Miss Ames started off in the way he pointed, and stood for a moment in front of the door numbered 614.
Then, with a determined shake of her thin shoulders, she opened the door and walked in.
“I want to see Mr. Hanlon,” she said to the girl at the first desk.
“By appointment?”
“No; but say it is Miss Ames—he’ll see me.”
“Why, Miss Ames, how do you do?” and the man who had so interested the beholders of his feat in Newark came forward to greet her. “Come right into my office,” and he led her to an inner room. “Now, what’s it all about?”
The cheery reception set his visitor at ease, and she drew a long breath of relief as she settled herself in the chair he offered.
“Oh, Mr. Hanlon, I’m so frightened—or, at least, I was. It’s all so noisy and confusing down here! Why, I haven’t been downtown in New York for twenty years!”
“That so? Then I must take you up on our roof and show you a few of the skyscrapers—”
“No, no, I’ve not time for anything like that. Oh, Mr. Hanlon—you—have you read in the papers of our—our trouble?”