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could not see it. No one had called her, but she found a can of tepid water outside her door and, wondering if she was late, made a scanty toilet and ran downstairs. The dining-room was empty but she found a small mo rn ing-room at the back of the house where Dane was already seated with Shorty in attendance.
    “Good-morning, M r. Merritt. I hope I’m not late,” Emily said, slipping into the place laid opposite him.
    “Breakfast is at eight-thirty. Didn’t Shorty tell you?” Dane asked, and for a moment she encountered that brief, blank stare.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, glancing at the clock. “I must have overslept,” and caught Shorty’s smug look of satisfaction. Emily’s grave glance met his for a moment and he looked away.
    “Help yourself,” said Dane courteously. “I shan’t want you any longer, Shorty.”
    “You always likes a second cup of coffee,” said Shorty insinuatingly.
    “Then Miss Moon can doubtless pour it out for me,” Dane replied, and the little man left the room with a vindictive glance in Emily’s direction.
    “I hope,” said Dane as the door closed, “you will pay no attention to Shorty’s manner. He’s devoted to me and seems to resent any addition to the household.”
    “He’s afraid for his job,” said Emily, helping herself to eggs and bacon. “He as much as told me so last night.”
    “A foolish attitude, as I’ve often told him,” replied Dane imperturbably. “I couldn’t get along without Shorty, as he ought to know. You will try, I hope, to bear with him, Emily. He’s been with me a long time.”
    Make friends with Bella, bear with Shorty, thought Emily, suddenly mutinous. Had the new employee no rights of her own?
    “You will have to bear with me more patiently than the others,” Dane said softly. “Think it over well.”
    She looked across at him and swift compassion drove out the momentary resentment. In the morning light he looked older and his eyes had the steady, unseeing stare of the blind.
    “If you want something of me, Mr. Merritt,” she said impulsively, “I wouldn’t find it hard to be patient,”
    Immediately his face took on a closed, still look which held much coldness.
    “I want nothing that you, or anyone else, aren’t prepared to give freely,” he said. “Above all, I want nothing from a sense of pity. What, I have to offer is on a purely commercial basis. I’d like the same in return.”
    Emily was silent. She was used to being snubbed by employers who seldom credited their paid help with personal feelings, but in this case the rebuke came hard. For the first time she wondered what Miss Pink’s other two applicants had been like, and if they, like herself, had been doubtful of measuring up to a blind employer’s demands?
    They finished their breakfast in silence. The bitch Bella, who lay by her master’s chair, had taken no exception to Emily’s presence, but her eyes had continued to watch, just as they had last night. The silence and the watchful dog began to worry her and she fidgeted.
    “You are too young,” said Dane abruptly.
    Emily’s pointed chin rose to meet the challenge.
    “Too young for what?” she demanded boldly.
    He smiled.
    “For matters outside your comprehension, perhaps. What’s making you nervous?”
    “The dog watches me,” she said.
    “She’s the only one of us who can," he said gently. “You’ll get used to her.”
    Emily gathered her lost courage together.
    “Mr. Merritt,” she said firmly, “if I’m to be here a month, I would like to know what my duties are. When do you like to give dictation?”
    He tossed his napkin on to the table and leaned back in his chair.
    “When the spirit moves me,” he replied indifferently. “There is no great hurry for the book’s completion.”
    “What are you writing?” she asked.
    “A thesis on the effect of nitro-glycerine compounds in relation to cardiac diseases,” he replied, and lifted one eyebrow quizzically. “Not very inspiring from