"Yes, you had better put on a clean one. I don't like your being out so late. I thought you were through for the day."
"I'll get extra pay, mother, and every little helps."
"I say, Mark," said Jimmy, "you'd better wear your dress suit and diamond scarf-pin."
"I would, Jimmy, only I lent 'em both to a bootblack of my acquaintance who's going to attend a ball on Fifth Avenue to-night."
Jimmy laughed.
"You've always got an answer ready, Mark," he said. "Well, so long! Hope you'll have a good time."
"Where does the lady live, Mark?" asked Mrs. Mason.
"At No. 90 West Forty-Fifth Street. I haven't much time to spare. I must go as soon as I can get ready."
It was half-past seven o'clock before Mark rang the bell at a fine brown stone house on West Forty-Fifth Street. The door was opened by a colored servant, who, without speaking to Mark, turned his head, and called out: "The messenger's come, Miss Maud."
"I'm so glad," said a silvery voice, as a young lady of twenty, already dressed for the street, came out of a room on the left of the hall. Mark took off his hat politely.