looked at her and saw that Griggs as usual had been exactly right—she was neither more nor less than pleasing—a small, slim, pale girl, whose unremarkable brown eyes radiated a steady intelligence.

Wood had employed labor in many parts of the world, from Chile to China, and he had a routine about it—a preliminary intelligence test, which he applied.

"Sit down, Miss Exeter," he said. "I think it will save us both time if you will tell me all that you know about this position"—this was the test—"and then I'll fill in."

Augusta sat down. She found herself a trifle nervous. This man impressed her, for since her childhood she had cherished a secret romantic admiration for men who exercised any form of power—kings and generals and men of great affairs. It was a feeling that had nothing to do with real life and represented no disloyalty to her fiancé, Horace Bayne, who exercised no power of any kind.

One reason why it had had no relation to life was that she had not met any men of this type. Even in the outer office she had been impressed by the sense of a man waited on and protected[Pg 23] by secretaries and office boys as an Eastern princess is waited upon by slaves. And now when she saw him she saw that he had exactly the type of looks she admired most—tall, a little too thin, his face tanned to that shade of café au lait that the blond Anglo-Saxon acquires under the sun—those piercing bright-blue eyes—that large handsome hand, which, with the thumb in his waistcoat pocket, was so clearly outlined against the blue serge of his clothes.

[Pg 23]

She said rather uncertainly, "I know that Mrs. Conway is a widow with three children——"

Even this much was wrong.

"Not, a widow," he said; "divorced."

"——with three children," Augusta went on; "a girl of seventeen, a boy of fifteen and a little girl of eleven. I know that during your absence you want someone to take the care and responsibility of the children off your sister's shoulders."

He smiled—his teeth seemed to have the extraordinary whiteness that is the compensation of a dark skin.

"I see," he said, "that Griggs has been discreet again." He glanced at his watch. "I'm going to Mexico in a few hours, Miss Exeter. I have just twenty-five minutes. If in that time I am[Pg 24] not 

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