the M. O. R.'s," said Laura, quietly. "That's all we do know at present."
"But there's something else."
"That we don't know. I wish we did."
"And he's going out of town!"
"Perhaps that is not so," returned Laura, thoughtfully. "Of course his wife knows that he works under an assumed name. That is no crime, of course"
"But there's something odd about it all," cried Jess.
"All right. How are we going to find out? Lil won't tell us"
"And it is her business—or her mother's," said Jess. "And that's a fact."
"She's one of us—she's a Central High girl," repeated Laura. "If we can save her from the result of her own awful folly, we should do so."
"Huh! And we don't know what she's to be saved from as yet!" cried Jess, which ended the discussion for the time being.
But that evening Bobby Hargrew hailed Jess in her father's store.
"Say, Eminent Author! what do you know about this?"
"About what, Bobby?" returned Jess.
Bobby was unfurling some sort of a folded
