"Very well, dad!"

She presented her cheek to her emphatic parent; he saluted it explosively, wheeled, marshaled the family at a glance, started them forward, and closed the rear with his own impressive person. The iron gates clanged, the door of the opera bus snapped, and Sacharissa strolled back into the rococo reception room not quite certain why she had not gone, not quite convinced that she was feeling perfectly well.

For the first few minutes her face had been going hot and cold, alternately flushed and pallid. Her heart, too, was acting in an unusual manner--making sufficient stir for her to become uneasily aware of it.

"Probably," she thought to herself, "I've eaten too many chocolates." She looked into the large gilded box, took another and ate it reflectively.

A curious languor possessed her. To combat it she rang for her maid, intending to go for a brisk walk, but the weight of the furs seemed to distress her. It was absurd. She threw them off and sat down in the library.

A little while later her maid found her lying there, feet crossed, arms stretched backward to form a cradle for her head.

"Are you ill, Miss Carr?"

"No," said Sacharissa.

The maid cast an alarmed glance at her mistress' pallid face.

"Would you see Dr. Blimmer, miss?"

"No."

The maid hesitated:

"Beg pardon, but Mr. Carr said you was to see some doctors."

"Very well," she said indifferently. "And please hand me those chocolates. I don't care for any luncheon."

"No luncheon, miss?" in consternation.

Sacharissa had never been known to shun sustenance.

The symptom thoroughly frightened her maid, and in a few minutes she had Dr. Blimmer's office on the telephone; but that eminent pract.i.tioner was out. Then she found in succession the offices of Doctors White, Black, and Gray. Two had gone away over New Year's, the other was out.

The maid, who was clever and resourceful, went out to hunt up a doctor.

There are, in the cross streets, plenty of doctors between the Seventies and Eighties. She found one without difficulty--that is, she found the sign in the window, but the doctor was out on his visits.

She made two more attempts with similar results, then, discovering a doctor's sign in a window across the street, started for it regardless of snowdrifts, and at the same moment the doctor's front door opened and a young man, with a black leather case in his hand, hastily descended the icy steps and hurried away up the street.

The maid ran after him and arrived at his side breathless, excited:

"Oh, _could_ you come--just for a moment, if you please, sir! Miss Carr won't eat her luncheon!"

"What!" said the young man, surprised.

"Miss Carr wishes to see you--just for a----"

"Miss Carr?"

"Miss Sacharissa!"

"Sacharissa?"

"Y-yes, sir--she----"

"But I don't know any Miss Sacharissa!"

"I understand that, sir."

"Look here, young woman, do you know my name?"

"No, sir, but that doesn't make any difference to Miss Carr."

"She wishes to see _me!_"

"Oh, yes, sir."

"I--I'm in a hurry to catch a train." He looked hard at the maid, at his watch, at the maid again.

"Are you perfectly sure you're not mistaken?" he demanded.

"No, sir, I----"

"A certain Miss Sacharissa Carr desires to see _me?_ Are you certain of that?"

"Oh, yes, sir--she----"

"Where does she live?"

"One thousand eight and a half Fifth Avenue, sir."

"I've got just three minutes. Can you run?"

"I--yes!"

"Come on, then!"

And away they galloped, his overcoat streaming out behind, the maid's skirts flapping and her narrow ap.r.o.n flickering in the wind. Wayfarers stopped to watch their pace--a pace which brought them to the house in something under a minute. Ferdinand, the second man, let them in.

"Now, then," panted the young man, "which way? I'm in a hurry, remember!"

And he started on a run for the stairs.

"Please follow me, sir; the elevator is quicker!" gasped the maid, opening the barred doors.

The young man sprang into the lighted car, the maid turned to fling off hat and jacket before entering; something went fizz-bang! snap! clink!

and the lights in the car were extinguished.

"Oh!" shrieked the maid, "it's running away again! Jump, sir!"

The ornate, rococo elevator, as a matter of fact, was running away, upward, slowly at first. Its astonished occupant turned to jump out--too late.