This not altogether pleasing reflection had scarcely taken shape in his mind, when, in the act of handing change to a customer, he beheld Miss Bentley coming toward him; without a doubt his Miss Bentley this time, for she wore the grey suit and the felt hat, jammed down any way on her bright hair and pinned with the pinkish quill.  She was not alone.  By her side walked a rather shabby, elderly man, with a rosy face, whose pockets bulged with newspapers, and who carried a large parcel.  She was looking at him and he was looking at her, and they were both laughing.  Comradeship of the most delightful kind was indicated.

Without a glance in the direction of the Candy Wagon they passed.  Well, at any rate she wasn’t at the Country Club.  But how queer!

Earlier in the afternoon Virginia had gone by in dancing-school array, accompanied by an absurdly youthful mother.  “I’ve got something to tell you,” she called, and the Candy Man could see her being reproved for this unseemly familiarity.

His curiosity was but mildly stirred; indeed, having other things to think of, he had quite forgotten the incident, when on Monday she presented herself swinging her school bag.

“Say,” she began, “I have found out about her Ladyship and the Little Red Chimney.”

“Oh, have you?” he answered vaguely.

Virginia, resting her bag on the carriage block, looked disappointed.  “I have been crazy to tell you, and now you don’t care a bit.”

“Indeed I do,” the Candy Man protested.  “I’m a trifle absent-minded, that’s all.”

Thus reassured she began:  “Don’t you know I told you I could see that chimney from our dining-room, and that I was going to watch it?  Well, the other day at lunch I happened to look toward the window, and I jumped right out of my chair and clapped my hands and said, ’It’s smoking, it’s smoking!’ There was company, and mother said, ’Good gracious, Virginia! what’s smoking?  You do make me so nervous!’ Then I was sorry I’d said anything, because she wouldn’t understand, you know.  Well, after lunch I took one of Ted’s balls, and went over to Uncle Bob’s, and I got a little darkey boy to throw it in the yard, and then I went in to look for it.  You see if Uncle Bob wasn’t there and anybody asked me what I was doing, I could say I was looking for my brother’s ball.”

“I fear you are a deep one,” remarked the Candy Man.

“No, I’m not, but I’m rather good at thinking of things,” Virginia owned complacently.  “And then,” she continued, “I poked around the rose bush, and peeped in at the window, and sure enough she was there, brushing the hearth.  She saw me and came to the window, and when I ran away, ’cause I thought maybe she was mad, she rapped, and then opened the window and called:  ‘Come in, little girl, and talk to me.’  And now who do you think she turned out to be?”

A suspicion had been deepening in the Candy Man’s breast for the last few moments.  His heart actually thumped.  “Not—­you don’t mean——?”