"And may I ask what it is about?"

"It's about myself and Ah Ben, and the awful predicament into which
we have fallen."

"I should like greatly to help you," said Paul, thinking the subject
might lead to a clearer insight of the situation; "but even were I
competent to do so, which I doubt, I can not see how any little
worldly knowledge I might possess could possibly be of service in a
description of your own life."

"It is only that I should like to present our story in attractive
form--one which would be read by worldly people."

"A laudable ambition. But what is the predicament you speak of?"

"The predicament is more directly my own; the situation, Ah Ben's."

"Perhaps if you will explain them, I might aid you."

"You might indeed," she answered seriously, rising from the table;
"but it would be premature. Let us go into the garden."

She led the way through the back of the house out into the old-fashioned
yard, where boxwood bushes and chrysanthemums, together with other
autumnal flowers, adorned the beds. They walked down a straight path
and seated themselves upon a rustic bench in full view of the edifice.
Paul lighted a cigarette and watched the strange old building before
him, while Dorothy was content to sit and look at him, as though he
were some new variety of man just landed from the planet Mars. Presently