“This room used to be a kind of a den, they tell me; so I’ve made it into one, the first thing, you see.”

There was a rug on the floor, a chair or two and a high mahogany desk which gave the place a semblance of comfort amid the general confusion.  Miss Lois Daggett gazed about with argus-eyed curiosity.

“I don’t know as I was ever in this room, when Andrew Bolton lived here,” she observed, “but it looks real homelike now.”

“Poor man!  I often think of him,” said kindly Mrs. Daggett. “’Twould be turrible to be shut away from the sunshine f’r even one year; but poor Andrew Bolton’s been closed up in State’s prison fer—­l’ me see, it mus’ be goin’ on—­”

“It’s fifteen years, come fall, since he got his sentence,” stated the spinster.  “His time must be ’most up.”

Lydia Orr had seated herself in an old-fashioned chair, its tall carved back turned to the open windows.

“Did you—­lose much in the bank failure, Miss Daggett?” she inquired, after a slight pause, during which the promoter of Famous People was loosening the strings of her black silk bag.

“About two hundred dollars I’d saved up,” replied Miss Daggett.  “By now it would be a lot more—­with the interest.”

“Yes, of course,” assented their hostess; “one should always think of interest in connection with savings.”

She appeared to be gazing rather attentively at the leather-bound prospectus Miss Daggett had withdrawn from her bag.

“That looks like something interesting, Miss Daggett,” she volunteered.

“This volume I’m holdin’ in my hand,” began that lady, professionally, “is one of the most remarkable works ever issued by the press of any country.  It is the life history of one thousand men and women of world-wide fame and reputation, in letters, art, science an’ public life.  No library nor parlor table is complete without this authoritative work of general information an’ reference.  It is a com-plete library in itself, and—­”

“What is the price of the work, Miss Daggett?” inquired Lydia Orr.

“Just hold on a minute; I’m coming to that,” said Miss Daggett firmly.  “As I was telling you, this work is a complete library in itself.  A careful perusal of the specimen pages will convince the most skeptical.  Turning to page four hundred and fifty-six, we read:—­”

[Illustration:  “Just hold on a minute; I’m coming to that,” said Miss Daggett firmly.]

“I’m sure I should like to buy the book, Miss Daggett.”

“You ain’t th’ only one,” said the agent.  “Any person of even the most ordinary intelligence ought to own this work.  Turning to page four hundred and fifty-six, we read:  ’Snipeley, Samuel Bangs:  lawyer ligislator an’ author; born eighteen hundred fifty-nine, in the town of—­’”

At this moment the door was pushed noiselessly open, and a tall, spare woman of middle age stood upon the threshold bearing a tray in her hands.  On the tray were set forth silver tea things, flanked by thin bread and butter and a generous pile of sponge cake.