We ten

by Barbara Yechton

But his father called out to him, "Stay here, Hilliard!" Then turning to us he said very sternly, "I have reason to think that this manuscript"—he still held the Fetich in his hand—"has been stolen from its rightful owner, of whom I have heard, and to whom I shall take pleasure in restoring his property. Unless you both at once take off what I am convinced is a disguise, and offer a full and satisfactory explanation, I shall be under the painful necessity of calling in a policeman and giving you in charge."

"Oh, no! no! no!" I cried out. "We didn't steal it—at least, it belongs to our father, and—"

"THERE WE STOOD; A FINE PAIR WE MUST HAVE LOOKED!"

But Phil strode over to my side. "Hush, Betty," he whispered; "I'll explain." Sweeping off his bonnet and veil, he threw them—nurse's best Sunday hat!—on a chair, and faced Mr. Erveng. You can't think how comical he looked, with his handsome boy's face and rumpled hair above that fat old woman's figure. And in a moment or two, I think, I must have looked almost as comical too; for before Phil could begin, Mr. Erveng said, "I insist upon that person removing her bonnet and veil as well."

So off went mine, and there we stood; a fine pair we must have looked! That boy Hilliard gave a little giggle,—Phil said afterwards he'd like to have "punched" him for it, and I felt awfully foolish,—but Mr. Erveng frowned.

Then Phil began and told who we were, and how something that had been said by a friend of ours had given him, and me,—though neither knew about the other,—the idea of coming over and asking him, Mr. Erveng, to buy the Fetich (of course Phil called the Fetich by its proper name), and thinking he might like to see some of the manuscript, he had got hold of two chapters and brought them along to show.

"But why this absurd disguise, if all this is true?" asked Mr. Erveng of us, looking from one to the other.

I began: "Because Ma—" but Phil gave me a hard nudge of the elbow: "Max mightn't like us to tell that," he mumbled, which ended my explanation.

But I was determined to get in a few remarks: "Papa doesn't know a thing about our doing this," I said very fast, for fear Phil would interrupt again, "and we don't want him to. We just came here and told you about the Fe—his book, because we were sure he'd never tell you, or let you see it, himself, and we thought if you knew of it, you would want to buy it from him, and that would make him finish it up,—papa's been years writing that book,—and then Felix could go to college and—"