Philip laughed as he picked up the envelope.

"The most beau--" he began.

He caught himself with a jerk. Gregson, looking up from his
pencil-sharpening, saw the smile leave his lips and a quick flush
leap into his bronzed cheeks. He stared at the face on the
envelope for a half a minute, then gazed speechlessly at Gregson.

It was Gregson who laughed, softly and without suspicion.

"How does your wager look now?" he taunted.

"She--is--beautiful," murmured Philip, dropping the envelope and
turning to the door, "Don't wait for me, Greggy. Go to bed."

He heard Gregson laugh behind him, and he wondered, as he went
out, what Gregson would say if he told him that he had drawn on
the back of the old envelope the beautiful face of Eileen Brokaw!





V


A dozen steps beyond the door Philip paused in the shadow of a
dense spruce, half persuaded to return. From where he stood he