"How did you know who I was?" he asked, and
then added quickly, "Of course, you're a mind reader."
For the first time the girl smiled. Winthrop found it a charming
smile, wistful and confiding.
"I don't have to ask the spirit world," she said, "to tell me
who is District Attorney of New York."
"Yes," said the District Attorney; "yes, I suppose you have to
be pretty well acquainted with some of the laws -- those about
mediums?"
"If you knew as much about other laws," began Vera, "as I do
about the law -- " She broke off and again smiled upon him.
"Then you probably know," said Winthrop, "that what our excited
friend said to you just now is legally quite true?"
The smile passed from the face of the girl. She looked at the
young man with fine disdain, as a great lady might reprove with
a glance the man who snapped a camera at her. "Yes?" she asked.
"Well, what are you going to do about it -- arrest me?" Mocking
him, in a burlesque of melodrama, she held out her arms. "Don't
put the handcuffs on me," she begged.
Winthrop found her impudence amusing; and, with the charm of her
novelty, he was conscious of a growing conviction that,
somewhere, they had met before; that already at a crisis she had
come into his life.
"I won't arrest you," he said with a puzzled smile, "on one
condition."
"Ah!" mocked Vera; "he is generous."
"And the condition is," Winthrop went on seriously, "that you
tell me where we met before?"
The girl's expression became instantly mask-like.
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