“That’s a lie, of course, but I haven’t time to argue it.”
“The difference is,” calmly pursued Mr. Burrow, “that the others wear their own feathers. Women wear those of the others.”
The office door opened. The head of the young woman stenographer appeared. Her voice was chilling. “Alderman Grotz says——”
“Say to Mr. Grotz,” replied the Hon. Alexander Hamilton in a voice loud enough to carry, “that it is very good of him to wait. If he’ll indulge me—just ten minutes longer——” His voice trailed off ingratiatingly as the door closed, and he turned again on his visitor. “No woman in the world could reduce me to so maudlin a condition in a month! No, nor in a century. Now, having warned you in behalf of friendship, I’m entirely ready to help you ruin yourself. What’s the idea?”
This was the moment for which Mr. Copewell had waited. He began with promptness.
“Mary has telephoned me. She lives in Perryville, two hundred and fifty miles away. They won’t let me see her.”
“They won’t let him see her!” commiserated Mr. Burrow with melancholy.
“This trip to Europe was planned on the spur of the moment. It was meant to surprise us. It did. She starts to-morrow, unless——”
“Unless you interfere to-day,” prompted Mr. Burrow. Mr. Copewell became intense. “She slipped away from home when she learned it, and we planned it all by ’phone. I can’t go to Perryville—they would watch us both. I must stay here till the last minute and establish an alibi. Mary leaves there this evening on the train that reaches here about midnight, which makes no regular stops between. She starts unaccompanied, but is to be met at the station here in Mercerville by her aunt, Mrs. Stone, who is to chaperone the European trip. It is to be strictly and personally conducted.”
“I know Mrs. Stone,” grinned Mr. Burrow. “I can recommend her as a reliable duenna.”