“And Bobby Larkin?” Lulu cared nothing for appearances now.

“He went in on the Local,” said Lenny, and his eyes widened.

“Where?”

“See.”  Lenny thought it through.  “Millton,” he said.  “Yes, sure.  Millton.  Both of ’em.”

“How long till another train?”

“Well, sir,” said the ticket man, “you’re in luck, if you was goin’ too.  Seventeen was late this morning—­she’ll be along, jerk of a lamb’s tail.”

“Then,” said Lulu, “you got to give me a ticket to Millton, without me paying till after—­and you got to lend me two dollars.”

“Sure thing,” said Lenny, with a manner of laying the entire railway system at her feet.

“Seventeen” would rather not have stopped at Warbleton, but Lenny’s signal was law on the time card, and the magnificent yellow express slowed down for Lulu.  Hatless and in her blue cotton gown, she climbed aboard.

Then her old inefficiency seized upon her.  What was she going to do?  Millton!  She had been there but once, years ago—­how could she ever find anybody?  Why had she not stayed in Warbleton and asked the sheriff or somebody—­no, not the sheriff.  Cornish, perhaps.  Oh, and Dwight and Ina were going to be angry now!  And Di—­little Di.  As Lulu thought of her she began to cry.  She said to herself that she had taught Di to sew.

In sight of Millton, Lulu was seized with trembling and physical nausea.  She had never been alone in any unfamiliar town.  She put her hands to her hair and for the first time realized her rolled-up sleeves.  She was pulling down these sleeves when the conductor came through the train.

“Could you tell me,” she said timidly, “the name of the principal hotel in Millton?”

Ninian had asked this as they neared Savannah, Georgia.

The conductor looked curiously at her.

“Why, the Hess House,” he said.  “Wasn’t you expecting anybody to meet you?” he asked, kindly.

“No,” said Lulu, “but I’m going to find my folks—­” Her voice trailed away.

“Beats all,” thought the conductor, using his utility formula for the universe.

In Millton Lulu’s inquiry for the Hess House produced no consternation.  Nobody paid any attention to her.  She was almost certainly taken to be a new servant there.

“You stop feeling so!” she said to herself angrily at the lobby entrance.  “Ain’t you been to that big hotel in Savannah, Georgia?”

The Hess House, Millton, had a tradition of its own to maintain, it seemed, and they sent her to the rear basement door.  She obeyed meekly, but she lost a good deal of time before she found herself at the end of the office desk.  It was still longer before any one attended her.

“Please, sir!” she burst out.  “See if Di Deacon has put her name on your book.”

Her appeal was tremendous, compelling.  The young clerk listened to her, showed her where to look in the register.  When only strange names and strange writing presented themselves there, he said: