New Britain herald., 1917-12-28
To Whom Did Dicky Telephone?

our telephone, Margaret?"
 Cousin Agatha asked the question
 hurriedly she came in from the
 walk which she took every morning
 unless the weather was impossibly in-
 element. Her whole manner was full
 of suppressed excitement, and there
 was speculatively curious look in her
 eyes I did not like. and that warned
 me to be careful in my answer.
 There may be- I replied non-
 committally. II haven't had occasion
 to ask for a number this morning"
 refrained from mentioning that Mrs.
 Durkee had telephoned to me but a
 few minutes before.
 Well, you'll probably find out that
 there is," she said, for as I went into
 the drug store just now, Richard was in a booth talking away like mad. He
 didn't notice me, and, of course, didn't bother him.
 "Oh, that wouldn't prove our phone was out of order," I countered smoothly. If you had lived in the Y same house with Dicky long you would know that he is an inveterate telephone fiend. He went out for 8 walk a few minutes ago and I sup pose he thought of something he wished to say to someone in New York. and you know his impatience. He would never wait to come home. But will test the telephone if you are worried about it.
 I walked steadily to the telephone. took down the receiver and when I heard the operator murmur Mum ber?" said courteously:
 'Will you give me the time, please?'' ; Mine forty-eight.''
 onHr h1rwon ceiver and faced Cousin Agatha's crafty eyes. "The telephone is all right you see,' I said with as indifferent an air as could manage, and going to tho table where I had laid my knitting I gathered 1t up and started leisurely up the stairs. A Momentous Question. was conscious Cousin Agatha's eyes were fixed upon my retreating back, and heard malevolent sniff. But she didn't say anything more, for which I was truly grateful. and reached the shelter of my room and locked the. door behind me before throwing off the senblance of non- chalance I had so carefully assumed. 1 I laid my knitting down with hands l that trembled in spite of my effort to l
 
 my mirror looked into it as I mentally l questioned myself. It is a queer habit 1 of mine whenever I am troubled thus l to face my own reflection as I study 1 out my problems. It is to me as if the reflection in the mirror were 1 l very real person who could answer my questions There was but one question con- fronting me, but it was a momentous 1 one. Why had Dicky rushed to a tele- | phone as soon as he could get out of the house, after telling me that he couldn't reach by telephone the people with whom he had an engagement for the evening, but must acquaint them by a note of his change of plans
 There was only one answer, there could be but one. He did not wish me to know the identity of the peo- pie with whom he had the engage ment.
 That 1t was an engagement he very much wished to keep I knew from the manner in which he had received my announcement that Mrs. Durkee and her son were coming over to spend the evening with us before AL fred's departure for the officers train ing camp at Plattsburg. He had been very much put out at the thought of their coming, although the Durkees are old friends of his, and he is very fond of both Mrs. Durkee and her son.
 There were two possible explana- tions of Dicky's behavior, and neither of them was calculated to bring any, thing but humiliation and sorrow to me. The person with whom he had the engagement, and whose identity 1 he was carefully shielding from me, must be either Grace Draper or Edith Fairfax. Dicky kney that didn't ob- ject to his having social engagements which did not include me; indeed, to . have accompanied him to the "par- /; ties'' of some of his studio acquaint- ances would have bored me infinitely. While he did not make a practice of going out socially without me, yet there had been a number of occasions when he had done so, and he always told me all about his plans. Gan It Be?
 Grace Drapers name had not been mentioned between us for many m onths. If it hadn't been for the re- cent photograph of her I had found ! tucked into the box of Dicky's posses sions which was hidden behind the rafters of the Brennan house, from ! where we had moved, I should not :, have thought of her in connection with this strange behavior of Dicky's, dan- gerous as she undoubtedly was, de-. termined to make trouble between. Dicky and me, knew her to be. Dickys friendship with Edith Fair fax, the Virginia art student, whose studio was in the same building with his, had grieved and had annoyed me by the secrecy which Dicky had seen fit to throw around it. But as I looked at myself in the mirror I knew I would give great deal to be as- sured that the person to whom my