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276 "Feeling the heat a bit, Colonel?"

"Anything wrong downstairs?"

The Colonel recovered himself promptly. He beamed upon them all affectionately, and set down an empty tumbler with a little sigh of satisfaction.

"I'm all right, boys," he declared. "I couldn't find a cab—had to walk further than I meant, and I wanted a drink badly. Wrayson, come over here. I want to talk to you."

Wrayson sat down by his side.

"I've done the best I could," the Colonel said. "Things may not come all right for you quite at once, but within a week I fancy it'll be all squared up. I've found out why she refused to marry you, and you can take my word for it that within a week the cause will be removed."

"You're a brick, Colonel," Wrayson declared heartily. "There's only one thing more I'd love to have you to tell me."

"I'm afraid" the Colonel began.

"That you and Louise were reconciled," Wrayson declared. "Colonel, there can't be anything between you two, of all the people in the world, there can't be anything sufficient to keep you and her, father and daughter, completely apart."

"You are quite right, Wrayson," the Colonel assented, a little more cheerfully. "Well, you may find that all will come right very soon now. By the by, I've been talking to the Baroness. I want you to let me be at your rooms to-morrow night."

Wrayson hesitated for a moment.

"You know how we stand?" he asked.

"Exactly," the Colonel answered. "I only wish that