"I know that much already. The mother's dead. Mr. and Miss Payson have traveled abroad. What else do you know about her?"
"Why, it seems she's the sole heir. Good news for you, eh? High society, too—Flower Mission, Kitchen Garden, Friday Cotillions, Burlingame, everything. She could help you, Frank, if you got on the right side of her."
Here Mr. Spoll tiptoed in, bowed to Granthope, and said:
"Eight o'clock, Gertie."
Madam Spoll arose cumbrously, took a last peep in the mirror of the folding bed and turned into the hall, saying, "You take my advice, Frank. We depend upon you. See what you can do with the girl." She paused to bend a keen glance upon him. "What did you do with her, anyway?"
"Why, I did happen on something," he answered. "Do you remember Madam Grant, who used to live down on Fifth Street, twenty-odd years ago?"
Madam Spoll came back into the room eagerly.
"The crazy woman who lived so queer and yet had lots of money? Yes! She did clairvoyance, didn't she? I remember. She had a kid with her, too. Let's see—he ran away with the money, didn't he? And nobody ever knew what become of him. What about her?"
There was a duel of astute glances between them. Granthope had his own reasons for not wanting to say too much. He guarded his secret carefully, as he had guarded it from her for years.
"Miss Payson used to go down to see Madam Grant with her mother, when she was a little girl."