"
"How would you like to ride around in a first-class motor-car the rest
of your days?"
She laughed merrily. Possibly it _was_ funny.
"Are you always amusing like this?"
"Supposing I were serious?"
"In that case I should say you had not yet slipped off your fool's
motley."
This directness was discouraging.
"I wonder if the ten of hearts is lucky, after all," I mused.
"We are not in jail. I consider that the best of good fortune."
"Give me your card," said I.
She gave me the card, and I put it with mine.
"Why do you do that?"
"Perhaps I want to bring about an enchantment,"--soberly.
"As Signor Fantoccini, or as Mr. Comstalk?"
"I have long since resigned my position in the museum; it was too
exciting."
She made no rejoinder; and for some time there was no sound but the
music of the bells.
Finally we drew up under the colonial porte-cochere of Hollywood Inn
and were welcomed by the genial Moriarty himself, his Celtic
countenance a mirror of smiles.
"Anything in the house to eat?" I cried, shaking the robes from me.
"Anything ye like, if you like cowld things. I can hate ye a pot of
coffee on the gasolene-burner, and there's manny a vintage in the
cillars."
"That will be plenty!"--joyfully, helping Miss Hawthorne to alight.
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