CHAPTER XXVIII

"IF EVER I FIND A MAN!"

"I trust you've not been getting into trouble, Mr. Lightnut!"

Her lovely eyes were dancing with mischief as they hung there below mine—eyes, bluer than the Hudson at our feet; yet between the jolly ripples that played across those pools of truth I could glimpse far down into depths that were the most devilishly entrancing, darkly, deeply, beautifully—oh, you know!

Why, by Jove, I almost took a cropper right into them! Only caught just in time, you know; straightened right on the verge, as it were—and came up with a gasp, monocle dangling.

Had almost forgotten the dashed windows—and the two cats that might be looking out!

I murmured some jolly apology, adding:

"Oh, yes—quite so; certainly! I mean—eh what?"

She was smiling, her rose-petal lip dragging through her teeth.

"The 'bobby,' you know, just now"—she nodded toward the porte-cochère—"I was positive he had come to drag you away to your loathsome dungeon. And when he retired, I was—oh, so relieved!" And she clasped her hands, her eyes lifting upward.