CHAPTER IV

ROSALIND STANTON DOESN'T DISAPPEAR


Rodney found a pipe of his that he kept concealed on the premises,
loaded and lighted it, sat down astride a spindling little chair that
looked hardly up to his weight, settled his elbows comfortably on the
back of it, and then asked his sister what Martin had meant--what was he
in for?

Frederica, curled up in a corner of the sofa, finished her own train of
thought aloud, first.

"She's awfully attractive, don't you think? His wife, I mean. Oh, James
Randolph's, of course." She turned to Rodney, looked at him at first
with a wry pucker between her eyebrows, then with a smile, and finally
answered his question. "Nothing," she said. "I mean, I was going to
scold you, but I'm not."

"Why, yes," he admitted through his smoke. "Randolph's wife's a mighty
pretty woman. But I expect that lets her out, doesn't it?"

Frederica shook her head. "She's a good deal of a person, I should say,
on the strength of to-night's showing. She kept her face perfectly
through the whole thing--didn't try to nag at him or apologize to the
rest of us. I'd like to know what she's saying to him now."

Then, "Oh, I was furious with you an hour ago," she went on. "I'd made