“Just because she wouldn’t tell who gave her some money.  She couldn’t—­she had promised not to!  And it was her own money!  But I must begin at the beginning, or you can’t understand.”

Polly drew a long breath, and recounted the details of the sad story.

“The next morning I happened to go over to see Miss Nita,” she concluded, “and Mrs. Albright told me this.  Miss Crilly was there, too.  Miss Crilly rooms right next to Miss Twining and heard a good deal; but she didn’t dare to stir.”

Nelson Randolph gazed at Polly with troubled eyes, and rested his arm upon his desk.

“David Collins overheard something one night,” she went on.  “He was going up Edgewood Avenue when he came upon Mrs. Nobbs and a man,—­probably her brother,—­and what Mrs. Nobbs was saying made him keep along behind them, instead of passing as he was intending to do.”

As the talk was repeated, the listener’s face grew stern, and when Polly came to the end of her story he fingered the little silver elephant upon his desk before he spoke.

“You say that the board is not what it should be?”

“It is poor, dreadfully poor, Mr. Randolph.  Lately they’ve had stale meat and sour bread—­and hardly any fruit or green vegetables all summer long!”

“Yet her accounts stand for expensive roasts, lamb chops, early fruits when they are highest in price—­the best of everything!”

“They never get on the table,” asserted Polly.  “Miss Nita and the others have spoken again and again of their wretched living.  And the cooking is awful!”

“I am told that she pays her cook fifty dollars a month.”

“I don’t know what she pays,” Polly replied, “but they seldom have good cooking.  She is changing help all the time.”

“We have trusted her implicitly,” the president mused.  “Her father was a man of undoubted honor.”

“I don’t see that it would be much worse to steal from the Home than to take Miss Twining’s money or Miss Nita’s cards or—­”

“Cards?  From Miss Sterling?” broke in Nelson Randolph quickly.

“Didn’t you put your cards in those boxes of roses you sent her?” asked Polly.

“Certainly.”

“She never saw any!  Miss Castlevaine was going upstairs and happened to see that first box of roses on the hall desk.  Miss Sniffen was fingering a card.  When Miss Nita received the box there was no card there.  That was why she was so long in saying ’thank you,’—­she didn’t know where they came from.  We finally found out through the boy who brought them.”

Nelson Randolph frowned.  “A pretty state of affairs!” he muttered.

“And she never got one of your telephone messages!” Polly went on.

“What!” the man exclaimed.

“She didn’t!” Polly reiterated.

“But Miss Sterling gave me no hint of such a thing!”

“No.”  Polly returned sadly.  “I guess she didn’t dare.”