CHAPTER II.
THE APARTMENT-HOUSE MYSTERY 1.
"This habit of becoming late for breakfast," Lady Ashleigh remarked, as she set down the coffee-pot, "is growing upon your father." Ella glanced up from a pile of correspondence through which she had been looking a little negligently.
"When he comes," she said, "I shall tell him what Clyde says in his new play--that unpunctuality for breakfast and overpunctuality for dinner are two of the signs of advancing age." "I shouldn't," her mother advised.

"He hates anything that sounds like an epigram, and I noticed that he avoided any allusion to his birthday last month.

Any news, dear ?" "None at all, mother.

My correspondence is just the usual sort of rubbish--invitations and gossip.

Such a lot of invitations, by-the-bye." "At your age," Lady Ashleigh declared, "that is the sort of correspondence which you should find interesting." Ella shook her head.