TEDDY DARRELL AGAIN.

Mrs. Carew's servant, Jones, was a very humane and tender-hearted man, and his heart swelled with anger as he obeyed the command of his mistress, and bore the fainting young girl out of the splendid abode of luxury and wealth into the cold and stormy night.

He stopped under the flaring street-lamp and looked pityingly into the lovely white face that had fallen back against his arm.

"Why, what a pretty young thing she is—little more than a child—and looks as innocent, too!" he soliloquized. "I'll bet my life that if she's ever done any harm, she's been betrayed into it by that scoundrelly Ivan Belmont that she came here to find! He ought to be hung, so he ought!"

He glanced anxiously up and down the almost deserted avenue. The snow lay white and deep upon the ground, and the great flakes swirled through the air, striking him coldly in the face.

"If I put her down here on the ground she will freeze to death, poor girl, that's certain!" he murmured, uneasily. "I just can't do such a wicked thing—no, not even if she is bad, as Mrs. Carew said. Why, even if she was a murderess it wouldn't be right to leave her out here to die in the cold! But, land, what be I to do with her? That's what I want to know!"

The whinny and stamp of an impatient horse attracted his attention at that moment. He turned his head and saw a smart cab waiting at the next door. The driver, half asleep, sat on his box, his head sunk into the collar of his great-coat.

A sudden temptation came to the troubled Jones, and he did not fight against it, but rather welcomed it as an inspiration.

Walking noiselessly across the snow, Jones placed his burden inside the cab upon the cushions, and closed the door so softly that it did not attract the attention of the tired and sleepy driver on the box.

"God bless you and raise you up a friend this awful night, you poor little wretch!" apostrophized Jones, as he returned from the scene and re-entered the Carew mansion.

He had not been gone ten minutes before a servant came from the house before which the cab was waiting and roused the sleepy cabby.

"The lady as you brought here has decided to stay all night with her sick mother, so she told me to pay you and send you away," he said.

"All right, but I wish she had made up her mind afore she kep' me a-waitin' here all night! I be frozen with the cold, that's what I be!" grumbled the driver, accepting the double fee ungraciously, and driving away at a high rate of speed, all unconscious of the silent passenger inside.

He went rattling down to a large hotel, hoping he might get a fare for the theater.

A tall, handsome young man came down the steps and hailed him.

"Take me to the Opera House," he said, opening the door and springing lightly in.

"All right, sir," and away they went.

Teddy Darrell, the new fare, pulled up the collar of his long, fur-lined overcoat about his ears, and was about to settle himself comfortably when he received a violent shock.

He discovered that he was not alone in the cab. A slight girlish form, shrouded in a heavy cloak, was huddled up on the opposite seat, and low moans were issuing from its lips.