continued, "since I did not recognise you. It was——" 

 "Preposterous?" he suggested. 

 "Yes, preposterous, to suppose that I could. Why, it was nearly dark that afternoon, and I——" 

 "Please don't rub it in. I know. You see I knew you so well." 

 "Me?" cried Margaret Elizabeth. 

 "I had seen you pass, I mean." 

 Again Miss Bentley said "Oh!" adding: "You are also the person who laughed when I made an idiotic remark about lighthouses in the grocery." 

 The Candy Man protested. He had not laughed. 

 "Your eyes laughed. That is how I first discovered my mistake. Your resemblance to Mr. McAllister is remarkable." 

 "So I have been told." The Candy Man shrugged his shoulders, ever so little. 

 "However, to go back, I think you owe me an explanation, Mr. Reynolds, considering how you allowed me to talk to you under a false impression. I am not absolutely lacking in grey matter," she added, while a smile curled her lips, "and I think you owe it to me to tell me why you became a Candy Man." 

 "In return for the Fairy Godmother idea?" he asked mischievously. 

 Miss Bentley's brows drew together. "If you knew how bitterly I have regretted all the foolish things I said that day, you would not laugh," she cried. 

 "Do not say that, please, Miss Bentley. I beg your pardon, and I am not laughing. I could not. If you only knew what it all meant to me. How I——" 

 His distress was so genuine that Margaret Elizabeth was touched. "Well, never mind now. It can't be helped, and I am willing to have it in return for the Fairy Godmother nonsense, if you choose to put it so." 

 And now perforce the Candy Man must explain himself. 

 "You see," he began, "I had been knocked out of everything through a bad accident that occurred at my home near Chicago—a runaway. Speaking of grey matter, there was some 

 Prev. P 47/76 next