I had no intention of opening the little bag.  I put it under my pillow—­which was my reason for refusing to have the linen slips changed, to Mrs. Klopton’s dismay.  And sometimes during the morning, while I lay under a virgin field of white, ornamented with strange flowers, my cigarettes hidden beyond discovery, and Science and Health on a table by my elbow, as if by the merest accident, I slid my hand under my pillow and touched it reverently.

McKnight came in about eleven.  I heard his car at the curb, followed almost immediately by his slam at the front door, and his usual clamor on the stairs.  He had a bottle under his arm, rightly surmising that I had been forbidden stimulant, and a large box of cigarettes in his pocket, suspecting my deprivation.

“Well,” he said cheerfully.  “How did you sleep after keeping me up half the night?”

I slid my hand around:  the purse was well covered.  “Have it now, or wait till I get the cork out?” he rattled on.

“I don’t want anything,” I protested.  “I wish you wouldn’t be so darned cheerful, Richey.”  He stopped whistling to stare at me.

“‘I am saddest when I sing!’” he quoted unctuously.  “It’s pure reaction, Lollie.  Yesterday the sky was low:  I was digging for my best friend.  To-day—­he lies before me, his peevish self.  Yesterday I thought the notes were burned:  to-day—­I look forward to a good cross-country chase, and with luck we will draw.”  His voice changed suddenly.  “Yesterday—­she was in Seal Harbor.  To-day —­she is here.”

“Here in Washington?” I asked, as naturally as I could.

“Yes.  Going to stay a week or two.”

  “Oh, I had a little hen and she had a wooden leg
  And nearly every morning she used to lay an egg—­”

“Will you stop that racket, Rich!  It’s the real thing this time, I suppose?”

  “She’s the best little chicken that we have on the farm
  And another little drink won’t do us any harm—­”

he finished, twisting out the corkscrew.  Then he came over and sat down on the bed.

“Well,” he said judicially, “since you drag it from me, I think perhaps it is.  You—­you’re such a confirmed woman-hater that I hardly knew how you would take it.”

“Nothing of the sort,” I denied testily.  “Because a man reaches the age of thirty without making maudlin love to every—­”

“I’ve taken to long country rides,” he went on reflectively, without listening to me, “and yesterday I ran over a sheep; nearly went into the ditch.  But there’s a Providence that watches over fools and lovers, and just now I know darned well that I’m one, and I have a sneaking idea I’m both.”

“You are both,” I said with disgust.  “If you can be rational for one moment, I wish you would tell me why that man Sullivan called me over the telephone yesterday morning.”

“Probably hadn’t yet discovered the Bronson notes—­providing you hold to your theory that the theft was incidental to the murder.  May have wanted his own clothes again, or to thank you for yours.  Search me:  I can’t think of anything else.”  The doctor came in just then.