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She went to the office in the morning, ignorant as to Lew's whereabouts, and learned that he had left town. No one regarded her differently; of course, no one knew. Jay was the same to her but every contact with him was charged with the stir within her aroused by Lew.

Working for Jay with her head and hands, she slipped into sudden, pale inattentions which puzzled him and caused him to ask less of her.

"You're doing too much," he said.

She denied it, ineffectively; he took his matters to another girl but with her he still talked over matters at the end of a day.

One bit of luck she had; Lew remained away. Indeed, he went off on a round of his sales offices in California and the northwest coast. When Ellen read this in a letter to Mr. Rountree, she felt lightened and as if given a reprieve. No longer, for a while at least, might he descend upon her with the morning train from Stanley.

However, he proved his persisting thought of her by bestowal of flowers with which Di had filled two vases, when Ellen reached home; as before, she cast them out and made no acknowledgment; but, as before, he had sent a card which discounted immediate expectations of gratitude.

Continually, through the office, he displayed the power of his position. It had been the habit of Stanley Alban,