"No, no! You must let me go ahead. They are everywhere. They may suspect even my disguise. I—I am dreadfully afraid."

Van Dam scarcely knew how to answer this. So, like a wise man, he held his tongue.

"Listen!" she continued. "I will walk slowly, and do you remain far enough behind for your own safety—"

"My safety is as nothing to yours," he told her, but she shook her head impatiently.

"Please! Please! They will never select you out of a thousand dominos, and I am not sure they suspect me. But should they try to lift my mask, you must escape at once."

"Would they dare?" Mr. Van Dam inquired, shocked at such a breach of carnival etiquette.

"They would dare anything."

"But I couldn't allow it, really," he persisted. "If any hand is to lift your mask, I insist that mine be the favored one."

She darted a doubtful look at him, being plainly perturbed at his tone, then shook her head. "She told me you were reckless, but you are quite—insane."

For a second time he discovered that delicious color tingeing her neck and laughed, which disconcerted her even more. She hesitated, then turned away and he fell in behind her.

But distance served only to enhance the girl's charms. Roly saw how beautifully proportioned she was, how regally she carried herself, how light and springy was her step. Although he had not seen her face, he somehow felt agreeably certain that she possessed a witching beauty.

The circumspection with which she avoided the densest crowds made him wonder anew at the character of the danger that could overhang a masked maiden at mid-afternoon on a carnival day, for by this time he had forgotten his first suspicion. He thought not at all that the peril could be serious, or in any way involve him, for the magic of the Van Dam name protected its owner like invisible mail. The effect of that patronymic was really quite wonderful; policemen bowed to it, irate strangers allowed their anger to ooze away before it. It smoothed the owner's way through difficulties and brought him favors when least expected; rage changed to servility; indignation, opposition, even jealousy altered color in the shadow of the Van Dam millions. Nothing really unpleasant ever happened to Roly, and so it was that he had become blasé and tired at 

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