Had Cheatham harbored the slightest suspicion against Teddy Trask’s friend, her conversation on the journey from Louisville to Cincinnati would have completely dispelled it. Cheatham was an intelligent villain, with some culture, and Josie’s deliberately silly patter bored him intensely. He stood it for about an hour and then made a plea of having to see a business acquaintance in the smoker.

“Well, I’ll see you again,” said Josie, “good-bye! Where are you going to stop in Cincinnati? I may go out to Walnut Hills with some friends or I’d just love to see you sometime. Where’d you say you were stopping? Not that I’d have any time for you. My friends are awfully smart. Money to burn. Cars and just everything. I’ll be dated up for every minute. Only going to be here one night anyhow. Where’d you say?”

“Hotel Haddon!” “Gee! I never even heard of it. Is it slummy?”

“Not at all! Very decent. An old downtown hotel!” Mr. Cheatham beat a hasty retreat.

Josie dropped her flapperish expression as soon as Cheatham passed from her coach and then she leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes with a sigh of relief. She wanted to think and to think fast. The porter passed down the aisle. Why not find out from him just where the Hotel Haddon was? Giving an adroit twist to the shade at the window, she pulled it out of place, which gave her an excuse to call on the porter for his services.

“Awfully sorry,” she said, slipping some silver in his hand after he had adjusted the shade. “Please tell me, do you know a Hotel Haddon in Cincinnati?”

“Yes, miss! Down-town place—uster be a fambly hotel but now it’s kinder taken over by theatre people. Travelin’ men use it some. I wouldn’t ’vise it for a lone young lady.”

Josie thanked him and listened attentively to the list of hotels he did advise for one in her situation. “Now, there’s a real ladylike hotel right acrost the street from the Haddon if you’ve a mind to be down-town. It’s called the Alpha,” said the friendly porter.

When the train pulled in at Cincinnati Josie managed to make herself invisible behind the curtains of the ladies’ dressing room. She hardly expected Cheatham to look her up, but there was a chance of his doing it, and she wanted him to forget she was in Cincinnati if possible. When the train was about emptied, she darted out, seized a belated red cap and had him put her safely into a taxi.

“Hotel Alpha,” she called, and at that moment had the satisfaction of seeing Cheatham enter a bus bearing the inscription Hotel Haddon. Evidently he had told the truth about his stopping place, because he had no suspicion of her wanting to know for any reason but idle curiosity.

Now came for Josie a period of watchful waiting. Fortunately the parlors of the Alpha Hotel were situated on the mezzanine floor and overlooked the street. Having registered and engaged a room, Josie ensconced herself in an easy chair behind a sash curtain that gave her a full view of the street and the Hotel Haddon which was directly across the way.

She was excited. There was no use in denying it. She felt her heart beats distinctly and her hands trembled a bit.

“Here, girl! Pull yourself together!” she commanded. “This is no time to behave in a womanish way, even if you are stopping at a ladylike hotel.”

She eagerly scanned the windows of the Haddon, beginning at the second floor and working systematically to the top. The building was only four stories high. The windows were blank and empty and gave away no secrets. Once she saw a man with a black moustache look out of one on the third floor, but he so quickly turned that Josie could not be sure of his identity. She marked the window, however—third floor at the extreme right.

So busy was she gazing at that window she almost missed seeing Cheatham emerge from the hotel accompanied by a woman, rather handsome, with auburn hair, carrying her head decidedly on one side. They were talking animatedly and walking rapidly. Josie also marked the gait of the woman which took a zigzag course—so much so that at times she bumped into the man by her side.

Again she looked up to the window on the third floor. It was blank but on the second floor directly below she was sure she could distinguish a wistful little face pressed close to the pane.

Josie paused not a moment. She did not wait for the elevator, but darted down the steps from the mezzanine and was across the street and in the Hotel Haddon before Cheatham and Miss Fitchet had even turned the corner. The Hotel Haddon was rather a haphazard place and, there being no clerk at the desk at the time, it was not necessary for her to explain her business. The elevator landed Josie at the second floor and, with an air of being a guest, she walked to the extreme end of the hall and turned the knob of the door of Number 220. She had her skeleton key in case it was necessary to use it, but was much relieved when the door opened. Evidently the kidnapers were so sure of themselves they had not thought of locking the child in the room.

“Hello, Philip!” Josie said quietly. “I’ve come to take you home, dear.” Her tone was so composed that Philip did not cry out at all, but his face was so bright with happiness that Josie almost gave herself up to the tears that were well nigh choking her.

“Get your coat and hat and let’s hurry,” she said. “Don’t talk any now. We can talk later.”

It was quite as easy to get out of the hotel with the boy as it had been to get in without him. She used the stairs this time, however. It was a matter of five minutes for Josie to release the room she had engaged at the ladylike hotel, jump in a taxi with Philip and make for the station. There was a train just ready to pull out, which she caught by the greatest good luck. It was a local, but its destination was Louisville. Josie would have taken it no matter what its destination, as she was sure it was a wise plan to leave Cheatham and Fitchet at any cost, and she hoped they would do some worrying.

Once they were settled in the train the little boy poured forth his soul to his liberator.

“I wasn’t doin’ nothin’ but jes’ sleepin’ when all of a sudden somebody jes’ picked me up an’ carried me off. I kinder thought it was Sister at first an’ I didn’t wake up all the way. I jes’ went on dreamin’, kinder half awake, but bye’m’bye I woke up ’cause somehow it didn’t smell like Sister but like powder. I was so scairt by that time I didn’t know what to do, so I kicked an’ hollered an’ clawed at that ol’ woman till she spanked me good.

“We were in a automobile an’ I don’t know where we was goin’ or where we’ve been but she made me put on my clothes an’ my overcoat, that she had brung along with me, an’ she tol’ me if I didn’t hush up cryin’ she’d tell Santa Claus I was a bad boy an’ he wouldn’t bring me a thing an’ I ’membered nex’ day was Christmus an’ I tried to stop bawlin’ but I missed Sister an’ Ben so bad I didn’t care after a while whether ol’ Santy brought me anything or not. I didn’t see how he was gonter know I wasn’t home with Sister. At last we went to that hotel where there weren’t any chimbleys an she tol’ me if I acted ugly she’d give me to the ash man, but if I ’haved she’d take me to the movies. There was a big fire here when we first came an’ I saw the men digging for dead folks but Aunty wouldn’t let me stop.”

“Oh, so she made you call her Aunty, did she?” asked Josie.

“Yes, but I don’t believe she’s any mo’ kin to me than the ash man. She ain’t never lef me ’til jes’ befo’ you came for me, an’ then somebody called her up on the ’phone an’ she jes’ powdered herself up an’ put on her hat an’ tol’ me if I didn’t stay right still until she got back a ol’ witch would git me. She said she was waitin’ out in the hall for me, but I didn’t believe her a bit ’cause Sister already tol’ me there wasn’t any witches ’cept in books an’ Aunty didn’t have any books.

“The man that called her up on the ’phone was waitin’ in the hall for her but I never saw him. He tol’ her she’d better lock me up in the room, but she said she was afraid of fire an’ I wouldn’t be no good to them any more if I got burnt up. I don’t see what good I am to them now, but Aunty made out she loved me mor’n Sister an’ Ben did, an’ she was jes a borrowin’ me for a while an’ if I ’haved like a gemman maybe sometime I could go see Sister. That’s the reason I didn’t holler, an’ was a gonter stay quiet in the room if you hadn’t come for me. She said she was gonter bring me back some all-day suckers an’ all kinds of things ’cause Santa Claus didn’t find me after all. An’ I pretty near knew he wouldn’t.” “I am pretty sure Santa Claus left your things at your home,” said Josie softly. “I am also pretty sure you are going to see Sister and Ben in a few hours. Sister has been very sad over your going away and Ben has been miserable.”

“Now, didn’t I say so? But ol’ Aunty kep’ on tellin’ me Sister was glad to get rid of me an’ had asked her to take me off. I never did b’lieve her, ’cause I’d already caught her lyin’ ’bout Santa Claus. I sure have missed all of you, The Lady in the Chair an’ Mrs. Danny an’ Uncle Peter an’ Aunt Peter. I reckon I’m gonter go to sleep. I ain’t slep’ much since Aunty grabbed me up an’ carried me off. I been thinkin’ so much an’ then when I’d git mos’ asleep Aunty would pipe up an’ snore to beat the band. I ain’t been away from home but ’bout three nights but it seems to me as if I been born away from home an’ been a livin’ with ol’ Aunty all my life.”

“Tell me, Philip, before you go to sleep, was there anybody else with you and Aunty—a man?”

“One time there was. I think he was Aunty’s brother, only he didn’t make out he was my uncle. I heard them talkin’ an’ they writ a letter together. That was in the hotel after we saw the fire a burnin’. She called him Bill an’ she told him not to let ol’ C. lay eyes on him an’ he said he had some sense left. An’ then he went off with the letter an’ I ain’t never seen him since an’ I ain’t sorry neither, cause he was a turrible lookin’ man an’ I don’t see what ol’ C. would want to lay eyes on him for.”

Philip then put his head in Josie’s lap and slept peacefully until the porter gave warning that Louisville was the next stop.