When Kit and Churn left Krantz's Keller they walked fast along Fourteenth Street till they came to Sixth Avenue. There they appeared to hesitate, as if they could not decide whether to go up or down town. Clo, as close behind them as she dared to venture, guessed instantly that, until now, they had not entirely made up their minds which of several hiding-places it would be safest for them to seek.

Judging by their linked arms, and the nearness of the two heads, their conversation was absorbing. They stopped at the corner, and Clo stopped also. Presently the pair resolved on going down toward Thirteenth Street. Clo went after them. They walked for several blocks; and the girl following always glanced at the number of each street she passed. There had been an accident to a taxi, however, in the neighbourhood of Eleventh Street, and a crowd had collected. In this crowd Clo nearly lost the quarry. She had a moment of despair, then saw the skirt of Kit in the distance. No longer was she wearing a pink cloak, but a white one. She must have had a chance to turn it wrong side out!

So excited was Clo that she forgot to notice the streets. Whether the couple turned off the Avenue into Tenth, or Ninth, or Eighth, she was not sure. She was certain only that she was on their track. Then followed a chase across town. In this, the girl finally lost her head a little, but when it seemed that she could drag herself no further, Kit and Churn stopped in front of a house, and rang the bell.

"Neither of them lives there, or there'd be a latch-key!" Clo thought, hovering on the other side of the street.

It was some time before the two were let in; but after a delay of four or five minutes a woman opened the door. A dim gas light shone from the hall or lobby, and Clo's impression was of a dark brown face, the face of a negress. There was a short discussion; then the woman nodded, stepping aside to let Kit and Churn pass. An instant later the door shut them in.

Clo stood gazing at the house. It was one in a row of old-fashioned, shabby brick buildings, four storeys in height. A light showed in the basement, but other windows were black. Suddenly, as Clo watched, a yellow gleam flashed in a fourth-storey room but at the same moment a man stepped to the window and pulled down a dark blind. Clo thought that this man was Churn.

"They're going to stay," she argued; and crossing the street at a distance from the house, the girl looked at it with interest. There was no street lamp near, and she could not see the number; but there was a small plaque at the side of the door, and Clo tripped up the steps to read it. Joy, the place was a boarding house!

The pair having mounted to the fourth storey, Clo thought she might venture to ring. She pulled an old-fashioned bell, and her heart thumped in her breast as the shrill sound jingled through the house.

"I must have some tale to tell—why I'm here so late, wanting a room," she reflected.

The door was opened by the woman who had admitted Kit and Churn. Not only was she black, but she was fat and slovenly. Staring at the new-comer, she exclaimed with a mouth full of gum:

"Say, is you another fren' o' Mr. Cheffinsky?"

"Chuff!" was the password that flashed through Clo's brain. "This is where he lives!" She was triumphant.

"I don't know anything about Mr. Cheffinsky," she replied, "but I'm in a scrape, and a friend of mine once recommended me to this house. I saw some people come in, and a light. It's still a boarding-house, isn't it?"

"It ain't no foundlin' orphant asylum."

"I don't ask for charity. I've got money to pay my board. But I don't want an expensive room. One at the top of the house will do."

"Say, it's a real funny time o' night for a young girl like you to go lookin' foh a home to lay her haid," remarked the negress. "But you can step in the hall. I'll call Mis' MacMahon. She's the lady o' the house. We've got a room upstahs, but I don't know whethah she'll let you have it."

She allowed Clo to enter, and left the girl standing as she descended the basement stairs.

"'MacMahon' sounds hopeful!" Clo thought. The girl had lodged drearily in New York, but she had never been in a house as dreary as this.

Mrs. MacMahon's look was less inspiring than her name. She was of the big-jowled type; a grim woman of middle age; and her manner suggested suspicion. But Clo began to speak first, with her best brogue, which she could use, when needed, with great effect.

"I beg your pardon, ma'am, for intruding on ye at this time of the night," said the girl in her creamiest voice, with a child-like smile, "but the lady I'm maid for and me had a quarrel about a young man, and rather than give him up, I just walked away from the house, without waitin' to pack my things. I've walked till I'm played out! I tould yer maid a friend o' mine had spoken o' Mrs. MacMahon's place and I didn't forget. I'll pay a week in advance if you'll take me in."

Whether Mrs. MacMahon believed these out-pourings was an open question, but her face softened slightly at sound of the brogue.

"Irish, are you!" she said.

"Yes, County Cork, and not over since very long," returned the girl.

"I'm from County Cork, me and me dead husband both," volunteered the woman. "I've been in New York these twelve years. Violet says you ast for a top-floor room?"

"I did that," said Clo.

"Well, a top-floor room is the only wan I've got vacant. How long would ye be wanting it for?"

"Oh, a few days, and maybe more."

"You can come and have a look. I don't boast of the room. It's last choice. I charge seven dollars with board."

"I don't mind seven dollars," said Clo, and followed her hostess up flight after flight of dimly lighted stairs. They were covered with oilcloth, and the hall smelled of escaping gas, but the girl was almost happy. The place was not attractive, but it seemed decent enough.

"It's a hall room, but a front one," explained Mrs. MacMahon, panting, as they reached the top of the house. Clo was enchanted to hear this, for it meant that the room must adjoin the one where Churn had pulled down the blind. She wondered if Churn were married to Kit. Perhaps she would find out by and by.

"There's a husband and wife come into the double room next," Mrs. MacMahon went on, when she had shown Clo her proposed quarters. "The wall's kind of thin, for this room was part of the other once, but they're a quiet couple, I guess: and if you're quiet, too, you won't trouble each other. They're friends of a gentleman boarder we've had for some time, and they've been here to call on him, though they've never stayed before. I want 'em to be comfortable, so stir around as little as you can in the morning. I guess they're the kind that lies late in bed."

"I feel more as if I'd like to lie in bed all day!" sighed Clo.

"Well, sleep as much as you like. But don't be scared if ye hear folks movin' later on to-night. The friend of this couple is out, but he may come home and want to see 'em."

Clo paid seven dollars in advance for the room, and took pains to show that she had plenty of money. She begged also to buy or borrow a clean nightgown, and suggested that, if there were a new toothbrush in the house, she would be glad to have it. Mrs. MacMahon laughed. A nightgown she could lend, but as for a toothbrush, there wouldn't be one this side of the nearest drugstore. Miss Ryan (the name Clo gave) must wait till next day.

"Well, anyhow, maybe you've a bit you'll give me to eat!" the new boarder pleaded. "I'm that hungry I could bite off the door-knob! I'll pay extra, of course—this time of night. And your coloured woman—Violet, isn't she?—shall have a couple of dimes for bringing up the food."

Mrs. MacMahon softened and asked what food her guest desired. Clo desired nothing so much as a knife, and made a bid to secure one by asking for meat. "Any old kind!—and some bread and milk. I'll give fifty cents—" (she watched the woman's eye)—"I mean, a dollar for my supper."

When Mrs. MacMahon had gone the girl held her breath to listen. Yes, the wall was thin! She could hear Kit and Churn talking in an ordinary tone, but she could catch few words, even when she laid her ear against the dusty paper. When the voices sank low, they reached her only in an indistinct rumble.

She guessed that the tiny room was separated from the larger one by a partition of laths and plaster, covered on each side with flimsy wall paper. She could feel as well as hear someone walking up and down, up and down, in the next room! No doubt it was Churn. Now and then he would pause. A piece of furniture would creak; then he would jump up, to begin walking again.

Presently Violet appeared, a coarse nightgown hanging over her arm, a plate of bread and ham on a napkinless tray, and glass of bluish milk. Clo gave the woman twenty cents, and promised the same sum if her breakfast were brought upstairs. Violet agreed to this bargain, which was well for the girl. She would have starved rather than desert her room long enough to eat while Churn and Kit remained in their quarters. She surmised that they would not often go out.

Clo had told the truth in pleading hunger, but when she was alone and had locked her door, she took from the tray only the steel knife and fork which lay beside the plate. Having pushed the cot bed away from the wall, she sat down on the floor, Turk fashion. Choosing a spot which would be invisible with the bed in place, she waited till Churn was inclined to walk. Then she began delicately to dig at the plaster with her extemporized tools. Whenever Churn stopped, she stopped also, lest the rat-like noise should reach alert ears in the next room. For a long time she toiled, cautiously, slowly, gathering up bits of paper and plaster that fell, and collecting them in her lap. It was a tedious task, but not difficult. In less than an hour she had made—practically without noise—a hole the size of a silver dollar. It went through to the lathes; beyond that barrier her tools were of no avail. She needed a thin, sharp instrument like a hat-pin, to push between the slats of wood. A tiny hole would suffice. But she had no hat-pin in the close-fitting toque lent by Beverley. Her own was now a souvenir in O'Reilly's possession.

She tried hair-pins, but they bent, one after another. Then she searched for a nail, and found one at last, stuck in the wall, supporting a small mirror. Carefully she deposited this upon the bed (it wouldn't do to break a looking glass!) and set to work once more. At the end of twenty minutes' scratching, she felt resistance cease before the nail-point. Hastily she withdrew it, lest it should pierce too far; and stretched on the floor she listened with her ear to the aperture on her side of the wall.