"I must go
back and get some of them."
Timidly she approached the jewelry counter. Surely the clerks, or Miss
Allen, at least, recognized her. The latter stepped directly up to the
place where Dorothy stood.
"Good-morning," began the clerk, smiling pleasantly. "What can I do for
you?"
Dorothy was hardly ready to make her purchases. She answered the greeting
and said so. Then Miss Allen leaned over the counter.
"I wanted to tell you that Miss Dearing, the woman detective, has been
discharged."
"Oh, has she?" asked Dorothy. "I'm sorry."
"Well, you needn't be," Miss Allen assured her. "She didn't much care how
you fared."
"But she only made a mistake," pleaded Dorothy.
"Perhaps," and Miss Allen shrugged her shoulders; "but she took the
trouble to come to me and ask your address."
"My address!"
"Yes; wanted it awfully bad, too. I wouldn't take any customer's address
off a tag; not for all the detectives in the house. But I happen to know
some one else did."
"But what did she want my address for?" asked Dorothy as quietly as her
voice could speak in spite of her agitation.
"Don't know," replied the clerk, indicating she might be able to guess;
"but it might be handy some day. When she gets time to think it over, you
know."
Dorothy was now almost as greatly mystified as she had been when the woman
on the train spoke of Tavia.
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