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Stepping out of the elevator on the ground floor he encountered Mortimer, and halted instinctively He had not seen Mortimer for weeks; neither had Leila; and now he looked at hily, disturbed at his battered and bloodshot appearance

"Oh," said Mortimer, "you down here?"

"Have you been out of town?" asked Plank cautiously

Mortie of the elevator, but so seemed to occur to him suddenly; he checked his pace, turned, and waddled after Plank, rejoining him on thePlank by the elbow and breathing heavily even after the short chase across the lobby, "ICo Plank's elbow in his puffy fingers, he directed him toward a velvet seat in a corner of the lobby; and here they sat dohile Morti at the heat under his breath

"Look here," he said; "I pro once, didn't I?"

"Did you?" said Plank, with his bland, expressionless stare of an overgrown baby

"Oh, cut that out! You know daood D'ye see?"

"I don't see," said Plank, "what you are talking about"

"I'ood? Haven't I put you into everything I said I would? Don't you go everywhere? Don't people ask you everywhere?"

"Yes--in a way," said Plank wearily "I a for you, Leroy?"

Mortinant at the implied distrust of the purity of histo stem thewithin himself as to what it could be that Mortimer wanted

It ca" at Desmond's, and, as usual, had provided the pièce de résistance for his soft-voiced host All he wanted was a temporary deposit to tide over matters He had never approached Plank in vain, and he did not do so now, for Plank had a pocket cheque-book and a stylograph

"It's damn little to ask, isn't it?" he muttered resentfully "That will only square o on with," and he pocketed his cheque with a scowl

Plank was discreetly silent

"And that is not what I chased you for, either," continued Mortioing to fix it in another way!" He cast an involuntary and sinister glance at the elevators gliding ceaselessly up and down at the end of the vast ain: "Beverly, old boy, I've got a certain mealy-faced hypocrite where any decent man would like to have hioing to kick hio of several things" Mortimer leered, pleased with his own si to drop several things that don't belong to hiht … One of 'em's yours"