"Oh, thank you!" she cried. "I know this naughty boy must have
been terribly hard to find. Mildred'll NEVER forgive me! I've
put you to so much----"

"Not at all," he said, amiably, and went away, leaving the
brother and sister together.

"Walter, let's dance just once more," Alice said, touching his
arm placatively. "I thought--well, perhaps we might go home
then."

But Walter's expression was that of a person upon whom an outrage
has just been perpetrated. "No," he said. "We've stayed THIS
long, I'm goin' to wait and see what they got to eat. And you
look here!" He turned upon her angrily. "Don't you ever do that
again!"

"Do what?"

"Send somebody after me that pokes his nose into every corner of
the house till he finds me! 'Are you Mr. Walter Adams?' he
says. I guess he must asked everybody in the place if they were
Mr. Walter Adams! Well, I'll bet a few iron men you wouldn't
send anybody to hunt for me again if you knew where he found me!"

"Where was it?"

Walter decided that her fit punishment was to know. "I was
shootin' dice with those coons in the cloak-room."