He could breathe freely here, thank goodness, and work. He was just
settling down to it when through the open transom behind him came the
sound of rustling skirts and a voice which demanded:

"But how do you suppose he found that we were here? You're certain that
it was Decatur Brown, are you?"

"Oh yes, quite certain. He has changed very little. Besides, there was
the name on the register."

Decatur thrilled at the music of that answering voice. There was a
little quaver in it, a faint but fascinating breaking on the low notes,
such as he had never heard in any voice save Jane Temple's.

"Then Mabel must not come down to dinner to-night. She must--" The rest
was lost around the corner of a corridor.

What Mabel must do remained a mystery. Must she go without her dinner
altogether? He hoped not, for evidently his arrival had something to do
with it. Why? Decatur gave it up. Who was Mabel, anyway? The owner of
the other voice he could guess at. That must be Mrs. Philo Allen, Jane's
aunt Judith, the one who had carried her off to Europe and forbidden
them to write to each other. But Mabel? Oh yes! He had almost forgotten
that elaborately gowned miss who at sixteen had assumed such
young-ladyfied airs. Mabel was Jane's young cousin, of course, the one
to whom he used to take expensive bonbons, his intent being to
propitiate Aunt Judith.

So they were guests at The Empress, too--Jane and her aunt and the
pampered Mabel? Chiefly, however, there was Jane. The others did not