It was fortunate, considering the magnitude of the shock which she wasto receive, that circumstances had given Steve's Mamie unusual powersof resistance in the matter of shocks. For years before herintroduction into the home of the Winfield family her life had been onelong series of crises. She had never known what the morrow might bringforth, though experience had convinced her that it was pretty certainto bring forth something agitating which would call for all herwell-known ability to handle disaster.

　　The sole care of three small brothers and a weak-minded father gives agirl exceptional opportunities of cultivating poise under difficultconditions. It had become second nature with Mamie to keep her headthough the heavens fell.

　　Consequently, when she entered the nursery next morning and found itempty, she did not go into hysterics. She did not even scream. She readSteve's note twice very carefully, then sat down to think what was herbest plan of action.

　　Her ingrained habit of looking on the bright side of things, the resultof a life which, had pessimism been allowed to rule it, might haveended prematurely with what the papers are fond of calling a "rashact," led her to consider first those points in the situation which shelabelled in her meditations as "bits of luck."It was a bit of luck that Mrs. Porter happened to be away for themoment. It gave her time for reflection. It was another bit of luckthat, as she had learned from Keggs, whom she met on the stairs on herway to the nursery, a mysterious telephone-call had caused Ruth to risefrom her bed some three hours before her usual time and departhurriedly in a cab. This also helped.

　　Keggs had no information to give as to Ruth's destination or theprobable hour of her return. She had vanished without a word, excepta request to Keggs to tell the driver of her taxi to go to theThirty-Third Street subway.

　　"Must 'a' 'ad bad noos," Keggs thought, "because she were look'n' whiteas a sheet."Mamie was sorry that Ruth had had bad news, but her departure certainlyhelped to relieve the pressure of an appalling situation.

　　With the absence of Ruth and Mrs. Porter the bits of luck came to anend. Try as she would, Mamie could discover no other silver linings inthe cloud-bank. And even these ameliorations of the disaster were onlytemporary.

　　Ruth would return. Worse, Mrs. Porter would return. Like two MotherHubbards, they would go to the cupboard, and the cupboard would bebare. And to her, Mamie, would fall the task of explanation.

　　The only explanation that occurred to her was that Steve had gonesuddenly mad. He had given no hint of his altruistic motives in thehurried scrawl which she had found on the empty cot. He had merely saidthat he had taken away William Bannister, but that "it was all right."Why Steve should imagine that it was all right baffled Mamie. Anythingless all right she had never come across in a lifetime of disconcertingexperiences.

　　She was aware that things were not as they should be between Ruth andKirk, and the spectacle of the broken home had troubled her gentleheart; but she failed to establish a connection between Kirk'sdeparture and Steve's midnight raid.

　　After devoting some ten minutes to steady brainwork she permittedherself the indulgence of a few tears. She did not often behave in thisshockingly weak way, her role in life hitherto having been that of theone calm person in a disrupted world. When her father had lost his job,and the rent was due, and Brother Jim had fallen in the mud to thedetriment of his only suit of clothes, and Brothers Terence and Mikehad developed respectively a sore throat and a funny feeling in thechest, she had remained dry-eyed and capable. Her father had cried, herbrother Jim had cried, her brother Terence had cried, and her brotherMike had cried in a manner that made the weeping of the rest of thefamily seem like the uncanny stillness of a summer night; but she hadnot shed a tear.

　　Now, however, she gave way. She buried her little face on the pillowwhich so brief a while before had been pressed by the round head ofWilliam Bannister and mourned like a modern Niobe.

　　At the end of two minutes she rose, sniffing but courageous, herselfagain. In her misery an idea had come to her. It was quite a simple andobvious idea, but till now it had eluded her.

　　She would go round to the studio and see Kirk. After all, it was hisaffair as much as anybody else's, and she had a feeling that it wouldbe easier to break the news to him than to Ruth and Mrs. Porter.

　　She washed her eyes, put on her hat, and set out.

　　Luck, however, was not running her way that morning. Arriving at thestudio, she rang the bell, and rang and rang again without resultexcept a marked increase in her already substantial depression. When itbecame plain to her that the studio was empty she desisted.

　　It is an illustration of her remarkable force of character that at thispoint, refusing to be crushed by the bludgeoning of fate, she walked toBroadway and went into a moving-picture palace. There was nothing to beeffected by staying in the house and worrying, so she resolutelydeclined to worry.

　　From this point onward her day divided itself into a series of threemovements repeated at regular intervals. From the moving pictures shewent to the house on Fifth Avenue. Finding that neither Ruth nor Mrs.

　　Porter had returned, she went to the studio. Ringing the bell there andgetting no answer, she took in the movies once more.

　　Mamie was a philosopher.

　　The atmosphere of the great house was still untroubled on her secondvisit. The care of the White Hope had always been left exclusively inthe hands of the women, and the rest of the household had not yetdetected his absence. It was not their business to watch his comings inand his goings out. Besides, they had other things to occupy them.

　　The unique occasion of the double absence of Ruth and Mrs. Porter wasbeing celebrated by a sort of Saturnalia or slaves' holiday. It wastrue that either or both might return at any moment, but there was adisposition on the part of the domestic staff to take a chance on it.

　　Keggs, that sinful butler, had strolled round to an apparentlyuntenanted house on Forty-First Street, where those who knew their NewYork could, by giving the signal, obtain admittance and the privilegeof losing their money at the pleasing game of roulette with a doublezero.

　　George, the footman, in company with Henriette, the lady's-maid, andRollins, the chauffeur, who had butted in absolutely uninvited toGeorge's acute disgust, were taking the air in the park. The rest ofthe staff, with the exception of a house-maid, who had been bribed,with two dollars and an old dress which had once been Ruth's and wasnow the property of Henriette, to stand by the ship, were somewhere onthe island, amusing themselves in the way that seemed best to them. Forall practical purposes, it was a safe and sane Fourth provided out of ablue sky by the god of chance............