Page:The Plutocrat (1927).pdf/375

 "Never mind," he said. "Let's not talk of that any more. I'm a little curious upon one point. Something I overheard you say on the steamer to your mother gave me the impression that you didn't know I" He checked himself, and reformed his sentence. "On the 'Duumvir' I think you weren't aware that I am a playwright. Were you?"

"No. I didn't know until yesterday that you were the author of that play."

"Until yesterday? How could you have learned it here, in Biskra?"

She laughed. "That's simple. My father" She stopped speaking, and leaned forward staring down from the parapet. "Why, how queer! There he is now."

Mrs. Tinker spoke from a little distance behind her. She was approaching over the roof with Mr. and Mrs. Shuler. "Your father, Libby? Where do you see him?"

Olivia answered quickly, "I don't. I was mistaken; it's someone else." She had been looking down into the street of the Ouled Nails, but immediately she pointed in another direction. "Look at that tower, Mamma, with those curious Moorish windows blazing. Isn't it wonderful?"