Judge Trent rubbed his chin the wrong way. "I _could_ send a detective, Martha," he said thoughtfully. "I don't keep them in the back yard, but I usually have one around the office. I could shadow the girl."

Miss Lacey took hope. This met her longings. "If we only surely knew where she is!" she responded acutely.

"Yes, if we only did," the judge replied equably. "Where is she, Dunham?"

The young man flushed at the question.

"I can't tell you," he answered, after a moment's pause.

"Of course he can't," exclaimed Martha. "How queer you act, Calvin.

_Do_ you intend to do anything, after all?" Tears sprang to her eyes and overflowed, but she paid no attention to them as she gazed distractedly at the exasperating lawyer.

Judge Trent's manner changed. He even smiled into the tearful countenance, and as she had suddenly risen he rose too.

"Yes, Martha," he answered, "I expect to see something done about it right away. The fat actor shan't get Laura's little girl this time."

Miss Lacey regarded the shrewd face in the intervals of wiping her eyes. "You'll telegraph to Sylvia, and send another message to Thinkright to come right here. Of course we can't be sure that Sylvia will get it, though--and there's all Thinkright's traveling expenses."

The speaker's wet eyes looked appealing.

"Dunham's going to tell us where Sylvia is," returned the judge quietly. He paused, and Martha looked bewildered by this persistence.

She turned toward John questioningly.

"I can't," replied Dunham again.

Judge Trent shrugged his shabby shoulders. "Oh, well, I suppose you can telegraph for us, then."

John swallowed, and meeting the lawyer's eyes, realized that he might as well save circ.u.mlocution.

"Well--yes."

"Of all things!" exclaimed Martha, with a start. "What do you mean?"

The judge hooked his thumbs in his armholes, regarding Dunham quizzically. "How about Jacob Johnson, Esquire, alias Thinkright. Do you suppose if I sent to him to shake the hayseed out of his hair and come on here you might unburden yourself to him somewhat?"

"Look here, Judge Trent," said Dunham, with exasperation, "perhaps you think I've had a pleasant day."

The lawyer approached the speaker and patted his big arm. "Could you, John, could you, do you think?"

"Yes, confound you!"

"Then we're fixed, Martha," said Judge Trent calmly. "You're all right, Dunham. You didn't overrate yourself at all."

"But I don't understand," exclaimed Martha tremulously, looking from one to the other.

Judge Trent opened the door for her ceremoniously.

"The intricate workings of the law, Martha, are difficult of explanation; but, after all, what do you care if the net result proves to be the arrival of your niece at the Mill Farm in a few days."

"Of your niece, Calvin," returned Miss Lacey, moving to the door, followed by Dunham, whose brow was lowering. "Don't think of coming with me, Mr. Dunham," she added, turning to him. "It is still fully light--and," ingratiatingly, "did you say you were going to telegraph Sylvia?"

"Yes."

"What shall he say, Calvin?"

"I should trust his judgment before my own," returned the lawyer.

"Here's your eight dollars, Boy, and you're a trump."

John took the money without smiling; but he was glad to know about the farm.

Miss Martha boarded her car with a heart that was questioning but beginning to hope, and her mind was busy piecing together the evidence.

Mr. Dunham had left her for hours. He had been unable to return Judge Trent's money. He knew where Sylvia was.

Her misery gradually abated, and before she reached her gate she began to wonder if her bonnet had been on straight during the recent interview.

CHAPTER VI

SYLVIA'S CALLER

When Dunham's telegram reached Sylvia Lacey she was for the time being powerless to disobey it. The excitement and disappointment of the interview with her aunt had resulted in a feverish attack which, though slight, destroyed her ambition to do more than lie on her narrow bed and meditate upon the situation.

She could not write to the friends at home who had pictured such a pleasant future for her with her Boston relatives. She was not able even to go out and buy a "Dramatic Mirror" to discover where Nat's company would be playing the coming week.

She lay white and slender in her black wrapper, and listlessly fingered the telegram, which was now two days old. It read:--

"Do not leave a.s.sociation till you hear from me. Important.

JOHN DUNHAM."

In the hopelessness of her thought her mental pictures of Dunham were always mortifying. He had heard her belittled, had heard her father slandered, had forced her to accept grudging charity, and yet the sunshine of the smile with which he had bade her good-by, his encouraging words and friendly handclasp, formed the only spot of cheer in her wilderness. The telegram was a straw to which she clung when, in the processes of dismal thought, waves seemed to go over her head.

What important matter could be coming to her? If it were only that he intended returning, with apologies or propositions from her discarded relations, she told herself with set lips that his errand would be fruitless; but even while she took comfort in reiterating this resolution, she was finding a ray of brightness in the idea that he would be the messenger.

Her aunt's words often recurred to her. "Of course we knew you would wish to get something to do."

In the precarious hand-to-mouth existence she had led with her father since she was old enough to understand his visionary, happy-go-lucky temperament, he had regarded her and taught her to regard herself as a flower of the field. He had petted her, praised her beauty, and had managed to pay their board spasmodically in first one, then another locality; and being a good fellow who usually won the hearts of his creditors, it was not until after his death that a mult.i.tude of small claims came buzzing about his daughter's ears; and it was these as much as anything which had made her accept with childlike insouciance the arrangement of the friends who packed her away to her relatives with all the celerity possible.

Her father's men friends had always admired and flattered her; she supposed that men were all alike, and that she had but to throw her lovely arms around Uncle Calvin's neck and tell him of her father's misfortunes and petty debts to have all troubles smoothed away. She had doubted a little how she should like Uncle Calvin and Aunt Martha (the latter's stiff epistles had not prepossessed her), but she had never entertained one question as to how they would like her.

To hear it declared first and foremostly that they took no interest in her, and did not want her, and secondly, that they proposed sending her out into the world to work for her living--these nightmarish facts made her rebound at once to the memory of the carefree, shabby environment where rosy possibilities had always been held before her. As her eyes rested now on the bare wall of her bedroom, it softened and melted until she saw a vision of footlights, herself in the centre of the stage, while a murmur of applause, heart-warming, inspiring, intoxicated her senses.

The day-dream soothed her to slumber, but the applause continued.

Instead of rejoicing, at last it began to disturb her. Her eyes slowly opened, and she grew conscious that some one was knocking on her door.

At her summons a maid entered. "Somebody to see you, Miss. You don't feel well enough, do you?"