The next day the shop was doing a thriving business. Josie was busily engaged in hunting up information concerning the best method to pursue when contemplating taking a donkey trip through Spain for a middle aged lady who had saved money for the venture and was determined to have the trip in spite of discouraging friends; Elizabeth was touching up a club paper on extra foraneous ornamentation; and Irene, who had been sent for in a hurry to do some smocking, had just wheeled herself from the dumb-waiter, produced her thimble and gone to work.

Hortense Markle came into the shop looking, as usual, fresh as the dawn and her eyes sparkling like dew drops. Josie looked at her almost pityingly. It seemed so sad to her that anyone who looked so charming could be so wicked.

“I have brought some trifling little gew-gaws that Felix and I have picked up at various times188 in our travels, thinking you young merchants might have some sale for them. They are of no great value, but there is no use in keeping such things around the house when one no longer cares for them,” she said, opening a package she carried. “Would you care to try to sell them?”

“Sure, we would,” answered Josie. “We are expecting to go into that kind of business a good deal. Are the things antiques?”

“Some of them! Here is a cameo brooch that is really quite pretty, but I am not the cameo brooch type. I can’t imagine what made Felix take—buy—such a thing.” Josie noticed the little slip but her expressionless face gave no clue to her thoughts. “Here is a chain, quite pretty, and a locket too.”

There were various trinkets, all of them accepted by the girls and a price agreed upon for them. They were to receive a commission on the sales.

“I have some rugs too that we don’t want,” continued Hortense. “Would you like them? Perhaps you might buy them outright and make quite a pretty penny on them.”

“Send them around and we will see about it,” said Josie. “Are they handsome?”

189 “Yes, quite fine! Felix thinks they are prettier than the ones we are using but I have a fancy for the old ones to which I have grown accustomed.”

Irene and Elizabeth listened to the above conversation with feelings of mingled astonishment and amusement. Life for those girls was very interesting during the days while the net was slowly closing around the unconscious Markles. They could not help feeling sorry for them, but at the same time disgust at Hortense’s perfidy was uppermost in the minds of the girls who had led quiet sheltered lives themselves.

“Tell me, Miss O’Gorman, has young Mr. Dulaney ever brought back your father’s notebook, and could he make head or tail of the pot-hooks?” asked Hortense, pretending to be very nonchalant.

“No, not yet, but he was to get to it last evening,” answered Josie. “But here he is now.”

Bob Dulaney came in the shop looking decidedly perturbed.

“Oh, Miss O’Gorman, I am worried stiff,” he cried, taking in the other occupants with a general bow. “I can’t bear to meet you, but I190 must have it over with. Do you know something has happened to the book you lent me, your father’s notebook, I mean. I have not had it out of my possession since you handed it to me, in my breast pocket all the time and when my coat was not on my back it was hanging on a chair by my bed. I have not had time to open the little book until last night. Then I untied the hard knot of the ribbons and found the book filled with nothing but blank pages. I can’t account for it. Certainly when you showed it to us when you moved in, it had ciphered notes in it. I remember well that you untied the strings and the pages were covered close with hieroglyphics. You put it back on the shelves tightly tied up and I fancy it had not been opened since. In fact, I think you said it had not when you lent it to me.”

It was difficult for Josie to pretend to the perturbed young man, but she felt she must keep up the farce before the watchful Hortense. She devoutly hoped Irene and Elizabeth could hold on to themselves. She could plainly see they were excited and that Irene was filled with pity for poor Bob.

“It is too bad,” said Josie with as cold a191 voice as she could muster. “I should not have let the book get out of my possession. Of course, I ............