"Has he?" inquired Alix innocently.

"He left a note for you."

"Read it to me," said the girl.

"'Dearest: I am grieved beyond words to hear that you are so awfully done up. I am not surprised. It was enough to bowl anybody over. I did not sleep a wink last night, thinking about it. I have been living in a daze ever since. I cannot begin to tell you how disappointed I am in not being able to see you this morning. Perhaps by tonight you will feel like letting me come. Ever yours, Courtney.'"

"Well?" said Mrs. Strong, sitting down on the edge of the bed.

A fine line appeared between Alix's eyes. She was deep in thought.

"Have they caught the man?" she asked, after a moment.

"Not that I know of. What's more, they'll never catch him. Bill Foss sent word up he was bringing several Italians here to see if we could identify one of them as the man."

"How can we be expected to identify a man whose face was covered by a mask?"

"Well, Bill is doing his best," replied Mrs. Strong patiently. "We've got to say that much for him. Charlie Webster was here early this morning to say that the police up in town have been notified, and they're sending a detective out. But he won't be any better than Bill Foss, so it's a waste of time. What we ought to have is a Pinkerton man from Chicago."

Despite the calm, deliberate manner in which she spoke, there was an odd, eager light in Mrs. Strong's eyes.

"I wish you would go down to the warehouse, Aunt Nancy, and ask Charlie to take the car and go up to the city. Tell him to call up the Pinkerton offices in Chicago and ask them to send the best man they have. No one must know about it, however. Impress that very firmly upon Charlie. Not even the police—or Bill Foss. Have him arrange to meet the man in town and give him directions and all the information possible. Please do it at once,—and tell Ed to have the car ready."

"That's the way I like to hear you talk," cried Mrs. Strong.

Half an hour later, Charlie Webster was on his way to the city. He had an additional commission to perform. Mrs. Strong was sending a telegram to her son David.

II

The next day a well-dressed, breezy-looking young man walked into Charlie's office and exclaimed:

"Hello, Uncle Charlie!"

"Good Lord!" gasped Charlie Webster. "It can't be—why, by gosh, if it ain't Harry! Holy smoke!" He jumped up and grasped the stranger's hand. Pumping it vigorously, he cried: "I'd know that Conkling nose if I saw it in Ethiopia. God bless my soul, you're—you're a MAN! It beats all how you kids grow up. How's your mother? And what in thunder are you doing here?"

"I guess I've changed a lot, Uncle Charlie," said the young man, "but you ain't? You look just the same as you did fifteen years ago."

"How old are you? My gosh, I can't believe my eyes."

"I was twenty-four last birthday. You—"

"If ever a feller grew up to look like his father, you have, Harry. You're the living image of George Conkling,—and you don't look any more like your mother than you look like me."

"Well, you and Mother look a lot alike, Uncle Charlie. She's thinner than you are but—"

"Well, I should hope so," exploded Charlie. "Take a chair, Harry,—and tell us all about yourself. Wait a minute. Sam, shake hands with my nephew, Harry Conkling,—Mr. Slutterback, Mr. Conkling. Harry lives up in Laporte. His mother—"

"Guess again, Uncle Charlie. No more Laporte for me. I've been living in Chicago ever since I got married. Working for—"

"Married? You married? A kid like you? Well, I'll—be—darned!"

"Sure. And I'm not Harry, Uncle Charlie. I'm Wilbur. Harry's two years older than I am. He's married and got a kid three years old. Lives in Gary."

"You don't mean to say you're little Wilbur? Little freckle-faced Wilbur with the pipe-stem legs?"

Mr. Webster's nephew took a chair near the stove, unbuttoned his overcoat, and held his hands to the fire. He was a tall, rather awkward young man, with large ears, a turned-up nose and a prominent "Adam's Apple."

"I'm working for one of the biggest oil companies in the world. We've got six hundred thousand acres of the finest oil-producing territory in the United States, and we control most of the big concessions in Honduras, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia and—thirty million dollar concern, that's all it is. Oh, you needn't look worried. I'm not going to try to sell you any stock, Uncle Charlie. That is, not unless you've got fifty thousand to invest. I'll tell you what I'm here for. My company wants to interest Miss Crown in—"

"Hold on a minute, Wilbur," interrupted Charlie firmly. "You might just as well hop on a train and go back to Chicago. If you're expecting me to help you unload a lot of bum oil stock on Miss Alix Crown you're barking up the wrong tree,—I don't give a cuss if you are my own sister's son. Miss Crown is my—"

The young man held up his hand, and favoured his uncle with a tolerant smile.

"I'm not asking your help, old chap. I've got a letter to her from Mr. Addison Blythe, one of our biggest stockholders. All I'm asking you to do is to put me up at your house for a day or two while I lay the whole matter before Miss Crown."

"I haven't got any house," said Charlie, rather helplessly. "Wait a second! Let me think. How long do you expect to be here, Wilbur?"

"I wouldn't be here more than half an hour if I could get Miss Crown to say she'd take—"

"Well, she's sick and can't see anybody for a couple of days,—'specially book agents or oil promoters. I was just thinking I might fix something up for you over at the Tavern where I'm staying. It won't cost you a cent, my boy. I'd be a darned cheap sort of an uncle if I couldn't entertain my nephew when he comes to our town,—out of a clear sky, you might say. I'll be mighty glad to have you, Wilbur, but you've got to understand I won't have Miss Crown bothered while she's sick."

"Permit me to remind you, Uncle Charlie, that I am a gentleman. I don't go butting in where I'm not wanted. My instructions from the General Manager are very explicit. I am to see Miss Crown when convenient, and give her all the dope on our gigantic enterprise,—that's all."

"By the way,—er,—is that your automobile out there?"

"It's one I hired in the city."

"You—er—didn't happen to bring your wife with you, did you? Because it would be darned awkward if you did. She'd have to sleep with Angie Miller or Flora—"

"She's not with me, Uncle Charlie,—so don't worry. Of course, if it isn't convenient for you to have me for a day or two, I can motor in and out from the city. Money's no object, you know. I've got a roll of expense money here that would choke a hippopotamus."

"Come on over to the Tavern, Wilbur. We'll see Miss Molly Dowd and fix things up. Sam, if anybody asks for me, just say I'll be back in fifteen minutes."

And that is how "Mortie" Gilfillan, one of the ablest operatives in the Pinkerton service, made his entry into the village of Windomville. Inasmuch as he comes to act in a strictly confidential capacity, we will leave him to his own devices, content with the simple statement that he remained two full days at Dowd's Tavern as the guest of his "Uncle Charlie"; that he succeeded in obtaining an interview with the rich Miss Crown, that he "talked" oil to everybody with whom he came in contact, including Courtney Thane; that he declined to consider the appeals of at least a score of citizens to be "let in on the ground floor" owing to the company's irrevocable decision to sell only in blocks of ten thousand shares at five dollars per share; that he said good-bye to Mr. Webster at the end of his second day and departed—not for Chicago but, very cleverly disguised, to accept a job as an ordinary labourer with Jim Bagley, manager of the Crown farms.



CHAPTER XVIII

MR. GILFILLAN IS PUZZLED



Three days passed. The village had recovered from its excitement. The Weekly Sun appeared with a long and harrowing account of the "vile attempt to rifle the home of our esteemed and patriotic citizeness," and sang the praises of Courtney Thane, whose "well-known valour, acquired by heroic services during the Great War," prevented what might have been "a most lamentable tragedy."

Those three days were singularly unprofitable to the "hero." He was unable to see Alix crown. He made daily visits to her home but always with the same result. Miss Crown was in no condition to see any one.

"But she saw this fellow Conkling," he expostulated on the third day. "He sold her a lot of phony oil stock. If she could see him, I—"

"He came all the way from Chicago to see her,—with a letter from Mr. Blythe," explained Mrs. Strong. "She had to see him. I guess you can wait, can't you, Mr. Thane?"

"Certainly. That isn't the point. If I had seen her in time I should have warned her against buying that stock. She's been let in for a whale of a loss, that's all I can say,—and it's too late to do anything about it. Good Lord, if ever a woman needed a man around the house, she does. She—"

"I will tell her what you say," said Mrs. Strong calmly.

"Don't you do anything of the kind," he exclaimed hastily. "I was speaking to you as a friend, Mrs. Strong. She means a great deal to both of us. You understand how it stands with Alix and me, don't you? I—I would cheerfully lay down my life for her. More than that, I cannot say or do."

"She will be up by tomorrow," said Mrs. Strong, impressed in spite of herself by this simple, direct appeal. (All that day she caught herself wondering if he had cast his spell over her!)

"Please give her my love,—and say that I am thinking about her every second of the day," said he gravely, and went away.

Alix had received another letter from Addison Blythe. Enclosed with it was a communication from an official formerly connected with the American Ambulance. It was brief and to the point:

Courtney Thane volunteered for service in the American Ambulance in Paris in November, 1915. He was accepted and ordered to appear at the hospital at Neuilly-sur-Seine for instructions. His conduct was such that he was dismissed from the service before the expiration of a week, his uniform taken away from him, and a request made to the French Military authorities to see that he was ordered to leave the country at once. Our records show that he left hurriedly for Spain. He was a bad influence to our boys in Paris, and there was but one course left open to us. We have no account of his subsequent movements. With his dismissal from the service, he ceased to be an object of concern to us.

Alix did not destroy this letter. She locked it away in a drawer of her desk. She had made up her mind to confront Thane with this official communication. It was an ordeal she dreaded. Her true reason for refusing to see him was clear to her if to no one else: she hated the thought of hurting him! Moreover, she was strangely oppressed by the fear that she would falter at the crucial moment and that her half-guarded defences would go down before the assault. She knew his strength far better than she knew his weakness. She had had an illuminating example of his power. Was she any stronger now than on that never-to-be-forgotten night?...She put off the evil hour.

And on the same third day of renunciation, she had a letter from David Strong. She wept a little over it, and driven finally by a restlessness such as she had never known before, feverishly dressed herself, and set forth late in the afternoon for a long walk in the open air. She took to the leaf-strewn woodland roads, and there was a definite goal in mind.

II

Courtney remembered Rosabel Vick.

"I guess I'd better call her up," he said to himself. "I ought to have done it several days ago. Beastly rotten of me to have neglected it. She's probably been sitting over there waiting ever since—Gad, she may; have some good news. Maybe she is mistaken."

He went over to the telephone exchange and called up the Vick house. Rosabel answered.

"That you, Rosie?...Well, I couldn't. I've been laid up, completely out of commission ever since I saw you....What?...I—I didn't get that, Rosie. Speak louder,—closer to the telephone."

Very distinctly now came the words, almost in a wail:

"Oh, Courtney, why—why do you lie to me?"

"Lie to you? My dear girl, do you know what you are—"

A low moan, and a harsh, choking sob smote his ear, and then the click of the receiver on the hook.

"Well, I'll be hanged!" he muttered angrily. "That's the last time I'll call you up, take it from me."

And it was the last time he ever called her up.

Then he, too, ravaged by uneasy thoughts, struck off into the country lanes, the better to commune with himself. In due course, he came to the gate leading up to the top of Quill's Window. Here he lagged. His gaze went across the strip of pasture-land to the deserted house above the main-travelled road. He started. His gaze grew more intense. A lone figure traversed the highway. It turned in at the gate, and, as he watched, strode swiftly up the path to the front door....He saw her bend over, evidently to insert a key in the lock. Then the door opened and closed behind her.

III

Every word of David's letter was impressed on Alix's brain. Over and over again she repeated to herself certain passages as she strode rapidly through the winding lanes. She spoke them tenderly, wonderingly, and her eyes were shining.

DEAREST ALIX:

I have always loved you. I want you to know it. There has never been an hour in all these years that I have not thought of you, that your dear face has not been before me. In France, here, everywhere,—always I am looking into your eyes, always I am hearing your voice, always I am feeling the gentle touch of your hand. Now you know. I could not have told you before. I am the blacksmith's son. God knows I am not ashamed of that. But I cannot forget, nor can you, that a blacksmith's son lies buried at the top of that grim old hill, and that he was not good enough for the daughter of a Windom. I hear that you have given your heart to some one else. You will marry him. But to the end of your days,—and I hope they may be many,—I want you to know that there is one man who will love you with all his heart and all his soul to the end of HIS days. I hope you will be happy. It is my greatest, my only wish. Once upon a time, we stole away, you and I, to write romances of love and adventure. Even then, you were my heroine. I was putting you into my poor story, but you were putting your dreams into yours, and I was not your dream hero. Then we would read to each, other what we had written. Do you remember how guardedly we read and how stealthy we were so as not to arouse suspicion or attract attention to our lair? I shall never forget those happy hours. Every line I wrote and read to you, Alix dear, was of you and FOR you. You were my heroine. My hero, feeble creature, told you how much I loved you, and you never suspected.

I am telling you all this now, when my hope is dead, so that you may know that my love for you began when you were little more than a baby, and has endured to this day and will endure forever. I pray God you may always be happy. And now, in closing, I can only add the trite sentence,—which I recall reading in more than one novel and which I was imitative enough to put into my own unfinished masterpiece: If ever you are in trouble and despair and need me, I will come to you from the ends of the earth. I mean it, Alix. With all the best wishes in the world, I am and will remain

Yours devotedly,

DAVID.

P.S.—I have just looked up from this letter to catch sight of myself in a mirror across the office. I have to smile. That beastly but honourable glass reveals the true secret of my failure to captivate you. How could any self-respecting heroine fall in love with a chap with a nose like mine, and a mouth that was intended for old Goliath himself, and cheek bones that were handed down by Tecumseh, and eyes that squint a little—but I daresay that's because they are somewhat blurred at this particular instant. I am reminded of the "Yank" who had his nose shot off at Chateau Thierry. He said that now that the Germans didn't have anything visible to train their artillery on, the war would soon be over. He had lost his nose but not his sense of the ridiculous. I have managed to retain both.

Up in that bare, dust-laden room, with the two candles burning at her elbows, sat Alix. There were tears in her eyes, a wistful little smile on her lips. She was reading again the clumsy lines David had written in those long-ago days of adolescence. Now they meant something to her. They were stilted, commonplace expressions; she would have laughed at them had they been written by any one else, and she still would have been vastly amused, even now, were it not for the revelations contained in his letter. And the postscript,—how like him to have added that whimsical twist! He wanted her to smile, even though his heart was hurt.

Ten years! Ten years ago they had sat opposite each other at this dusty table, their heads bent to the task, their brows furrowed, their hands reaching out to the same bottle of ink, their souls athrill with romance. And she was writing of a handsome, incredibly valiant hero, whilst he—he was writing of her! Time and again his hand, in seeking the ink, had touched the hand of his heroine,—she remembered once jabbing her pen into his less nimble finger as she went impatiently to the fount of romance, and he had exclaimed with a grimace: "Gee, you must have struck a snag, Alix!" She recalled the words as of yesterday, almost as of this very moment, and her arrogant rejoinder, "Well, why can't you keep your hand out of the way?"

She was always hurting him, and he was always patient. She was always sorry, and he was always forgiving. She was superior in her weakness, he was gentle in his strength.

And his heroine? She read through the mist that filled her eyes and saw herself. The lofty heroine wooed by the poor and humble musician who crept up from unutterable depths to worship unseen at her feet! "The Phantom Singer!" The lover she could not see because her starry eyes were fixed upon the peak! And yet he stood beneath her casement window and sang her to sleep, lulled her into sweet dreams,—and went his lonely way in the chill of the morning hours, only to return again at nightfall.

She looked up from the sheet she held. She stared, not into space, but at the face of David Strong, sitting opposite,—the phantom singer. It was as plain to her as if he were actually there. She looked into his deep grey eyes, honest and true and smiling.

What was it he said in his letter? About his nose and mouth and eyes? They were before her now. That keen, boyish face with its coat of tan,—its broad, whimsical mouth and the white, even teeth that once on a dare had cracked a walnut for her; its rugged jaw and the long, straight nose; its wide forehead and the straight eyebrows; and the thick hair as black as the raven's wing, rumpled by fingers that strove desperately to encourage a recalcitrant brain; and those big, bony hands, so large that her little brown paws were lost in them; and the broad shoulders hunched over the table, supported by widespread elbows that encroached upon her allotted space so often that she had to remind him: "I do wish you'd watch what you're doing," and he would get up and meekly recover the scattered sheets of paper from the floor. Ugly? David ugly? Why, he was BEAUTIFUL!

Suddenly her head dropped upon her arms, now resting on David's manuscript; she sobbed.

"Oh, Davy,—Davy, I wish you were here! I wish you were here now!"

The creaking of the stairs startled her. She half arose and stared at the open door, expecting to see—the ghost! Goose-flesh crept out all over her. The ghost that people said came to—

The very corporeal presence of Courtney Thane appeared in the doorway.

For many seconds she was stupefied. She could see his lips moving, she knew he was speaking, she could see his smile as he approached, and yet only an unintelligible mumble came to her ears.

"—and so I cut across the field and ventured in where angels do not fear to tread," were the first words that possessed any degree of coherency for her.

She hastily thrust the precious manuscript into the drawer. He stopped several feet away and looked about the room curiously, his gaze coming back to her after a moment. The light of the candles was full on her face.

"Well, of all the queer places," he said. "What in the world brings you here? I thought no one ever entered this house, Alix."

"I have not been inside this house in ten years," she said, struggling for control of herself. "I came today to—to look for some papers that were left here. I was on the point of leaving when you came up." She picked up her gloves from the table.

"It's cold here. Do you think it was wise for you to sit here in this chilly—Gad, it's like an ice-house or a tomb. Better let me give you my coat." He started to remove his overcoat. There was an anxious, solicitous expression in his eyes.

"No,—no, thank you. I am quite warm,—and I shall be as warm as toast after I've walked a little way. I must be going now, Mr. Thane." She took a few steps toward the door.

"Are you going away without blowing the candles out?" he inquired.

She halted. She felt herself trapped. She did not want to be alone in the dark with him.

"If you will go ahead while there is light, I will follow—" The solution came suddenly. "How stupid! There is nothing to prevent us carrying the candles downstairs with us, is there? Will you take one, please?"

She returned to the table and took up one of the candlesticks.

"I've been terribly worried about you, Alix," he said, without moving. "How wonderful it is to see you again,—to see what is really you and not the girl I've seen in dreams for the past few endless nights. You in the flesh, you with your beautiful eyes, you whose lips—oh, God, I—I have been nearly mad, Alix. A thousand times I have felt you in my arms,—you've never been out of them in my thoughts. I—"

"Please—please!" she cried, shrinking back and putting her hands to her temples.

Still he did not move. There was a gentleness in his voice, a softness that disarmed her. It was not the voice of a conqueror, rather it was that of a suppliant.

"I am not worthy to touch the hem of your garment," he went on, an expression of pain leaping swiftly to his eyes. "I am most unworthy. My life has not been perfect. I have done many things that I am ashamed of, things I would give my soul to recall. But my love for you, Alix Crown, is perfect. All the good that God ever put into me is in this feeling I have for you. You are the very soul of me. If you tell me to go away, I will go. That is how I love you. You DO believe I love you with all my heart and soul, don't you, Alix? You DO believe that I would die for you?"

Now she was looking into his eyes across the candle flames. David's features had vanished. She saw nothing save the white, drawn face of the man whose voice, sweet with passion, fell upon her ears like the murmur of far-off music. She felt the warm thrill of blood rushing back into her icy veins, surging up to her throat, to her trembling lips, to her eyes.

"I—I don't know what to think—I don't know what to believe," she heard herself saying.

He came a step or two nearer. Her eyes never left his. She tried to look away.

"I want you to me mine forever, Alix. I want you to be my wife. I want you to be with me to the end of my life. I cannot live without you. Do not send me away now. It is too late."

Her knees gave way. She sank slowly to the bench,—and still she looked into his gleaming eyes.

He came to her. She was in his arms. His face was close to hers, his breath was on her cheek....

"No! No!" she almost shrieked, and wrenched herself free. "Not now! Not here! Give me time—give me time to think!"

She had sprung to her feet and was glaring at him with the eyes of an animal at bay. He fell back in astonishment.

"You—you had no right to follow me here," she was crying. "You had no right! This place is sacred. It is sanctuary." Her voice broke. "My mother was born in this room. She died in this room. And I was born here. Go! Please go!"

He controlled himself. He held back those words that were on his tongue, ready to be flung out at her: "Yes, and in this room you behaved like hell with David Strong!" But he checked them in time. He lowered his head.

"Forgive me, Alix," he said abjectly. "I—I did not know. I was wrong to follow you here. I could not help myself. I was mad to see you. Nothing could have stopped me." He looked up, struck by a sudden thought. "You call this sanctuary. It is a sacred place to you. Will you make it sacred to me? Promise here and now, in this sanctuary of yours, to be my wife, and all my life it shall be the most sacred spot on earth."

She turned her head quickly to look at David Strong. A startled, incredulous expression leaped into her eyes. He was not there. By what magic had he vanished? She had felt his presence. He was sitting there a moment ago, his tousled head bent down over the pad of paper,—she was sure of it! Then she realized. A wave of relief surged over her. He was not there to hear this man making love to her in the room where he had poured out his soul to her. She experienced a curious thrill of exultation. David could never take back those unspoken words of love. She had them safely stored away in that blessed drawer!

A flush of shame leaped to her cheeks. She could not banish the notion that he,—honest, devoted David,—had seen her in this man's arms, clinging to him, giving back his passionate kisses with all the horrid rapture of a—She stiffened. Her head went up. She faced the man who had robbed David.

"I cannot marry you," she said quietly. The spell was gone. She was herself again. "I do not love you."

He stared, speechless, uncomprehending.

"You—you do not love me?" he gasped.

"I do not love you," she repeated deliberately.

"But, good God, you—you couldn't have kissed me as you—"

"Please!"

"—as you did just now," he went on, honestly bewildered. "You put your arms around my neck,—you kissed me—"

"Stop! Yes, I know I did,—I know I did. But it was not love,—it was not love! I don't know what it was. You have some dreadful, appalling power to—Oh, you need not look at me like that! I don't care THAT for your scorn. Call me a fool, if you like,—call me ANYTHING you like. It is all one to me now. What's done, is done. But it can never happen again. I will not even say that I am ashamed, for in saying so I would be confessing that I was responsible for my actions. I was not responsible. That is all, Mr. Thane. No doubt you are sincere in asking me to be your wife. No doubt your love for me is sincere. I should like to think so—always. It would help me to forget my own weakness. I am going. I want you to leave this house before I go, Mr. Thane."

She spoke calmly, evenly, with the utmost self-possession.

"I can't let you go like this, Alix! I can't take this as final. You—you MUST care for me. How can I think otherwise? In God's name, what has happened to turn you against me? You owe me more of an explanation than—"

"You are right," she interrupted. "I do owe you an explanation. This is not the time or the place to give it. If you will come to see me tomorrow, I will tell you everything. It is only fair that you should know. But not now."

"Has some one been lying about me?" he demanded, his eyes narrowing.

She waited an instant before replying.

"No, Mr. Thane," she said; "no one has been lying about you."

He took up his hat from the table.

"I will come tomorrow," he said. At the door he paused to say: "But I am not going to give you up, Alix. You mean too much to me. I think I understand. You are frightened. I—I should not have come here."

"Yes, I WAS frightened," she cried out shrilly. "I was frightened,—but I am not afraid now."

She had moved to Thane's side of the table, and there she stood until she heard his footsteps on the little porch outside.

She was in an exalted frame of mind as she hurried from the house. The short October day had turned to night. For a moment she paused, peering ahead. A queer little thrill of alarm ran through her. She had never been afraid of the dark before. But now she shivered. A great uneasiness assailed her. She listened intently. Far up the hard gravel road she heard the sound of footsteps, gradually diminishing. He was far ahead of her and walking rapidly.

At the gate she stopped again. Then she struck out resolutely for home,—the Phantom Singer was beside her. She was not afraid.

A farm-hand, leaning on the fence at the lower corner of the yard, scratched his head in perplexity.

"Well, here's a new angle to the case," he mused sourly. "I'm up a tree for sure. Why the devil should Miss Crown be meeting him out there in this old deserted house. My word, it begins to look a trifle spicy. It also begins to look like a case that ought to be dropped before it gets too hot. I guess it's up to me to see my dear old Uncle Charlie What's-His-Name."

Whereupon Mr. Gilfillan set off in the wake of the girl who had employed him to catch the masked invader.



CHAPTER XIX

BRINGING UP THE PAST



Charlie Webster wore a troubled expression when he appeared for dinner that same evening. He was late. If such a thing were believable, his kindly blue eyes glittered malevolently as they rested upon the face of Courtney Thane, who had taken his place at table a few minutes earlier. The fat little man was strangely preoccupied. He was even gruff in his response to Mr. Pollock's bland inquiry as to the state of his health.

"How's your liver, Charlie?" inquired the genial editor. This amiable question was habitual with Mr. Pollock. He varied it a little when the object of his polite concern happened to be of the opposite sex; then he gallantly substituted the word "appetite." It was never necessary to reply to Mr. Pollock's question. In fact, he always seemed a little surprised when any one did reply, quite as if he had missed a portion of the conversation and was trying in a bewildered sort of way to get the hang of it again.

"Same as it was yesterday," said Charlie. "I don't want any soup, Maggie. Yes, I know it's bean soup, but I don't want it, just the same."

"Going on a hunger strike, Charlie?" inquired Doc Simpson.

"Sh! He's reducing," scolded Flora Grady.

"What's on your mind, Charlie?" asked Courtney.

Charlie swallowed hard. He made a determined effort and succeeded in recovering some of his old-time sprightliness.

"Nothing, now that I've got my hat off."

"Have you heard the latest news, Charlie?" inquired Mrs. Pollock, a thrill of excitement in her voice.

He started, and looked up quickly. "There's been so blamed much news lately," he muttered, "I can't keep track of it."

"Well, this is the greatest piece of news we've had in ages," said the poetess. "Wedding bells are to ring in our midst. Somebody you know very well is going to be married."

Mr. Webster's heart went to his boots. He stared open-mouthed at the speaker.

"Oh, my Lord!" he almost groaned. "Don't tell me she has promised to marry—" He broke off to glare venomously at Thane.

"Don't blame me for it, Charlie," exclaimed the latter. "I am as innocent as an unborn babe. Charge it to woman's wiles." He laughed boisterously, unnaturally.

Mr. Pollock spoke. "The next issue of the Sun will contain the formal announcement of the engagement of the most popular and beloved young lady in Windomville. No doubt it will be old news by that time,—next Thursday,—but publication in the press gives it the importance of officialty."

"We may congratulate ourselves, however, that we are not to lose her," said Mrs. Pollock. "She is to remain in—"

"Whe-when is it to take place?" groaned Charlie, moisture starting out on his brow.

"That," began Mr. Pollock, "is a matter which cannot be definitely announced at present, owing to certain family—er—ah—conditions. In addition to this, I may say that there is also the children to consider, as well as the township trustee and, to an extent, the taxpayer. The—"

"All I've got to say," grated Charlie, "is that the police ought to be consulted, first of all."

"The police!" exclaimed Angie Miller.

"The—the what?" gasped Furman Hatch, lifting his head suddenly. He was very red in the face. "I'd like to know what the devil the police have to do with it?"

Charlie took a look at Angie Miller's face, and then the truth dawned upon him. He sank back in his chair so suddenly that the legs gave forth an ominous crack.

"Don't do that!" cried Margaret Slattery sharply. "You know them chairs are not made of iron. And I don't want you flopping all over me when I'm passing the stew—"

"Yes, sir!" boomed Charlie, who had collected his wits by this time, and was pointing his finger accusingly at Mr. Hatch. "The police have simply got to be called. It's going to take half the force, including Bill Foss, to keep me from drinking the heart's blood of my hated rival. Ladies and gents, that infernal, low-down villain over there has come between me and—But nobody shall say that Charles Darwin Webster is a poor loser! Say what you please about him, but do not say he is a short sport. It breaks my heart to do it, but I'm coming around there to shake hands with you, old Tintype. I'm going to congratulate you, but I'm never going to get through hating you."

He arose and bolted around the table. Mr. Hatch got to his feet and the long and the short man clasped hands.

"Put her there, old boy! I've already made up my mind what my wedding present is going to be. The day before the wedding I'm coming in and order a dozen photographs of myself,—pay for 'em in advance. And I'm going to give every darned one of 'em to the bride, so's she can stick 'em up all over the house just to make you feel at home, you blamed old bachelor. And as for you, Miss Angelina Miller, the very topmost height of my ambition will be reached in less than two minutes after the ceremony. Because, then and there, I'm going to kiss you. Bless you, my children. As old Rip Van Winkle used to say, 'may you live long and brosper.'"

Having delivered himself of this felicitous speech, the somewhat relieved Mr. Webster wiped his brow.

"What did he say?" quaked old Mrs. Nichols, putting her hand to her ear.

"Says he hoped they'd be happy," bawled old Mr. Nichols, close to her ear.

"Pass the bread, Doc," said Mr. Hatch, getting pinker and pinker.

"When's it to take place, Angle?" inquired Charlie, resuming his seat. He cast a sharp look at Courtney. The young man shifted his gaze immediately.

"As I explained to Mr. Pollock, everything depends on my aunt," said Angie composedly. "She is very old,—eighty-three, in fact."

"You don't mean to say your aunt objects to your marrying old Tintype," exclaimed Charlie.

"Not at all," replied Angie, somewhat tartly.

"You see, it's this way," volunteered Mr. Pollock. "Miss Angie is the sole support of a venerable and venerated aunt who lives in Frankfort. That is a thing to be considered. Her duty to her father's sister—"

Courtney interrupted, chuckling. "It's too much to ask of any woman. I suppose it must take nearly all you earn, Miss Miller, to support your aged relative, so naturally you do not feel like taking on Mr. Hatch immediately."

There was a moment's silence around the table.

"I see by the Chicago Tribune," said Mr. Pollock, after a hurried gulp of coffee, "that there's likely to be a strike of the street-car men up there."

"You don't say so," said Doc Simpson, looking so concerned that one might have been led to suspect that he was dismayed over the prospect of getting to his office the next day.

"What's the world coming to?" sighed Maude Baggs Pollock nervously. "Strikes, strikes everywhere. Murder, bloodshed, robbery, revolution—"

"Next thing we know," put in Charlie Webster, without looking up from his plate, "God will strike, and when He does there'll be hell to pay, begging your pardon, ladies, for using a word that sounds worse than it tastes."

"I use it every day of my life," said Miss Flora Grady. "It's a grand word, Charlie," she added, a little defiantly.

"Times have changed," remarked Mr. Pollock blandly. "It wasn't so very long ago that women Said 'pshaw' when they wanted to let off steam. Then they got to saying 'shucks,' and from that they progressed to 'darn,' and now they say 'damn' without a quiver. Only yesterday I heard my wife say something that sounded suspiciously like 'dammit to hell' when she upset a bottle of ink on her desk. She hasn't stubbed her toe against a rocking-chair lately, thank goodness."

Doc Simpson stopped Courtney as he was starting upstairs after dinner. The dentist was unsmiling.

"Say, Court, I'm running a little close this week. Been so much excitement a lot of patients have forgotten all about their teeth. Can you let me have that ten you borrowed last week?"

"Sure," said Courtney, in his most affable manner. "I'll hand it to you tomorrow. I'll give it to you now if you'll wait till I run upstairs and get it out of my trunk. That's my bank, you know."

"Tomorrow'll do all right," said Doc, a trifle abashed.

"Can I see you a second, Mr. Thane?" called Miss Grady, when he was halfway up the stairs.

He stopped and smiled down at her. "I hope you'll forgive me if I don't come down, Miss Flora. My knee is still on the blink. It hurts worse to go downstairs, than it does up."

"I'll come up," said Miss Grady promptly. "You remember those roses I ordered for you last week? Well, I had to pay cash for them, including parcel post. You owe me seven dollars and thirteen cents."

"I'm glad you spoke of it. I hadn't forgotten it, of course, but—I simply neglected to square it up with you. Have you change for a twenty, Miss Flora?"

"Not with me."

"I'll hand it to you tomorrow. Seven-thirteen, you say? Shall we make it seven-fifteen?" He favoured her with his most engaging smile, and Miss Grady, who thought she had steeled her heart against his blandishments, suffered a momentary relapse and said, "No hurry. I just thought I'd remind you."

He failed completely, however, to affect the susceptibilities of Miss Mary Dowd, who presently rapped at his door, and rapped again when he called out "Come in." He opened the door.

"Pardon me, Mr. Thane, for coming up to speak to you about your bill. Will it be convenient for you to let me have the money this evening?"

She did not soften the dun by offering the usual excuse about "expenses being a little heavier this month than we expected," or that she "hated to ask him for the amount."

"Is it three or four weeks, Miss Molly?" he inquired, taking out an envelope and a pencil.

"Four weeks today."

"Sixty dollars." He jotted it down. "I cannot let this opportunity pass to tell you how thoroughly satisfied I have been with everything here, Miss Molly. The table is really extraordinarily good. I don't see how you can do it for fifteen dollars a week, including room." He replaced the envelope in his pocket, and smiled politely, his hand going to the door knob.

"We couldn't do it, Mr. Thane, unless we stuck pretty closely to our rule,—that is, of asking our patrons to pay promptly at the end of every week."

"It's really the only way," he agreed.

"So if you will be kind enough to let me have the amount now, I will be very much obliged to you."

He stepped to the head of the stairs, ostensibly to be nearer a light, and took out his purse. While counting out the bills, he cast frequent glances down into the lower hall. The buzz of conversation came up from the "lounge."

"I think you will find the proper amount here, Miss Molly," he said, after restoring the purse to his pocket.

She took the bank-notes and counted them.

"Quite correct, Mr. Thane. Thank you. By the way, I have been meaning to ask how much longer you contemplate remaining with us. Pastor Mavity has been inquiring for room and board for his sister, who is coming on from Indianapolis to spend several months in Windomville. If by any chance you are thinking of vacating your room within the next few days, I would be obliged if you would let me know as soon as possible in order that I may give Mr. Mavity an answer."

"I think I shall be leaving shortly, Miss Dowd. I can let you know in a day or two," said he stiffly. "I am afraid your winters are too severe for me. Good night,—and thank you for being so patient, Miss Dowd."

Meanwhile, Miss Angie Miller had taken Charlie Webster off to a corner of the "lounge" remote from the fireplace. She was visibly excited.

"I had a letter in this afternoon's mail from my uncle, Charlie," she announced in subdued tones. "My goodness, you'll simply pass away when you read it."

"Where is it?" demanded Charlie eagerly.

"I haven't even shown it to Furman," said she, looking over her shoulder. "I've been wondering whether I ought to let him read it first."

"Not at all," said he promptly. "It's none of his business. This is between you and me, Angie. Let's have a look at it."

"I don't think you'd better read it here," she whispered nervously. "It—it is very private and confidential."

"That's all right," said Charlie. "I'll sneak upstairs with it, Angie."

"Well, act as if you are looking out of the window," she said, and when his back was turned she produced the letter from its hiding place inside her blouse.

II

Charlie retired to his room a few minutes later. There he perused the following letter, written on the stationery of Beck, Blossom, Fredericks & Smith, Attorneys-at-law, New York City:

MY DEAR NIECE:

Pardon my delay in replying to your letter of recent date. I have been very busy in court and have not been in a position to devote even a little of my time to your inquiry. Your second letter reached me yesterday, and I now make amends for my previous delinquency by answering it with a promptness most uncommon in lawyers.

The firm of which I am a member appeared in 1912 for the plaintiff in the case of Ritter vs. Thane. Our client was a young woman residing in Brooklyn. The defendant was Courtney Thane, the son of Howard Thane, and no doubt the young man to whom you refer. In any case, he was the grandson of Silas Thane, who lived in your part of the State of Indiana. We were demanding one hundred thousand dollars for our client. Miss Ritter was a trained nurse. Young Thane had been severely injured in an automobile accident. If YOUR Courtney Thane is the same as MINE, he will be walking with a slight limp. His left leg was badly crushed in the accident to which I refer. For several months he was unable to walk. Upon his removal from St. Luke's Hospital to his father's home in Park Avenue, a fortnight after the accident, our client was employed as a nurse on the case. This was early in the spring of 1912. In June the Thane family went to the Berkshires, where they had rented a house for the summer. Our client accompanied them. Prior to their departure, Thane, senior, had settled out of court with the occupants of the automobile with which his son's car had collided in upper Broadway. His son was alone in his car when the accident occurred, but there were a number of witnesses ready to testify that he was driving at a high rate of speed, regardless of traffic or crossings. If my memory serves me correctly, his father paid something like twenty-five thousand dollars to the three persons injured. That, however, is neither here nor there, except to illustrate the young man's disregard for the law.

Miss Ritter had been on the case a very short time before he began to make ardent love to her. She was an extremely pretty girl, two years his senior, and, I am convinced, a most worthy and exemplary young woman. She became infatuated with the young man. He asked her to marry him. (Permit me to digress for a moment in order to state that while Courtney Thane was in his freshman year at college his father was obliged to pay out quite a large sum of money to a chorus-girl with whom, it appears, he had become involved.) To make a long story short, our client, trusting implicitly to his honour and submitting to the ardour of their joint passion, anticipated the marriage ceremony with serious results to herself. When she discovered that he had no intention of marrying her, she attempted suicide. Her mother, on learning the truth, went to Thane's parents and pleaded for the righting of the wrong. Howard Thane had, by this time, lost all patience with his son. He refused to have anything to do with the matter. The young man's mother ordered Miss Ritter's mother out of the apartment and threatened to have her arrested for blackmail. Shortly after this episode, we were consulted by Mrs. Ritter, much against the wishes of her daughter, who shrank from the notoriety and the disgrace of a lawsuit. The elder Thane was adamant in his decision that his son should marry the girl, who, he was fair enough to admit, was a young woman of very superior character and who, he was convinced, had been basely deceived. The mother, on the other hand, was relentlessly opposed to the sacrifice of her son. We took the matter to court. On the morning of the first day of the trial, before the opening of court, the defendant's counsel came to us with a proposition. They offered to settle out of court for twenty-five thousand dollars. In the end, we accepted fifty thousand, and the case was dismissed. Afterwards counsel for the other side informed us that the elder Thane turned his son out of his home and refused to have anything more to do with him. I understand the young man went to Europe, where he subsisted on an allowance provided by his mother. Thane, senior, died shortly after this. Our client, I am pained to say, died with her babe in childbirth.

You may be interested to know, my dear niece, that Mrs. Thane married soon after her husband's death. Her second husband was a young French nobleman, many years her junior. He was killed in the war, I think at Verdun. I understand she is now living in this city. Her present name escapes me, but I know that her widowhood has been made endurable by a legacy which happens to be one in name only. In other words, he left her the title of Countess.

If I can be of any further service to you, my dear niece, pray do not hesitate to call upon me. Believe me to be...etc., etc.

Within ten minutes after the perusal of this very convincing indictment, Charlie Webster was on his way to Alix's home. He was quite out of breath when he presented himself at the front door, and his first words to Alix were:

"While I'm getting my breath, Alix, you might prepare yourself for a shock."



CHAPTER XX

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ROSABEL VICK



Early the next morning, the telephone in township assessor Jordan's house rang. Annie Jordan was "setting" the breakfast table. She waited for the call to be repeated; she was not sure whether the bell had rung thrice or four times. Their call was "Party J, ring four." Four sharp rings came promptly. She looked at the kitchen clock. It lacked five minutes of seven.

"Gee," she grumbled, "I didn't know anybody had to get up as early as I do." Taking down the receiver she uttered a sweet "hello," because, as she said, "You never know who's at the other end, and it's just as likely to be HIM as not."

"Is that you, Annie? This is Mrs. Vick. May I speak to Rosabel?"

"Why, Rosabel isn't here, Mrs. Vick."

"What?"

"Rosabel isn't here."

There was a short silence. Then: "Are you joking with me, Annie? If she isn't up yet, please tell her to—"

"Honest to goodness, Mrs. Vick, she's not here. I haven't seen her since day before yesterday."

"She said she was going over to spend the night with you. She left home about four yesterday. Oh, my goodness, I—I—is there any one else she might have,—I'm sure she said you, though, Annie. Can you think of any one else? She took her nightdress—and things."

"She always comes here, Mrs. Vick," said Annie, and felt a little chill creeping over her. "Still she may have gone to Mrs. Urline's. She and Hattie are good friends. Shall I call up and ask? I'll ring you up in a couple of minutes."

That was the beginning. Within the hour the whole of Windomville was talking about the strange disappearance of the pretty daughter of Amos Vick, across the river. Old Jim House, the handy-man at Dowd's Tavern, inserted his shaggy head through the dining-room door and informed the editor of the Sun in a far from ceremonious manner that he had an "item" for the paper.

"I'll be out as soon as I've finished breakfast," said Mr. Pollock.

"Well, you can't say I didn't tell ye," said Jim, and withdrew his head. "No wonder there ain't ever anything worth readin' in that pickerune paper of his, Maggie," he growled to Margaret Slattery. "If ever I DO subscribe for a paper, it's goin' to be one that's got some git up and go about it. Some Injinapolis er Cincinnaty paper, b'gosh. There's Link Pollock settin' in there eatin' pancakes while a girl is bein' missed from one end of the township to the other. Bill Foss has—"

"What girl?" demanded Margaret.

"That girl of Amos Vick's. They ain't seen hide er hair of her sence yesterday afternoon. Amos is over to the drug store, nearly crazy with suspicion. I got it all figgered out. One of two things has happened. She's either run off to get married er else she's been waylaid and—er—execrated by some tramp. Like as not the very feller that peeped in at Alix Crown's winder the other night. 'Twouldn't surprise me a particle if she was found some'eres er other with her head beat in or somethin'! And Link Pollock jest sits in there stuffin' pan—"

Margaret Slattery having disappeared abruptly into the dining-room, Jim grunted and edged over to the kitchen range, where Miss Jennie Dowd was busily engaged.

"I ain't got nothin' personal ag'in Link Pollock, Jennie," he said, sniffing the browning batter with pleasurable longing, "but if you was to ask me I'd say his wife is twice the man he is, and a little over. The minute that woman is a widder I'm goin' to subscribe for the paper, 'cause I know she'll—What say, Jennie?"

"Bring me another scuttle of coal,—and, for goodness' sake, don't smoke that pipe in my kitchen."

"What's the matter with this here pipe?" demanded Mr. House in some surprise.

"Never mind. I'm busy."

"Yes,—cookin' pancakes for that—all right, ALL RIGHT, I'll get your coal fer ye. I ought to be out helpin' Amos Vick to investigate fer his daughter, that's where I ought to be. First thing you know, he'll be offerin' twenty-five er fifty dollars fer her and—say, it seems to me you ought to be more interested in that pore lost girl than makin' pancakes fer Link Pollock." He prepared to sit down. "There's a lot of people in this here town payin' him two dollars a year fer to git the news, and all he does is to—All right, I wasn't goin' to set down anyways. I was jest movin' this cheer out o' the way a little, so's Maggie—Yes, and with coal as high as it is now and a lot of pore people starvin' and freezin' to death, it exaggerates me considerable to see you wastin'—Well, is he still eatin', Maggie?"

"He's beat it upstairs to change his carpet slippers," announced Margaret Slattery excitedly. "You needn't make any more, Miss Jennie. They're all beatin' it,—all except Mr. Thane, and he says he don't want any more. He says he ain't feelin' well and thinks he'll go up to his room and lay down for a while."

"Well, seein's you don't need that coal, Jennie, I guess I'll mosey along and see if I c'n be any help to Amos. This jest goes to show what an ijit I'd ha' been to let my pipe go out."

Courtney Thane hung over the little stove in his room, shivering as with a chill. About ten o'clock some one knocked at his door. He started up from the chair, his gaze fixed on the door. With an effort he pulled himself together and inquired who was there.

"Is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Thane?" asked Miss Molly Dowd, outside.

"Nothing, thank you." After a moment's indecision, he crossed over and opened the door. "It's awfully good of you, Miss Molly. There's nothing really the matter with me. I was awake most of the night with a pain in my back,—something like lumbago, I suppose. I was afraid at first it was my old pleurisy coming back for another visit, but it seems to be lower down. I feel much better, thank you. The fresh air will do me good. I think I'll go out and see if I can be of any assistance to poor Vick. Have they had any news of Rosabel?"

"I think not. They have telephoned to the city to ask the police to watch out for her, especially at the trains. She's been terribly depressed, they say, since her brother went to the Navy training school up near Chicago. Amos thinks she may have taken it into her head to go up there somewhere to be near him."

"It is possible. She was devoted to her brother. I hope nothing worse has happened to her. She is a sweet, lovable girl, and they worshipped her."

Later on, as he was standing in front of the postoffice, smoking a cigarette, Vick came up in Alix Crown's automobile.

The former had been to the city to consult with the police. He inquired anxiously if any word had been received from the men who had volunteered to search in the woods and along the river bank for the girl. Receiving a reply in the negative from several of the hangers-on, he turned to give an order to the chauffeur. As he did so, his gaze fell upon Courtney, who was on the outer edge of the little group surrounding the car.

After a moment of indecision, the young man pushed his way forward, an expression of deep concern in his eyes.

"Morning, Courtney," greeted the older man, extending his hand. "I'm glad to see you. I suppose you've heard about Rosabel?"

Thane shook hands with Rosabel's father.

"I wouldn't be worried if I were you, Mr. Vick. She'll turn up all right. I feel sure of it. If there is anything in the world I can do, I wish you would say so, Mr. Vick. Anything, sir. There is nothing I wouldn't do for you and Mrs. Vick and Rosabel. I adore that child. Why, I get positively sick all over when I let myself think that—but, it's impossible! I feel it in my bones she'll come home sometime today."

Vick pressed the young man's hand.

"I wish I could be sure of that,—God, I wish I could be sure," he said, with a little catch in his gruff voice. "I don't see what got into her to run away like this. She ain't been very chipper since Cale went away, you know. Sort of sick and down in the mouth. Her mother's heard her crying a good bit lately up in her room. I promised her only a couple of days ago to take her up to Chicago for a spell, so's she could see Cale every once in a while. So it can't be she's gone off on her own hook to see him, knowin' that either me or her mother was planning to go up with her next week. Thank you, Courtney, for offering to help us. If there's anything, I'll let you know. We've been telegraphin' and telephonin' everywhere to see if we can get track of her, and we've been to all her friends' homes to ask if they've seen her. I wish, if you feel like it, you'd go over and see Mrs. Vick. Maybe you can cheer her up, encourage her or something. She's terribly worried. I—I think it would break her heart if anything happened to—to—" His lips twisted as with pain. He bent over and picked a burr from his trousers' leg.

"Buck up, old fellow," said Courtney, a ringing note of confidence in his voice. He laid his hand on Vick's arm. "Tell me all about it. When did she leave the house, and where did she say she was going?"

"Yesterday afternoon. She said she was going to spend the night at the Jordans'. She kissed her mother good-bye,—just as she always does,—and we ain't seen or heard anything of her since. Nobody in Windomville saw her. Bill Foss is afraid she may have been waylaid by hoboes down along the river road. If—if THAT happened there'll be something worse than lynchin' if I ever lay hands on—"

Thane broke in with an oath.

"By God, I'll do the job for you if I get hold of him first, Vick. I could set fire to a devil like that and see him burned alive without moving a muscle."

"I can't let myself believe she's met with any such horrible fate as that, Courtney. I simply can't bear to think of my pretty little Rosie in the hands of—"

"Don't think about it, Vick. I believe she will turn up safe and sound and—By the way, has it occurred to you that she may have eloped? Was she in love with anybody? Was she interested in any young fellow that you didn't approve of?"

"She never spoke of being in love with anybody. She never even gave us an inklin' of such a thing. She would have told her mother. Why, good heavens, Courtney, she wasn't much more'n a little girl! She was eighteen her last birthday, and we never thought of her as anything but a child just out of short dresses. Did she ever speak to you about being gone on any of these young fellows that come to see her? She liked you tremendous, Courtney,—and I didn't know but what maybe she might have mentioned something to you about it when you were off on those long walks together. Some of the times when you used to take a lunch basket and go off—"

"Not a word," broke in Courtney. "Why, she was just like a kid, laughing and singing and begging me to tell her stories about the war, and life in New York, and all that sort of thing. She used to read to me, bless her heart,—read by the hour while I smoked,—or went to sleep. If she was in love with anybody she certainly never took me into her confidence."

"I—I guess there's nothing in that theory," said Amos Vick, shaking his head. "She didn't run away with anybody. That's out of the question. I'm working on the theory that she sort of went out of her head or something and wandered away. You read about cases like that in the papers. I forget what they call the disease, but there's—"

"Aphasia," supplied Courtney absently. His gaze was fixed on a graceful, familiar figure down the street.

Alix Crown had just dismounted from her horse in front of the library. She stood, straight and slim, on the sidewalk awaiting the approach of Editor Pollock, who was hurrying up from Assessor Jordan's house where he had been "interviewing" Annie.

A warm glow shot through Courtney's veins. He had held that adorable, boyish figure tight in his arms! Nothing could rob him of that rapturous thought,—nothing could deprive him of those victorious moments. Amos Vick's voice recalled him.

"I'll have to be on the move, Courtney. Here comes Bill Foss. He's been telephonin' to Litchtown, down the river. I do wish you'd go over and see Lucinda. She'll be mighty grateful to you."

"Don't fail to call on me, Mr. Vick, if there's anything I can do," called out Courtney after the moving machine.

He did not take his eyes from Alix until she disappeared through the library door. The horse, a very fine animal, was wet with sweat. He could see, even at that distance, the "lather" on her flanks.

"Any news?" he inquired of Pollock, as that worthy came up panting.

"Nope. Alix Crown is just back from Jim Bagley's. Some one said a hired man of his had seen a woman walking across the pasture yesterday just before dark—out near the old Windom place,—but it couldn't have been Rosie Vick because she had no way to get across the river except by the ferry, and she didn't come that way, Joe Burk swears. Alix saw this hired man and he says it was almost dark and he couldn't be sure whether it was a man or a woman."

A greyish pallor spread over Courtney's face. He turned away abruptly and hurried down the street. He remembered the "skiff" that belonged to young Cale, salvaged some years before on the abatement of a February flood. On more than one occasion he had taken Rosabel out on the river in this clumsy old boat, twice at least to the base of Quill's Window where she had refused to land because of the dread she had for the gruesome place.

Cale kept his boat down among the willows, chained to a pole he had driven deep in the bed of the river. It was one of his treasures. He had fished from it up and down the stream; he had gone forth in it at daybreak for wild ducks and geese.

Yes, Thane remembered the "skiff." Strange that no one else had thought of it. Strange that even Amos Vick was satisfied she could not have crossed the river except by the ferry. He wondered whether it was tied up in its accustomed place over yonder, or was it now on this side of the river? He felt a strange chill in his blood.

He was nearing the library when Alix came out. If she saw him she gave no sign. She crossed the sidewalk threw the bridle rein over the horse's neck, and swung herself gracefully into the saddle. Without so much as a glance over her shoulder, she rode off at a brisk canter in the direction of the ferry. He knew she was on her way to see Mrs. Vick.

The R. F. D. postman making his rounds, came to Amos Vick's shortly after noon that day. He volunteered a bit of information. Rosabel had given him a letter when he stopped the day before. It was addressed to Caleb Vick. She asked him how long he thought it would take the letter to reach its destination. When he told her that it might be delivered to Cale early the next day, she thanked him and returned to the house.

He thought at the time that she looked "kind of white around the gills."

II

Jim Bagley and his new "hired man," pursuing a suggestion made by the latter, went to the top of Quill's Window for a bird's-eye view of the river and the surrounding country. The sharp eyes of the Pinkerton man descried the rowboat under the willows along the opposite bank of the stream.

Half an hour later, Bagley and several companions came upon the boat. On one of the seats lay Rosabel Vick's heavy coat and the black fur collar she was known to have worn when she left home. Under the seat in the stern was a small paper bundle. It contained a nightgown, a pair of black stockings, and several toilet articles.

Across the river, several hundred yards above Quill's Window, a small gravelly "sand-bar" reached out into the stream. Here the practised eyes of Gilfillan found unmistakable indications of a recent landing. The prow of the boat, driven well out upon the bar, had left its mark. Also, there were two deep cuts in the sand where an oar had been used in pushing off. It was impossible to make out footprints in the loose, shifting gravel.

Mr. Gilfillan pondered deeply.

"That boat crossed over here yesterday," he reflected. "It's pretty clear that it belongs over on that side. If the Vick girl came over in it, there's no use looking for her on this side of the river. That boat couldn't have got back to the other side unless somebody rowed it over. If it was a woman I saw walking across the pasture in the direction of the river, it must have been this girl. Now—one of two things happened—in case it was the Vick girl. Either she was up near that old house before I got there, or she saw me when she was approaching, and turned back. In either case, she had an object in hanging around that house. Now we come to the object. Was she going there to meet some one? If so, it would naturally be a man.

"Now let's get this thing straight. Thane crossed the pasture from this direction. That's positive,—because I followed him. It is a dead certainty he did not meet the Vick girl. I would have witnessed any such meeting. The fact that he lived at her father's house for several weeks may have something to do with the case,—but that's guesswork. What we want is facts. This much is certain. I did not see Miss Crown go into that house,—but I did see her come out. I never was so paralysed in my life. It is clear, therefore, that she was in there before either I or Thane came upon the scene. Now the question is, was she there to meet Thane? I doubt it. Things begin to look a little clearer to me. Suppose, for instance, he went out to that big hill to meet some one else,—presumably the Vick girl, and that they had planned to go to that old deserted house. He was late. So, thinking she had gone on, he hustled across the field and received the surprise of his life. Now, we'll say the Vick girl was over there waiting for him when Miss Crown came to the house,—a thing they couldn't have foreseen in view of the fact that she shunned the place. Our hero comes up and enters the house as if he owned it. The other girl hangs around outside till it gets dark enough for her to risk making a getaway without attracting my attention,—in case she saw me. She beats it back to the river, and then, being afraid that I saw and recognized her, she concludes to beat it to somebody's house over in the next county, so's she'll have an alibi if I go to Miss Crown with the story. Now, that's one way to look at it. The other angle is that she was jealous and trailed Thane to his rendezvous, as my old friend Nick Carter would say. In that case,—By thunder!" He gave vent to a soft whistle.

"In that case, she may have jumped into the river and—No, that doesn't hang together. She wouldn't have gone to the trouble to row back to the other side. Wait a second! Now, let me think. Here's an idea. We'll suppose somebody waylaid her over there on the other side of the river, put the quietus on her and chucked her into the water. Then he rowed across here and started for the turnpike. Seeing me and also Thane, he turns back. It's a man I see in the darkness instead of a woman. He goes back to the boat, rows over to the other side again and—Holy Mackerel! Here's a new one. That girl's body may be lying up there in the underbrush at this instant. Dumped there by the murderer, who turned back after seeing me—I'll take a look!"

For an hour Gilfillan searched through the underbrush along the bank. Finally he gave it up and started toward the village. He found the town in a state of great excitement. Everybody was hurrying down to the river. Overtaking an old man, he inquired if there was any news of the missing girl.

"They say she's been drownded," chattered the ancient. "My daughter says they found her things in a boat, but no sign of her. Did you ever see the beat? They's been more goin' on in this here town in the last week than—"

Gilfillan hurried on. He caught Charlie Webster as he was leaving the warehouse.

"I want to see Miss Crown as soon as possible, Webster," he said. "Do you suppose she will go up in the air if I mention the fact that I know she was with Thane yesterday up in that old house? It's a rather ticklish thing to spring on her if she—"

"It's all right," interrupted Charlie. "I talked with her about it last night. She had no idea he was coming there. He told her he saw her from across the pasture and hustled over. She was surprised almost out of her skin when he popped in on her. She tells me she ordered him out of the house."

The detective was thoughtful. "I wonder if it has occurred to Miss Crown that Thane might have mistaken her for some one else at that distance."

"Not so's you'd notice it," declared Charlie. "He knew it was Alix all right. She isn't in any doubt on that score."

"It begins to take shape," mused Gilfillan. "He didn't wait for her, that's all."

"What say?"

"I was just thinking," replied the other. "Where is Thane at the present moment, Webster?"

"He just went off in an automobile with Dick Hurdle and a couple of fellows to stretch one of Joe Hart's big fish nets across the river down at the Narrows, five or six miles below here."

"Would you mind inviting me up to your room at the Tavern for a little while, Webster?"

"Well, I was going down to the ferry. There are half a dozen skiffs down—"

"See here, Webster, as I understand it, my real job is to find out all I can about this chap Thane. I am really working for you, not for Miss Crown, although she is putting up the money. I am just as thoroughly convinced as you are that Thane staged that masked robber business himself. It's an old gag, especially with lovers—and occasionally with husbands."

Charlie grinned sheepishly, a guilty flush staining his rubicund face.

"I guess I might as well confess that I was guilty of something of the sort when I was about seventeen," he said. "That's how I came to figger out that maybe he was up to the same kind of heroism."

"Nearly every kid has done the same thing. It's boy nature."

"I reckon that's right. I fixed it for a boy friend of mine to jump out of a dark place one night when I was walkin' home from a church sociable with my girl. He had false whiskers on. I helped him glue them on,—and he had an awful time getting 'em off. Course when he jumped out and growled 'hands up,' I just sailed into him and the fur flew for a few seconds. Then he run like a whitehead. It didn't work out very well, however. That kid's sister got onto the trick and told my girl about it, and—well, I almost had to leave town. But it ain't a game for a grown-up man to play, and that's what I think this feller Thane has been pulling."

"What you want to find out, before it's too late, is whether Thane is all that he professes to be," said the other. "Well, I'm simply sitting tight on the job, stalling along until I hear from our people in New York. They have cabled England to find out whether he was connected with the British air forces. Now, what I want to do is to get into that fellow's room for ten or fifteen minutes. Can you fix it?"

"It—it wouldn't be legal," protested Charlie. "You've got to get out a search warrant."

"My dear fellow, I'm not planning to steal anything," exclaimed Gilfillan. "I merely want to get into his room by mistake. That happens frequently,—you know."

Charlie was finally persuaded. He cast an apprehensive glance down the road leading to the ferry, searched the Main Street for observers, and then led the way over to the practically deserted Tavern.

Half an hour later Mr. Gilfillan re-entered Charlie's room.

"Remember I don't know where you've been or what you were up to," warned the fat man firmly. "I'm not a party to this nefarious—"

"Righto!" said the detective cheerily. "Your skirts are clear. They are immaculate. Let's beat it."

"Well, what did you find out?" inquired Charlie, when they were in the street once more. He was bursting with curiosity.

"In as much as you don't know where I was or what I've been doing, it will not compromise you if I say that I found a thirty-eight calibre revolver with three empty shells in the cylinder. I also found a theatrical make-up box, with grease paints, gauze, and all that. Also currency amounting to about three hundred dollars. Nothing incriminating, nothing actually crooked. Simply circumstantial as relating to recent events in your midst, Mr. Webster."

"Makes it look mighty certain that he was the feller with the mask, don't it? Only three shots were fired, you know. I've been thinking a lot about what you said awhile ago. You don't think that he had anything to do with—with putting the Vick girl out of the way? You spoke about him being mistaken in the woman."

"He had nothing to do with it, Webster. I told you I saw a figure in the pasture after he had gone into the house. If it was the Vick girl, she was certainly alive then. He went straight home after leaving that house. He didn't go out of the Tavern again last night, that's positive. Now, what I want to find out is this: was the girl in love with him? Was there anything between them? If she's at the bottom of the river down there, it's a plain case of suicide, my friend, and people do not take their own lives unless there's a mighty good reason. With a young girl it's usually a case of unrequited love,—or worse. According to that letter Miss Miller had from New York, Thane is not above betraying a girl. Of course, if the Vick girl is dead and left nothing behind to implicate Thane, it will be out of the question to charge him with being even indirectly responsible for her death."

"The main thing," said Charlie, who had turned a shade paler during this matter-of-fact, cold-blooded analysis, "is to keep Alix Crown from falling into his clutches. He's a bad egg, that feller is, and he's made up his mind to win her by fair means or foul."

"Well, if she falls for him after reading that lawyer's letter and when she hears what I believe to be the truth about that heroic episode the other night,—why, she ought to get what's coming to her, that's all I have to say," said Mr. Gilfillan flatly. "I've discovered one thing, Mr. Webster. If a woman makes up her mind to marry a man, hell-fire and brimstone can't stop her. The older I get and the more I see of women, the more I am convinced that vice is its own reward. I guess we'd better stroll down to the river and see what's doing."

"I've been thinking," said Charlie as they walked along, "that if Thane wasn't in the British Army and wasn't in our army, then he must be a slacker and wanted by the government for—"

"Nothing doing on that line. You forget he was crippled long before the war. He couldn't get by a medical board. They'd turn him down in a second. If he was in this country at the time of the draft, he would have had no trouble getting an exemption. What I can't understand is why he, a New Yorker, should be hiding out here in the jungles of Indiana. There's something queer about that, my friend."

"Kind of fishy," said Charlie darkly. Then upon reflection, he added with considerable vehemence: "Damn him!"

Already half a dozen rowboats were out in the stream, with men peering over the sides into the deep, slow-moving water. Burk's Ferry did a thriving business. It plied back and forth from one "road-cut" to the other, crowded with foot passengers, all of whom studied the water intently. Men, women and children tramped close to the edge of both banks. People spoke in subdued voices; an atmosphere of the deepest solemnity hung over the scene.

The sky itself was overcast; a raw wind moaned through the trees, sighing a requiem. The drab, silent river went placidly, mockingly on its way down to the sea, telling no tales: if Rosabel Vick was rolling, gliding along the bottom, gently urged by the current, the grim waters covered well the secret.

The word went from lip to lip that motor-boats were on the way down from the city, with police officers and grappling-hooks and men experienced in the gruesome business of "dragging." The boss of the railway construction gang at Hawkins, where the new bridge was being built, had started for Windomville with a quantity of dynamite to be exploded on the bottom of the river in the hope and expectation of bringing the body to the surface.



CHAPTER XXI

OUT OF THE NIGHT



All afternoon the search continued. At intervals and at widely separated points dull explosions took place on the bed of the river, creating smooth, round hillocks that lasted for the fraction of a second and then dissolved into swift-spreading wavelets, stained a dirty yellow by the upheaval of sand and mud, and went racing in ruffles to the banks which they tenderly licked before they died. White-bellied fish, killed by the shock of the explosions, came to the surface and floated away,—scores of them, large and small. Spider-like grappling hooks, with their curving iron prongs, raked the bottom from side to side, moving constantly downstream, feeling here, there and everywhere with insensate fingers for the body of Rosabel Vick.

A pall settled over the river; it reached far beyond the environs of Windomville, for Amos Vick was a man known and respected by every farmer in the district.

Night came. Courtney Thane, considerably shaken by the tragedy, set out immediately after dinner for the home of Alix Crown. He had been silent and depressed at dinner, taking his little part in the conversation, which dealt exclusively with the incomprehensible act of young Rosabel Vick.

"What possible reason could that pretty happy young girl have had for killing herself?" That was the question every one asked and no one answered. Mrs. Maude Baggs Pollock repeatedly asked it at dinner, and once Thane had replied:

"I still don't believe she killed herself. It is beyond belief. If she is out there in the river, as they suspect, it is because there was foul play. Some fiend attacked her. I will never believe anything else, Mrs. Pollock. I knew her too well. She would never dream of killing herself. She loved life too well. I can't help feeling that she is alive and well somewhere, that they will hear from her in a day or two, and that—"

"But how about the things they found in that boat?" demanded Doc Simpson. "She wouldn't be so heartless as to play a trick like that on her folks."

Courtney's answer was a gloomy shake of the head.

His heart was pounding heavily as he trudged up the walk to Alix's door. He knew that the crisis in his affairs was at hand. She had asked him to come. He had not given up hope. He was still confident of his power to win in spite of her amazing perversity. Inconsistency, he called it. Of one thing he was resolved: he would brook no delay. She would have to marry him at once. He wanted to get away from Windomville as soon as possible. He loathed the place.

Hilda came to the door.

"Miss Crown is over at Mr. Vick's," she announced. "She's not at home."

He stiffened. "I had an appointment with her for this evening, Hilda. She must be at home."

"She ain't," said the maid succinctly.

"Did she leave any word for me?"

"Not with me, sir. She telephoned to Mrs. Strong this evening to say she was going to stay with Mrs. Vick."

"All night?"

"No, sir. The car's going down to meet her at the ferry about ten o'clock."

He departed in a very unpleasant frame of mind. This was laying it on a bit thick, he complained. If she thought she could treat him in this cavalier fashion she'd soon find out where she "got off." What business had she, anyhow, over at the Vicks? All the old women in the neighbourhood would be there to—An idea struck him suddenly.

"I'll do it," he muttered. "I'll have to go over some time, so why not now? It's the decent thing to do. I'll go tonight."

He hurried up to his room. Opening his trunk, he took out his revolver, replaced the discharged shells and stuck it into his overcoat pocket. Picking up the little package of bank-notes, he fingered them for a moment and then, moved by an impulse for which he had no explanation, he not only counted them but quickly stuffed them into his trousers' pocket. Afterwards he was convinced that premonition was responsible for this incomprehensible act.

He crossed the ferry with several other people. The moon had broken through the clouds. Its light upon the cold, sluggish water produced the effect of polished steel. It reminded him of the grey surface of an ancient suit of armour. The crossing was slow. He could not repress a shudder when he looked downstream and saw lights that seemed to be fixed in the centre of the river. He closed his eyes. He could not bear to look at the cold, silent water. The soft splashing against the broad, square bow of the old-fashioned ferry served to increase his nervousness. The horrid fancy struck him that Rosabel Vick was out there ahead clawing at the slimy timbers in the vain effort to draw herself out of the water....He wished to God he had not come.

He was the first person off the ferry when it came to a stop on the farther side of the river. Ahead of him lay the road through the narrow belt of trees that lined the bank. He knew that a scant hundred yards lay between the river and the open road beyond and yet a vast dread possessed him. He shrank from that black opening in the wall of trees where dead leaves rustled and the wind whispered secrets to the barren branches.

He fell in behind a couple of men who strode fearlessly into the dark avenue. After him came two men and a woman. They were all strangers to him, so far as he could make out, but he felt a sense of security in their nearness. He gathered that they were bound for Amos Vick's. Presently they came to the open road beyond the trees. The half moon rode high and clear; the figures of his companions took shape, dusky and ghost-like; the fences alongside the road became visible, while straw-ricks, lone trees and other shadowy objects emerged from the maw of the night. Here and there in the distance points of light indicated the presence of invisible farmhouses, while straight ahead, a mile or more away, a cluster of lights marked the house of Amos Vick.

As he drew nearer, Thane was able to count the lights. He looked intently for the sixth window, an upstairs corner room was where it would be,—but there were lights in only five. The corner window was dark. He knew that window well....He wished he had a stiff drink of whiskey.

Half a dozen automobiles stood at the roadside in front of the house. He stopped beside one of them to look at his wrist-watch. It was half-past eight. Alix would be starting home in less than an hour. No doubt it had been arranged that one of these cars was to take her down to the ferry. He had seen her saddle horse late that afternoon standing in front of the blacksmith's shop, evidently waiting to be re-shod.

If he had his way,—and he was determined to have it,—Alix would walk with him to the ferry.

As he turned in at the gate he observed that the woman and her two companions, after pausing for a moment to look at the house, continued their way up the road. The men who had preceded him all the way were already on the front porch. He followed the disappearing trio with his eyes. The woman, he noticed for the first time, was very tall,—quite as tall as the men. She wore a shawl over her head, and some sort of a long cloak.

Setting his jaw he strode up the walk, looking neither to right nor left, mounted the steps where many a night he had sat with Rosabel beside him, and after passing a group of low-voiced neighbours, knocked on the closed door. He was admitted by an elderly woman who looked askance at this well-dressed stranger.

"I am Mr. Thane, a friend," he said. "Will you tell Mrs. Vick, please?"

"She's upstairs, and I—I—"

"I think she is expecting me. But,—wait. I thought I might be able to comfort her, but I can see by your expression that she isn't feeling up to seeing people. I came over primarily to see if there is anything I can do, Madam. You see, Rosabel and I were great pals." His voice broke a little, and he bit his nether lip.

"We've finally got her to lie down," said the woman. "She's—she's nearly crazy with the suspense and—everything. If you'll wait a little bit, I'll find out if she feels like seeing you. Alix Crown is with her. She coaxed her to stretch out on the bed. Miss Crown understands these things. She did some hospital work during the war—"

"Yes, I know Miss Crown," he interrupted.

"—and saw a lot of suffering, 'specially among mothers who came to see their crippled and sick sons in the hospitals."

"Perhaps if you were to tell Miss Crown that I am here she could—but no, I sha'n't even bother Miss Crown. She's got her hands full. I will sit down and wait awhile, however. If by any chance, you should be able to get word to Mrs. Vick that I am here, I think she might feel like seeing me."

"I'll see," said the woman dubiously, and went away.

Courtney sat down on a sofa in the parlour. He looked around the lamp-lit room....Over in the corner was the upright piano on which Rosabel used to play for him. He could see her now—the shapely, girlish back; the round, white neck and the firm young shoulders; the tilt of her head; the strong, brown hands,—he could see her now. And she used to turn her head and smile at him, and make dreadful grimaces when this diversion resulted in a discord....He got up suddenly and walked out into the dining-room.

Beyond, in the kitchen, he heard the rumble of men's voices. He hesitated for a moment, and then opened the door. There were half a dozen men in the kitchen, and one of them was Amos Vick. They were preparing to go out into the night. Vick's face was haggard, his garments were muddy, his long rubber boots were covered with sludge and sand. Catching sight of Thane in the doorway, the farmer went toward him, his hand outstretched.

"I'm glad you came, Courtney," he said, his voice hoarse but steady. "Lucinda will be pleased. Does she know you're here?"

"I sent word up, but if she doesn't feel like—"

"She'll want to see you. We're starting out again. Down the river." (His voice shook a little.) "My soul,—boy,—you look as white as a sheet. Here,—take a good swig of this. It's some rye that Steve White brought over. We all needed it. Help yourself. You've been overdoing a little today, Courtney. You're not fit for this sort of—That's right! That will brace you up. You needed it, my boy." Courtney drained half a tumbler of whiskey neat. He choked a little.

"I guess we'd better be starting, Amos," said Steve White.

"Take me along with you, Mr. Vick," cried Courtney, squaring his shoulders. "I can't stand being idle while—"

"You'd catch your death of cold," interrupted Vick, laying his hand on the young man's shoulder. "It's mighty fine of you and I—I sha'n't forget it. But you're not fit for an all night job like this. I feel sort of responsible for you, my boy. Your mother would never forgive me if anything happened to you, and this is a time when we've got to think about the mothers. Good night,—God bless you, Courtney."

"Good night, Amos."

The men trooped heavily out of the kitchen door.

Presently he heard the chugging of automobile engines and then the roar as they sped off down the road. He returned to the parlour. The whiskey had given him fresh confidence.

The elderly woman was talking to a couple of men in the hall. From the scraps of conversation he was able to pick up, he gathered that they were reporters from the city. She invited him into the room.

"We would prefer a very recent picture," one of the men was saying. "Something taken within the last few weeks, if possible. A snap-shot will do, Madam."

The speaker was a middle-aged man with horn-rimmed spectacles. His companion was much the younger of the two. The latter bowed to Thane, who had taken a position before the fireplace and was regarding the strangers with interest.

"I'll have to speak to Mrs. Vick," murmured the woman. "I don't know as she would want Rosabel's picture printed in the papers."

"It would be of incalculable assistance, Madam, in case she has run away from home. We have an idea that she may have planted those garments in the boat in order to throw people off the track."