"That," says Mr. Robert, "is something I mean to find out."

And say, if you ever see that jaw of Mr. Robert's, you'll know he did. And she wa'n't an Astor or a Gould in disguise. She was just plain Miss Morgan, that had come on with her mother from Kansas City, or Omaha, or somewhere out there; put in six or eight months in a swell dressmaker's shop; learned how to make herself the kind of clothes that look like ready money; shuffled off her corn-belt accent; and then broke into the typewritin' game while she waited for somethin' better to turn up.

"And Benny was it, wa'n't he?" says I to Mr. Robert.

"With your help, Torchy," says he, "it appears that he was."

"Well," says I, "he needed the push, all right, didn't he!"

Fired? Me? Ah, quit your kiddin'! Why, they're tickled to death now, all of 'em. They're beginnin' to find out that Mildred's quite a girl, even if she ain't got a lot of fat-wad folks back of her.

And say, w'atcher think! Benny comes around here the other day wearin' a broad grin, lugs me out to his tailor's to have me taped for a whole outfit of glad rags, and says I've got to be one of the ushers at the weddin'. Wouldn't that sting you?


CHAPTER VI