's in the oilice where she worked.” “I’d have asked her right off about that man,” said Broxton. “You bet 1 did. ‘He lias a voice like Bryan, and a mind like Daniel Webster,’ she said. ‘When he sits and talks his speeches to me, all about torts and habeas corpus and things like that, how can you expect me to think of a man who writes advertisements for a breakfast food?’ ‘Well,’ I said, T should think that would be just the time when you could think of me—when you don’t understand a word he’s saying.’ ‘Oh, no,’ she answered, T get hypnotised by him. I feel 1 can look up to his intellect. The only man I could ever marry would lie one that knows more than I do. - And he knows such a lot more than either you or me.’ There’s where 1 got mad and made a bad break.” He shook his head dolefully and took a drink. “How was that?” asked Broxton. "I said: “That may all be, but you can’t marry those that don’t ask you.’ Then the real trouble began; wo handed each other hot ones, for she was mad, and I wasn’t going to hack down. ‘AH right,’ I said at last. ‘Either you’ve been just amusing yourself at my expense or you haven’t, and I’m going to know tonight which it is. Here I’ve' been seeing you day in, day out, giving you flowers every day—look here,’ I said, ‘haven’t you ever had any sentiment at-all about those flowers? Has it just been all a graft for personal adornment?’ I put it a shade softer than that to her, but that was the idea.” “And what did she say?” “She said she didn’t know what I meant by sentiment, but she had found my flowers useful. I asked her how, and then—oh, gee !” Perch poured himself another drink of whisky and withdrew to fill the tumbler in the bathroom. “If she found the flowers useful,” prompted Broxton, and at once Perch exploded. “What do you think she had the nerve —! She said that sometimes What’s-his-name, the tall high-brow in the office that

hands her the long talk, gets held up for a word. And then, she says, she remembers my flowers and buries her nose in them, so ad not to seem impatient and make him nervous. Yes, she said, my flowers were useful in helping him to think, and so, of course, for that reason she was always glad to have them, and she had some sentiment about them then! —Oh, gee.” He swallowed another drink. Broxton sat impassive in spite of a curious sense of unreality. “Look here,” he said. “Tell me. Is she worth your feel ing so about her? What does she look like, anyhow?” “Worth my feeling—! 1 wish you could see her once! She’s only about so high —her eyes are about on a level with my shoulder. She wears a big hat with two red feathers stuck across the front, kind of on the bia.s ; it’s such a big hat that when we walk together I can’t get a look at her face at all until she turns it and looks up at me, and then —say, I want to get right in under the hat, too.” “Pretty, is she? Blonde or brunette?” “Brunette. Pretty? Well, what would you think!” Perch gave Broxton a reproachful glance. “1 tell you whenever she looks at me I want to get in under the hat. I did it twice, too,” he aded reminiscently. ‘Walking one Sunday in the country. I thought maybe she was just pretending that she minded it that time.” He sighed in disillusionment. Broxton was not listening very attentively. The identity of the young woman had been made sufficiently clear by the detail of two feathers, and the thought that even in the most remote way he had interfered with Mr Perch’s happiness was so amazing that it excluded all other emotions. "Oh, she was just playing the coquette,” lie soid at last. "She’d been doing that enough,” responded Perch gloomily. "I let her know that if she really cared at all, now was the time to be serious. \\ hen she just handed me the worst jolly yet, that was enough ; I have some pride. ’ "Too much, if that made you quit.” "I gave her one more chance.” Perch drained his glass. AV e always used to meet at the corner of Third and Walnut at half-past eight in the morning in front of the flower stand, and then, after Td got the flowers we would walk clown Walnut together. I left her last night; 1 said good-by to her for good. She let me go.' but 1 thought that maybe overnight she’d have thought better of it. So I got to the corner of Third and Walnut at twenty minutes past eight this morning; the kid with the flowers asked me what I’d have, and 1 said 1 didn't know its I'd have any to-day —didn't know as . she’d he along. 'Then I told him he might have a hunch of pinks ready in case she did come. Pretty soon he said : ‘There she comes,' and got busy with the pinks 1 just kept my hack turned to Third street and went on, reading the Herald. ’Say,’ says the kid all of a sudden, ‘she's going on down Third! She saw you, too.’ ’ Yes, that's ail right.' I said. ’ I'm going to meet her somewhere' c'lse. Hive me tlie pinks.’ So 1 walked down Walnut a block or two and chucked them in the gutter.” "Well,” said Broxton. "What <1 id you want? Did you think she would ‘run after you ?” "She needn't have thought I'd rim after her,” returned Perch belligerently. "That's what you should have done.” "And been given Hie laugh! No, sir. L went down to the office—did 1 tell you 1 was the advertising man for the Little Bright eyes Breakfast Food? 1 invented the ad. : ‘ Wide, you must not come to breakfast in your pyjamas’—you know the answer?” "‘Mama I can not wait to dress for Little Brighteyes’?” "Correct. That ad. and the picture made thousands of dollars for the breakfast food this last year,” continued Perch warmly. "I originated all their ads. I was ottered chances at other things with twice the money. But I stuck to Little Brighteyes. I was interested in building up the business; 1 felt I was doing a good work. ‘A good healthful food for the millions and for the millionaires.' You know the ad. It was all right till about a month ago when Whitfield went out and Bannock came in as manager. 1 knew I’d have a row with Bannock some day—the lobster! Naturally I had a grouch when 1 got into the office this morning; Bannock sailed in first thing and gave me some what-lhe-hang talk about an ad. I come from Missouri myself. 1 resigned on the spot so that he couldn’t fire me, and then 1 unloosed on him all those words that a man in love ought to forget.” A smile at the agreeable recollection passed over Perch’s sombre face. "So now you haven't a job, even if you could get married,” observed Broxton disapprovingly. "A man who’s an artist in his line needn't stay out of a job Jong,” replied Perch. “The Hunnisun people had been after me for a year to handle their advertising for them. I’m to give ’em an answer to-morrow.” “.So it’s just a question whether you do that or go to the Klondike or Mexico or the deuce generally?” “That’s it.” "Queer how many men go to the deuce because of some woman,” observed Broxton platitudinously. “In my business I'm always finding that out.” "What’s your business?” "I’m a private detective.” "No! The deuce you say !” exclaimed Perch with admiring interst, and Broxton, nodding gravely, tried not to appear too important or too proud. "Look here,” he said. ‘T’cT like to do something for you in this case. You tell me the young lady’s name and the office where she works, and I’ll guarantee to find out for you everything about that fellow that’s got her hypnotised ; I’ll let you know what sort of attentions lie’s paying her.” Perch hesitated, looking at the floor. "No,” he said at last. "Much obliged. But I don't like the idea of spying on them. It's her business, anyway. No, 1 guess 1 won’t tell you her name; I—it wouldn’t bo treating her right. 1 care too much about her to do a thing like that ; yes, darn it all,” ho added mournfully, "I do.” “All right. 1 was just thinking—” Broxton left the sentence unfinished. Ther was a pause. “A private detective’s life must be mighty interesting,” suggested Perch. "Oh, it’s about like anything else,” said Broxton. He yawned. ‘How about bed for you? 1 guess what you need is to sleep on your troubles.” "I guess I’ve kept you up listening to them,” replied I’erch. He took the blanket off his bed, and, with a sofa-cushion and an overcoat, made up a bed on the floor. Broxton, unlacing his boots, watched him, and divining his hospitable purpose. And suddenly, when Perch had turned away, Broxton cast himself just as he was on the improvised couch, drew the overcoat over him, put his head on the sofa-cushion, and closed his eyes. “Good niglit,” he said. Perch expressed himself in a manner appropriate to his Missouri origin. But as his guest did not open his eyes, ho made no further protest; in a few moments he turned out the lights, and soon after that they both were asleep. At six o’clock Broxton awoke; his host was still sleeping. Broxton dressed quietly—an easy task, as he had so little dressing to do. He wrote a note: “Dear Mr Perch, —I did not like to wake you, ahd I have to leave early; in my profession we have to be silent and mysterious. Thank you for your kind hospitality, and believe me “Your friend, “The Private Detective.” Broxton laid the note on the table where it would be sure to catch Perch’s

' eye, and then went softly down the stairs and out of the house. Three hour’s later Broxton entered his office. After interviewing the witness, he had gone home, taken ia bath, put on clean clothes; and now he felt disposed to set right what was wrong in the world. Passing through the outer room, he glanced at Miss Kelly. She was bent over a letter-file, and he could not see her face. He did see that there were no ♦ flowers on her desk and that above her head, on a peg, hung a hat with two slanting red feathers. After he had opened his letters lie called : “Miss Kelly.” She appeared with her note-book and seated herself beside his desk; on her face was the listless expression which had disturbed him the day before. “I’ll give you those notes that 1 got from Williamson,” he said, and he began dictating : “ ‘Williamson is prepared to swear that at the time of the accident ” He broke off suddenly. "Miss Kelly, what’s the matter? No flowers again to-day !” She looked up with a startled appeal in her eyes. But he continued : “1 wonder if you don’t need a vacation?” . "Why?” she asked. "Hon t—don t 1 do my work all right?” Ho shook his head. "How can you do it all right without flowers? You need to go into the country and pick bunches and bunches —if your garden at home has given out.” She looked at him perplexed, uneasy. “I don’t believe you feel very well. I noticed it yesterday. You looked out of sorts —as if you’d just lost your l>ost friend.” Then, under bis keen gaze, eyes laltered, swam with tears, and dropped, and the crimson rushed to her face. “j l—you know, that was it,” she confessed. She drew out her handkerchief and touched it to her eyes. "But 1 11 get over it ; I’m not going to think about it any more, Mr Bryce; truly, I m not ; and I’m not sick or anything. 1 can do my work, 1 can.’ “But why should you get over if? friend if you’ve quarrelled with her? Why don’t you make it up with your Broxton’s solemn face gave no intimation of the mirth which he was controlling as he threw out that suggestion. "Probably she’s feeling just as had about it as YOU.” , - v -i hope”—Miss Kelly hit her lip lor a moment, and then ejaculated desperately —”(Vh, I hope she is!” "Aren't you the unchristian peitSon! Now. Miss Kelly, look here; I’ll ho your lounsel in this matter. I feel able to ad- • vise you just from what 1 see. Hero you’ve had a quarrel with your best "friend, and both of you are quite broken up about it —you feel sure she’s broken up about it, don t you? Miss Kelly, her lips pressed light together, nodded. _ , "And it's upset you so that if you don t mend the situation you'll have a nervous breakdown, and ixave to take a vacation for months.” _ -Oh, no, 1 won't!" she cried with sudden spirit.’ "I won’t think of hi—her; I won’t think of her, 1 "But wiiy shouldn’t you?” asked Broxlun soothingly. "Isn't it foolish, olvstinate pride to refuse to make up a quarrel with your best friend when you miss her so much and when you know, as I am sure you do, that you've been to blame as much as she?’ i'll never admit it,” declared Miss Kelly with spirit. "Never, never. It - if she wanted to come hack —then it might he different. But 1 can't grafter her ; 1 wont. I —ld rather suiter. "But if she’s as proud as you are ’ "She lias no business to he,” snapped Miss Kelly. •• It lit aren’t you over willing to take the first step, even though you may think the other person was in the wrong? 01 course 1 could understand your holding hack if the other person was a man, hut ” "Mr Bryce!” she cried imploringly. ’1 know you want to help me. hut please don’t talk about it any more! 1 can’t do anything about it, and I feel as if 1 just couldn't hear to think of it—and 1 do want to work, so as to keep my mind from thinking of it —and ’ Her voice ( linked and her eyes filled again ; she im-p-atientlv brushed away her tears. "I'd like to show you how well I can take dictation." she said, with an entreating, sad little smile. "All right," said Broxton cheerfully. "1 guess it s no use ever for a man to try to act as peacemaker lietwceu women. Now we’re off: ‘Williamson’ is prepared to swear that at the time of the accident he was driving ids express wagon ” Miss Kelly bent her head and began scribbling earnestly in her note-hook. hater” in the morning, when he was alone in his room, Broxton wrote the following note • "Hear Mr Perch—The brunette girl who wears the big hat with two red feathers and who has a face that makes you want to get in under the hat is Miss Anna Kelly. Site is a stenographer in the law office of' Starr and Parsons, and she is crying her heart out for you. Ho to her as soon as you can. "Your friend, "The Private Detective.” He addressed the note to Mr Perch's lodgings, and posted it at noon. He came hack after luncheon lu find Miss Kelly sitting idly at her desk, gazing out of the window with a dreary face, lie glanced at her when she looked round. She blushed and at once began to play industriously on the keys of her instrument. Broxton closed his desk early that afternoon ; as he was putting on Ids hat he heard the telephone belt ring in the outer office. Thinking that the call might he for him, he lingered while Miss Kelly answered it. "Yes,” she said, and then Broxton saw her face undergo a sudden change, a sudden transfiguration of joy, and he heard her say with a little gasp of laughter: "This evening? ies, 1 will.” At once, as unobtrusively as possible, Broxton departed. The next morning when he entered the office Miss Kelly was there, arranging a hunch of roses in a tall tumbler on the top of her desk. She looked at Broxton with a radiant, shyly embarrassed smile, and she came to hint quickly, and said: "1 must tell you right off, Mr Bryce. 1 shan’t need any vacation, for I’m going to—to leave the office for good pretty soon. I’m going to be married.” “Arc you!” exclaimed Broxton. He put out his hand. "Well! How sudden you are ! 1 never suspected ! Who’s the lucky man?” "A Mr Perch —Peter Perch. He’s an advertising man—he writes advertisements, L mean.” "Really!” said Broxton. "1 think I must resort to advertising if it produces such results. What papers did he use?” Miss Kelly blushed and laughed. “Oh, I didn’t mean that. Oh, now you’re laughing because you got a rise out of me! Well —!” "I hope I’m to have an opportunity of meeting Mr Perch some time?” “Oh, in about ten minutes. He walked downtown with me; he’s making a change in his business, and he’s coming round here right away to let me know if it’s all right. I’d like awfully to have you meet him.” "I shall he delighted.” Broxton turned to enter his room, # then stopped. “Oh, Miss Kelly ! Now surely you’ll make it up with that friendi of yours who’s feeling so unhappy?” Ehe laughed. “Oh, I’m not going to bother about that any tnotav” Broxton shook his head. “Dear me, but you’re the unchristian person.” He wondered whether Perch would be-

tray himself at the meeting; he opened and read his letters, feeling a pleasurable undercurrent of excitement. He was writing at his desk when he heard a buoyant voice outside—“lt’s all right, Annie” — and looked up to see Perch standing just beyond his door. Again he bent over his desk; he was much absorbed in his work when Miss Kelly entered. “Mr Bryce,” she said timidly, “this is Mr Perch.” “Oh,” cried Broxton, springing up quite suddenly. He looked at Perch and smiled, and put out his hand. Perch seemed not to see the oustretched hand; his frightened eyes were fixed on Broxton’s face with an expression of incredulity : a flush mounted to his cheeks and forehead. Broxton took his hand masterfully and continued: “So glad to meet you and offer you my congratulations; Miss Kelly has just told me.” "Yea..” Perch laughed nervously. "Thank you very much.” And then, without any warning, lie hurst into a shout of laughter, in which Broxton instantly joined him : and so, shouting, they wrung each other’s hands. Miss Kelly stood petrified. “Where's the joke?” she demanded with asperity. "Are you crazy, Peter Perch? What’s the matter with you, anyway ?” "I’m a little hysterical. I guess, because I’m so happy,” Perch ventured apologetically, with a deprecating glance at Broxton. She looked at him with scorn. "1 don’t like it. You seem to know each other: you have some secret. You’re laughing at me.” She was growing more excited, more suspicious every moment : her blue eyes, which at first had been snapping, were now misting over with a hint of tears. "I—there’s something you’re keeping from me, Peter.” Her lips quivered, her eyes were reproachful ; she turned away. "Miss Kelly!” cried Broxton, and she paused and looked at him irresolutely: there was a pleasant twinkle in his eyes. "Mr Perch and ! happened to he t> together once; we were able to help each other. 1 suppose Mr Perch will tell you some time how it was. But if he doesn’t choose to, you must trust him, and you must trust me. There was nothing discreditable to either of us. We weren’t laughing at you. Miss Kelly. But we oughtn’t to have laughed, for it must bare seemed rude. Only, you see, it was such a surprise to Mr Perch—our meeting. Isn’t that till true, Mr Perch?” “Every word,” said Perch fervently. Miss Kelly looked at them both don't fully for a moment. Then her eyes cleared and shone; she stepped up to Perch and slipped her hand into his. "Of course I do trust you, Peter,” she said. “And I shan’t ever ask what it was that was so funny. But,” she added, “I do hope that some time you’ll want to tell.” "Some time f will." Perch promised. "But not right now. Hood-hy Mr Bryce.” He gave Broxton a grateful glance. “Hood-hy.” As they were going out. Broxton called : “Oh, there’s one thing. Mr Perch; do all yon can to reconcile Miss Kelly to that friend of hers that she's quarrelled with.” “What’s that?" asked Perch. But Mis-s Kelly, with a merry laugh took a firmer grip upon his hand and drew him away.