who ever should own it. One owner in Amsterdam failed; another in
Antwerp committed suicide; a Russian nobleman was banished to
Siberia, and another went bankrupt and lost his home and family.
Now here it is in Mr. Mansfield's life. I--I hate it!" I could not
tell whether it was the superstition or the recent events
themselves which weighed most in her mind, but, at any rate, she
resumed, somewhat bitterly, a moment later: "M-1273! M is the
thirteenth letter of the alphabet, and 1, 2, 7, 3 add up to
thirteen. The first and last numbers make thirteen, and John
Mansfield has thirteen letters in his name. I wish he had never
worn the thing--never bought it!"

The more I listened to her the more impressed I was with the fact
that there was something more here than the feeling of a private
secretary.

"Who were in the supper-party?" asked Kennedy.

"He gave it for Madeline Hargrave--the pretty little actress, you
know, who took New York by storm last season in 'The Sport' and is
booked, next week, to appear in the new show, 'The Astor Cup.'"

Miss Grey said it, I thought, with a sort of wistful envy.
Mansfield's gay little bohemian gatherings were well known. Though
he was not young, he was still somewhat of a Lothario.

"Who else was there?" asked Kennedy.

"Then there was Mina Leitch, a member of Miss Hargrave's new
company," she went on. "Another was Fleming Lewis, the Wall Street