you’re inviting yourself here for a visit. But what you mean by ‘the hotel valet’ is more than I—”

[45]

“Don’t you grasp it?” demanded Chase, in amaze. “Haven’t you even read that thing? It was in one of the New York papers, at the club, this morning. A chap, there, said it was in the Advocate, yesterday. Your secret has exploded. All the cruel world knows of your shame. You run a hotel. You have to; or else you’d lose Vailholme. It’s all in the paper. In nice clear print. For everybody to read. And everybody’s reading it, ever so happily. I’m going to be your first guest. It all flashed on me, like—”

“Then switch the flash off!” ordered Thaxton, impatiently. “This crazy thing seems to hit you as a grand joke. To me, it hasn’t a single redeeming feature. Clear out!”

“My worthy fellow,” reproved Chase, “you forget yourself. You run a hotel. Your hotel is not full. I demand a room here. I can pay. By law, you cannot refuse to take me in. If you do, I shall bring an attorney here to enforce my rights. And at the same time, I shall bring along ten or eleven or nineteen of the Hunt Club crowd, as fellow-guests; to liven things for the[46] rest of the summer. Now, Landlord, do I stay; or do I not?”

[46]

Vail glowered on his ecstatically grinning friend, in sour abhorrence. Then he growled:

“If I throw you out, it’d be just like you to bring along that howling crowd of outcasts; and all of you would camp here on me for the season. If you think it’s a joke, keep the joke to yourself. If you insist on butting in here, you can stay. Not because I want you. I don’t. But you’re equal to making things fifty times worse, if I turn you out.”

“I sure am,” assented Chase, much pleased by the compliment to his powers. “Maybe even seventy-eight times worse. And then some—et puis quelque, as we ten-lesson boulevardiers say. So here we are. Now, what can you do for me in the way of rooms, me good man? The best is none too good. I am accustomed to rare luxury in my own palatial home, and I expect magnificent accommodations here.”

Thaxton’s grim mouth relaxed.

“Very good,” he agreed. “Miss Gregg and Doris are due here, too, in an hour or so. They have picked out my best suite. But—”

“They are? Glory be! I—”

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