had wished to be delayed on the journey, but the evening in the lodge had been a delightful one. She had planned waffles with real maple syrup and coffee for breakfast. And now came this. It was disheartening.

Here in the gloom of early morning was the dark-faced woman claiming that her traveling bag had been taken. And who, in the end, could doubt it? It surely was not to be seen in the bunk room. Everything was turned over there except the dark one’s bunk which had been made up. And of course in a bunk flat as a pancake one does not look for a sizable traveling bag stuffed with all manner of things.

It was not in the large outer room either. When they went outside to see if some person might have crept in and taken it, or, as the dark-faced one insisted, “crept out to hide it” there was the clean white snow with never a track save the half-buried one of Mark Morris coming to report on the progress of the storm some hours before.

“It’s the strangest thing!” said Rosemary, for once finding herself quite out of bounds. “It can’t have gotten away. It just can’t!”

“I insist that every person in the place be searched!” the dark woman demanded.

“What! Search our pockets for a traveling bag?” A rotund drummer roared with laughter.

“Not for the bag, but for the valuable papers I carried. The bag, more than likely, has been burned in the fireplace.”

“Absurd!” exclaimed one of the middle-aged ladies. “Leather creates a terrible odor when burned.”

“Who said it was leather?” snapped the inquisitor. “It was, I believe, fiber.”

In the end, for the good of her company’s reputation, Rosemary persuaded them to submit to a search of a sort. The men emptied their pockets, then turned them inside out. The dark-faced woman went over the other women with hands that suggested they might have been used for that same purpose often, so deft, precise and cat-like were her motions.

It was while the men were going through their part of the performance that the young stewardess noticed a curious thing. The woman watched them all with what appeared to be slight interest until it came the turn of Danby Force who had paid so high a price for his reservation on this plane. Then it seemed to the girl that veritable sparks of fire shot from the black eyes of the woman. That she took in every detail was evident. That a look of grim satisfaction, seeming to say, “Ah ha! It is as I thought!” settled on the woman’s face at that moment, the girl could not for a moment doubt.

“But why?” she asked herself. “Why?”

To this question she could form no sensible answer for, as in all other cases, the woman said in a low tone: “None of these are mine.”

Just then the airplane pilot came in to tell them that the storm was at an end and they might resume their journey. In the rush of preparation, the hurried brewing of coffee, the hasty eating of a rather meager breakfast, the dark-faced woman and her vanished traveling bag were pretty much forgotten.

When at last the travelers were on their way, walking single-file up the steep incline, Rosemary found herself standing quite unexpectedly beside the strange young man, Danby Force.

“Wonderful place, this lodge!” he was saying. “Wouldn’t mind coming up here for a week sometime.”

“Nor I!” Rosemary spoke with unfeigned enthusiasm. And who would not? They were standing on a broad ledge. Above them, seeming to melt into the fleecy clouds, was the mountain’s snowy peak. Below, a sheer drop of a thousand feet, was a very narrow valley all covered with the dark green of pine, spruce, cedar and tamarack. The air was rich with the fragrance of the forest.

“One of the high officials in our company is a member,” Rosemary said, nodding back at the lodge. “That’s why we are free to use it.”

“I fancy I shall be coming back.” The young man spoke slowly. He looked her squarely in the eyes. Then turning, he followed swiftly after the others.

“What did he mean by that?” Rosemary asked herself. A strange thought leaped unbidden into her mind. “Supposing the young man took the missing bag and hid it somewhere about the place?

“Nonsense!” she whispered. “Where could he have hidden it? No one had been outside, absolutely no one. And if he did take it, surely he would not tell me he hoped to return.”

Then a strange fact struck her—the look on this young man’s face had changed. When she first saw him he had the appearance of one who had gone through much, who was still haunted by the thought of some great loss. Now his face was as bland and cheerful as an early spring morning.

“What am I to make of that?” she asked herself.

The answer in the end appeared simple enough, “One good night’s sleep.” This, she knew full well, was capable of working wonders on a young and buoyant spirit.

It is strange the manner in which a single incident may change the whole course of thought for an entire group. As they resumed their journey to Salt Lake City, no one in the plane discussed economic conditions or child welfare. No one read. No one wrote or figured. When they spoke it was in low tones just above the roar of the motors. And Rosemary, though she heard never a word, knew they talked of the dark-faced woman and her missing bag. “And those who do not talk are thinking of it,” she told herself. “And it is strange! What can have become of that bag?”

As if reading her thoughts, Danby Force leaned across the aisle to say in a low distinct tone: “I fancy Santa Claus must have come down that broad chimney and carried it off.”

Those were the only words spoken to her until they were nearing their destination. Then that strange young man leaned over once more to say:

“Curious sort of job you’ve got here! Necessary enough, though. And you fit in very well, I can see that. I am no end grateful for what you did back there in Chicago. You saved the situation for me, you surely did! Hope I may travel with you often. This is my first trip by air, but not the last—you may be assured of that. I enjoy being carried along by this—this invisible power.” He chuckled. “And I—I like the company, if you don’t mind my saying it.”

“Not in the least. I’ve enjoyed knowing you.” Rosemary was vexed at herself for saying so trite a thing. Truth was, her mind was still filled with that missing bag. That the dark-faced woman would report the loss to the office and that there would be no end of fuss about it, she did not doubt.

“I—I’d like to know you better,” she added as a kind of after-thought, as she favored Danby Force with a smile.

“You will,” he prophesied, “Oh yes, I am sure you will.”

“And if I don’t,” she told herself a moment later, “I shan’t know much except that he says his name is Danby Force and that he fancies, at least, that he can be of service to a few thousand people. Well—” she sighed, “that’s really something, if it’s not pure fancy.”

The landing field at Salt Lake City seemed hot after their rapid gliding down from the lands of perpetual snow. In spite of this, Rosemary Sample breathed a sigh of relief. Her journey was over. From this point the party would break up. She would rest for a few hours, then go soaring back to home base where she was to have two whole days to herself.

“Guess we’d better stick around for a bit,” suggested the pilot. “That woman will be putting in a complaint. We’ll have to tell what we know.

“For that