"Yes, LeGrand. I'd go anywhere with you—you know that."

"I'm glad I do, my dear. It may be necessary to go very soon, and—well, we won't stop to say good-bye, either."

"Why! what do you mean," and the hidden detective knew that the girl had drawn away from the young man.

"Oh, I mean that we won't bother about the fuss of a farewell-party. I'm not tied to the Carwell business. In fact I'd be glad to chuck it. There's nothing in it any more, since there's no chance for a partnership. We'll just go off by ourselves and be happy—won't we, Minnie?"

"I hope so, LeGrand. But must we go away? Can't you get something else here?"

"I think we must, yes."

"You haven't had trouble with—with Viola, have you?"

"No. What made you think of that?"

"Oh, it was just a notion. Well, if we have to leave we will. I shall hate to go, however. But, I'll be with you—" and again the words were smothered.

"I wonder what sort of a double-cross game he's playing," mused the colonel when the two had left the park and he, rather stiff from his position, shuffled to the lonely spot where he had before made a change of garments. Attired as his usual self, he went back to The Haven, and spent rather a restless night.

Minnie Webb was perplexed. She loved LeGrand Blossom—there was no doubt of that—but she did not see why he should have to leave the vicinity of Lakeside where she had lived so many years—at least during the summer months. All her friends and acquaintances were there.

"I wonder if Viola has given him notice to leave since she came into her father's property," mused Minnie. "I'm going to ask her. He may never get such a good place in Boston as he has here. I'll see if I can't find out why he wants to leave. It can't be just because father does not care much for him."

So she called on Viola, as she had done often of late, and found her friend sitting silent, and with unseeing eyes staring at the rows of books in the library.

"Oh, Minnie, it was so good of you to come! I'm very glad to see you. Since father went it has been very lonely. You look extremely well."

"I am well—and—happy. Oh, Viola, you're the first I have told, but—but Mr. Blossom has—asked me to marry him, and—"

"Oh, how lovely! And you've said 'yes!' I can tell that!" and Viola smiled and kissed her friend impulsively. "Tell me all about it!"

"And so it's all settled," went on Minnie, after much talk and many questions and answers. "Only I'm sorry he's going to leave you."

"Going to leave me!" exclaimed Viola. Her voice was incredulous.

"Well, I mean going to give up the management of your business. I'm sure you'll miss him."

"I shall indeed! But I did not know Mr. Blossom was going to leave. He has said nothing to me or Aunt Mary about it. In fact, I—"

"Oh, is there something wrong?" asked Minnie quickly, struck by something in Viola's voice.

"Well, nothing wrong, as far as we know. But—"

"Oh, please tell me!" begged Minnie. "I am sure you are concealing something."

"Well, I will tell you!" said Viola at last. "I feel that I ought to, as you may hear of it publicly. It concerns fifteen thousand dollars," and she went into details about the loan, which one party said had been paid, and of which Blossom said there was no record.

"Oh!" gasped Minnie Webb. "Oh, what does it mean?" and, worried and heartsick, lest she should have made a mistake, she sat looking dumbly at Viola...



CHAPTER XXI. THE LIBRARY POSTAL

"My dear, I am sorry if I have told you anything that distresses you," said Viola gently. "But I thought—"

"Oh, yes, it is best to know," was the low response. "Only—only I was so happy a little while ago, and now—"

"But perhaps it may all be explained!" interrupted Viola. "It is only some tiresome business deal, I'm sure. I never could understand them, and I don't want to. But it does seem queer that there is no record of that fifteen thousand dollars being paid back."

"What does Captain Poland say about it?"

"Oh, he told Harry, very frankly, that father paid the money, and that the receipt was sent to Mr. Blossom. But the latter says it can not be found."

"And do you suspect Mr. Blossom?" asked Minnie, and her voice held a challenge.

"Well," answered Viola slowly, "there isn't much of which to suspect him. It isn't as if Captain Poland claimed to have paid father the fifteen thousand dollars, and the money couldn't be found. It's only a receipt for money which the captain admits having gotten back that is missing. But it makes such confusion. And there are so many other things involved—"

"You mean about the poisoning?"

"Yes. Oh, I wish it were all cleared up! Don't let's talk of it. I must find out about Mr. Blossom going away. We shall have to get some one in his place. Aunt Mary will be so disturbed—"

"Don't say that I told you!" cautioned Minnie. "Perhaps I should not have mentioned it. Oh, dear, I am so miserable!" And she certainly looked it.

"And so am I!" confessed Viola. "If only Harry would tell what he is keeping back."

"You mean about that quarrel with your father?"

"Yes. And he acts so strangely of late, and looks at me in such a queer way. Oh, I'm afraid, and I don't know what I'm afraid of!"

"I'm the same way, Viola!" admitted Minnie.

"I wonder why we two should have all the trouble in the world?"

And the two were miserable together.

They were not the only ones to suffer in those days. Captain Gerry Poland could not drive Viola from his mind. To the yachtsman, she was the most beautiful woman he had ever met, and he wondered if fortune would ever make it possible for him to approach her again on the subject that lay so close to his heart.

And then there was Bartlett. It was true he walked the streets—or rather rode around them in his "Spanish Omelet"—a free man; yet the finger of suspicion was constantly pointed at him.

More than once in the town he met people who sneered openly at him, as if to say, "You are guilty, but we can't prove it." And once on the golf course he went up to three men who had formerly been quite friendly and suggested a game of golf, upon which one after another the others made trivial excuses and begged to be excused. Upon this occasion the young man had rushed away, his face scarlet, and he had only calmed down after a mad tour of many miles in his racing machine.

"It's an outrage!" he had muttered to himself. "A dastardly outrage! But what is a fellow going to do?"

Meanwhile Colonel Ashley and Jack Young were puzzling their heads over many matters connected with the golf course mystery. Jack had obeyed the colonel's instructions to the letter. He had played many rounds on the links and had gotten to a certain degree of friendship with Jean Forette. He had even formed a liking for Bruce Garrigan, who, offhand, informed him that the amount of India ink used in tattooing sailors during the past year was less by fifteen hundred ounces than the total output of radium salts for 1916, while the wheat crop of Minnesota for the same period was 66,255 bushels. All of which information, useful in a way, no doubt, was accepted by Jack with a smile. He was there to look and listen, and, well, he did it.

"But I've got to pass it up," he told Colonel Ashley. "I've stuck to that Jean chap until I guess he must think I want him for a chauffeur if ever I'm able to own a car bigger than a flivver. And aside from the fact that he does use some kind of dope, in which he isn't alone in this world, I can't get a line on him."

"No, I didn't expect you would," said Colonel Ashley, with a smile. "But are you well enough acquainted with him to have a talk with his sweetheart?"

"You mean Mazi?"

"Yes."

"Well, I s'pose I might get a talk with her. But what's the idea?"

"Nothing special, only I'd like to see if she tells you the same story she told me. Have a try at it when you get a chance."

"On the theory, I suppose, of in any trouble, look for the lady?"

"Somewhat, yes."

They were talking in The Haven, for Jack had been put up there as a guest at the request of Colonel Ashley. And when the bell rang, indicating some one at the door, they looked at one another questioningly.

Then came the postman's whistle, for Lakeside, though but a summer resort, with a population much larger in summer than in winter, boasted of mail delivery.

A maid placed the letters in their usual place on the hall table, and the colonel quickly ran through them, for he had reports sent him from his New York office from time to time.

"Here's one for you, Jack," he announced, handing his assistant a letter.

While Jack Young was reading it the colonel caught sight of a postal, with the address side down, lying among the other missives. It was a postal which bore several lines of printing, the rest being filled in by a pen, and the import of it was that a certain library book, under the number 58 C. H—I6I* had been out the full time allowed under the rules, and must either be returned for renewal, or a fine of two cents a day paid, and the recipient was asked to give the matter prompt attention.

The colonel turned the card over. It was addressed to Miss Viola Carwell at The Haven.

"So the book is out on her card," murmured the detective. "I must look for her copy of 'Poison Plants of New Jersey,' and see if it is like the one I have."

"Were you speaking to me?" asked Jack, having finished his letter.

"No, but I will now. We've got to get busy on this case, and close it up. I've been too long on it now. Shag is getting impatient."

"Shag?"

"Yes, he wants me to go fishing."

"Oh, I see. Well, I'm ready. What are the orders?"

Two busy days on the part of Colonel Ashley and his assistant followed. They went on many mysterious errands and were out once all night. But where they went, what they did or who they saw they told no one.

It was early one evening that Colonel Ashley waited for his assistant in the library of The Haven. Jack had gone out to send a message and was to return soon. And as the colonel waited in the dim light of one electric bulb, much shaded, he saw a figure come stealing to the portieres that separated the library from the hall. Cautiously the figure advanced and looked into the room. A glance seemed to indicate that no one was there, for the colonel was hidden in the depths of a big chair, "slumping," which was his favorite mode of relaxing.

"I wonder if some one is looking for me?" mused the colonel. "Well, just for fun, I'll play hide and seek. I can disclose myself later." And so he remained in the chair, hardly breathing the silent figure parted the heavy curtains, within, dropped something white on the floor, and then quickly hurried away, the feet making no sound on the thick carpet of the hall.

"Now," mused the colonel to himself, "I wonder that is a note for me, or a love missive for one the maids from the butler or the gardener, who too bashful to deliver it in person. I'd better look."

Without turning on more light the colonel picked up the thing that had fluttered so silently to the floor. It was a scrap of paper, and as he held it under the dimly glowing bulb he saw, scrawled in printed letters:

"Viola Carwell has a poison book."

"As if I didn't know it!" softly exclaimed the colonel.

And then, as he resumed his comfortable, but not very dignified position, he heard some one coming boldly along the hall, and the voice of Jack asked:

"Are you in here, Colonel?"

"Yes, come in. Did you get a reply?"

"Surely. Your friend must have been waiting for your telegram."

"I expected he would be. Let me see it," and the detective read a brief message which said:

"Thomas much better after a long sleep."

"Ah," mused the colonel. "I'm very glad Thomas is better."

"Is Thomas, by any chance, a cat?" asked Jack, who read the telegram the colonel handed him.

"He is—just that—a cat and nothing more. And now, Jack, my friend, I think we're about ready to close in."

"Close in? Why—"

"Oh, there are a few things I haven't told you yet. Sit down and I'll just go over them. I've been on this case a little longer than you have, and I've done some elimination which you haven't had a chance to do."

"And you have eliminated all but—"

"Captain Poland and LeGrand Blossom."

At these words Jack started, and made a motion of silence. They were still in the library, but more lights had been turned on, and the place was brilliant.

"What's the matter?" asked the colonel, quickly. "I thought I heard a noise in the hall," and Jack stepped to the door and looked out. But either he did not see, or did not want to see, a shrinking figure which quickly crouched down behind a chair not far from the portal.

"Guess I was mistaken," said Jack. "Anyhow I didn't see anything." Did he forget that coming out of a light room into a dim hall was not conducive to good seeing? Jack Young ought to have remembered that.

"One of the servants, likely, passing by," suggested the colonel. "Yes, Jack, I think we must pin it down to either the captain or Blossom."

"Do you really think Blossom could have done it?"

"He could, of course. The main question is, did he have an object in getting Mr. Carwell out of the way?"

"And did he have?"

"I think he did. I've been trailing him lately, when he didn't suspect it, and I've seen him in some queer situations. I know he needed a lot of money and—well, I'm going to take him into custody as the murderer of Mr. Carwell. I want you to—"

But that was as far as the detective got, for there was a shriek in the hall—a cry of mortal anguish that could only come from a woman—and then, past the library door, rushed a figure in white.

Out and away it rushed, flinging open the front door, speeding down the steps and across the lawn.

"Quick!" cried Colonel Ashley. "Who was that?"

"I don't know!" answered Jack. "Must have been the person I thought I heard in the hall."

"We must find out who it was!" went on the detective. "You make some inquiries. I'll take after her."

"Could it have been Miss Viola?"

The question was answered almost as soon as it was asked, for, at that moment, Viola herself came down the front stairs.

"What is it?" she asked the two detectives. "Who cried out like that? Is some one hurt?"

"I don't know," answered Colonel Ashley. "Mr. Young and I were talking in the library when we heard the scream. Then a woman rushed out."

"It must have been Minnie Webb!" cried Viola. "She was here a moment ago. The maid told me she was waiting in the parlor, and I was detained upstairs. It must have been Minnie. But why did she scream so?"

Colonel Ashley did not stop to answer.

"Look after things here, Jack!" he called to his assistant. "I'm going to follow her. If ever there was a desperate woman she is."

And he sped through the darkness after the figure in white.



CHAPTER XXII. THE LARGE BLONDE AGAIN

The trail was not a difficult one to follow. The night was particularly black, with low-hanging clouds which seemed to hold a threat of rain, and the wind sighed dolefully through the scrub pines. Against this dim murkiness the figure of the woman in white stood out ghostily.

"Poor Minnie Webb!" mused Colonel Ashley, as he hurried on after her. "She must be desperate now—after what she heard. I wonder—"

He did not put his wonder into words then, but his suspicion was confirmed as he saw her head for the bridge that spanned a creek, not far from where the ferry ran over to Loch Harbor.

At certain times this creek was not deep enough to afford passage for small rowboats, but when the tide was in there was draught enough for motor launches.

"And the tide is in now," mused the colonel, as he remembered passing among the sand dunes late that afternoon, and noting the state of the sea. "Too bad, poor little woman!" he added gently, as he followed her. "Not so fast! Not so fast! There is no need of rushing to destruction. It comes soon enough without our going out to meet it. Poor girl!"

He went on through the darkness, following, following, following distracted Minnie, who, with the fateful words still ringing in her ears, hardly knew whither she hurried.

Colonel Ashley, in spite of the desperate manner in which the chase had begun, felt that he was safe from observation. He had on dark clothes, which did not contrast so strongly with the night as did the light and filmy dress of Minnie Webb. Besides, she was too distracted to notice that she was being followed.

"She is going to the bridge, and the tide is in," mused the detective. "I didn't think she had that much spunk—for it does take spunk to attempt anything like this in the dark. However, I'll try to get there as soon as she does."

The fleeing girl in white passed over an open moor, fleeced here and there with scanty bushes, which gave the detective all the cover he needed. But the girl did not look back, and the night was dark. The clouds were thicker too, and the very air seemed so full of rain that an incautious movement would bring it spattering about one's head, as a shake of a tree, after a shower, precipitates the drops.

And then there suddenly loomed, like grotesque shadows on the night, two other figures at the very end of the bridge that Minnie Webb sought to cross. They seemed to bar her way, and yet they were as much startled as she, for they drew back on her approach.

And Colonel Ashley, stealing his way up unseen, heard from Minnie Webb the startled ejaculation:

"LeGrand! You here? And who—who is this?"

Then, as if in defiance, or perhaps to see who the challenger was, the figure standing beside that of LeGrand Blossom flashed a little pocket electric torch. And by the gleam of it Colonel Ashley saw the large blonde woman again.

"Morocco Kate!" he murmured. "So she is mixed up in it after all! I think I begin to see daylight in spite of the darkness. Morocco Kate!"

Then, crouching down behind some bushes, he waited and listened and thought swiftly.

"Speak to me!" implored Minnie of the young man. "What does it mean, LeGrand? Why are you here with—with—"

"He knows my name well enough, if he wants to tell it," broke in the other. "I'm not ashamed of it, either. But who are you, I'd like to know? I never saw you before!" and the blonde woman flashed her light full on Minnie's white face.

And as the girl shrank back, Morocco Kate, so called, sneered:

"Some one else he's got on a string, I suppose! Ho! It's a merry life you lead, LeGrand Blossom!"

"Stop!" the young man exclaimed. "I can't let you go on this way. Minnie, please leave us for a moment. I'll come to you as soon as I can."

"Oh, yes! Of course!" sneered the other. "She's younger and prettier than I—quite a flapper. I was that way—once. And I suppose you said the same thing to some one else you wanted to get rid of before you took me on. Oh, to the devil with the men, anyhow!"

Minnie gasped.

"Shocked you, did I, kid? Well, you'll hear worse than that, believe me. If I was to tell—"

"Stop!" and LeGrand Blossom snapped out the words in such a manner that the desperate woman did stop.

"Minnie, go away," he pleaded, more gently. "I'll come to you as soon as I can, and explain everything. Please believe in me!"

"I—I don't believe I can—again, LeGrand," faltered Minnie. "I—I heard what you said to her just now—that you couldn't do anything more for her. Oh, what have you been doing for her? Who is she? Tell me! Oh, I must hear it, though I dread it!"

"Yes, you shall hear it!" cried LeGrand Blossom, and there was desperation in his voice. "I was going to tell you, anyhow, before I married you—"

"Oh, you're really going to marry her, are you?" sneered the blonde. "Really? How interesting!"

"Will you be quiet?" said LeGrand, and there was that in his voice which seemed to cow the blonde woman.

"Minnie," went on LeGrand Blossom, "its a hard thing for a man to talk about a woman, but sometimes it has to be done. And it's doubly hard when it's about a woman a man once cared for. But I'm going to take my medicine, and she's got to take hers."

"I'm no quitter! I'm a sport, I am!" was the defiant remark. "So was Mr. Carwell—Old Carwell we used to call him. But he had more pep than some of you younger chaps.

"Leave his name out of this!" growled LeGrand, like some dog trying to keep his temper against the attacks of a cur.

"This woman—I needn't tell you her name now, for she has several," he went on to Minnie. "This woman and I were once engaged to be married. She was younger then—and—different. But she began drinking and—well, she became impossible. Believe me," he said, turning to the figure beside him, "I don't want to tell this, but I've got to square myself."

"Yes," and the other's voice was broken. "I may as well give up now as later. If anything can be saved out of the wreck—my wreck—go to it! Shoot, kid! Tell the worst! I'll stand the gaff!"

"Well, that makes it easier," resumed Blossom. "We were going to be married, but she got in with a fast crowd, and I couldn't stand the pace. I admit, I wasn't sport enough."

"I'm glad you weren't," murmured Minnie, her breast heaving.

"The result was," went on Blossom, "that she and I separated. It was as much her wish as mine—toward the end. And she married a Frenchman with whom she seemed to be fascinated."

"Yes, he sure had me hypnotized," agreed the blonde woman. "It was more my fault than yours, Lee. Perhaps if you'd taken a whip to me, and made me behave—Some of us women need a beating now and then. But it's too late now." Of a sudden she seemed strangely subdued.

LeGrand Blossom went on with the sordid tale.

"Well, the marriage didn't turn out happily. It was—"

"It was hell! I'm not afraid to use the word!" interrupted the blonde. "It was just plain, unadulterated hell! And I went into it with my eyes open. That's what it was—hell! I've had such a lot here on earth that maybe they'll give me a discount when I get—well, when I get where I'm going!" and she laughed, but there was no mirth in it.

Minnie shuddered, and drew nearer to LeGrand. And it did not seem to be because of the chill night wind, either.

"It was the same old story," went on the clerk. "No need of going over that, Minnie. It doesn't concern the question now. In the end the Frenchman cast her off, and she had to live, somehow. She came to me, and I, for the sake of old times, agreed to help her. I didn't think I was doing anything wrong; but it seems I was. I thought the rare and expensive book publishing business she said she was in was legitimate. Instead it was—"

"Yes, it was a blackmailing scheme!" interrupted Morocco Kate, not without some curious and perverted sense of pride. "I admit that. I got you in wrong, LeGrand, but it wasn't because I hated you, for I didn't. I really loved you, and I was a fool to take up with Jean. But that's past and gone. Only I didn't really mean to make trouble for you. I thought you might be able to wiggle out, knowing business men as you did."

"Instead," said the clerk, "I only became the more involved. It began to look as though I was a partner in the infernal schemes, and she and those she worked with held the threat over my head to extort money from me."

"Believe me, LeGrand, I didn't do that willingly," interrupted Morocco Kate. "The others had a hold over me, and they forced me to use you as their tool. They bled me, as I, in turn, bled you. Oh, it was all a rotten game, and I'm glad the end's at hand. I suppose it's all up now?" she asked Blossom.

"The end is, as far as it concerns you and me," he said. "I'm going to confess, and take my medicine. Minnie, I've lied to give this woman money to prevent her exposing me. Now I'm through. I've told my last lie, and given my last dollar. Thank God—who has been better to me than I deserve—thank God! I'm still young enough to make good the money I've lost. The lies I can't undo, but I can tell the truth. I'm going to confess everything!"

"Oh, LeGrand!" cried Minnie, and she held out her hands to him. "Not—not everything!"

"Yes, the whole rotten business. That's the only way to begin over again, and begin clean. I'll come through clean!"

"Oh!" murmured Minnie. "It will be so—so hard!"

"Yes," and LeGrand gritted his teeth, "it isn't going to be easy; but it'll be a bed of roses compared to what I've been lying on the last year. This woman had such a hold on me that I couldn't clear myself before—that is, clear myself of grave charges. But now I can. This is the end. I can prove that I wasn't mixed up in the Roswell de luxe book case, and that's what she's been holding over me."

"The Roswell case!" faltered Minnie.

"Yes, you don't know about it, but I'll tell you, later. Now I'm free. This is the end. I came here to-night to tell her so. How you happened to follow me I don't know."

"I didn't follow, LeGrand. It was all an accident."

"Then it's a lucky accident, Minnie. This is the end. From now on—"

"Yes, it's the end!" bitterly cried the other woman. "It's the end of everything. Oh, if I could only make it the end for Jean Carnot, I'd be satisfied. He made me what I am—an outcast from the world. If I could find Jean Carnot—"

And then, with the suddenness of a bird wheeling in mid air, the blonde woman turned and rushed away in the darkness.

For an instant Colonel Ashley hesitated in his hiding place. And then he murmured:

"I guess you'll keep, LeGrand Blossom, and you, too, Minnie Webb. Morocco Kate needs watching. And I think, now, she'll lead me right where I've been wanting to go for a long time. The darkness is fast fading away," which was a strange thing to say, seeing that the night was blacker than ever.

Back on the desolate moor, near the bridge under which the black tide was now hurrying, murmuring and whispering to the rushes tales of the deep and distant sea, stood two figures.

"Do you believe in me, Minnie?" asked the man brokenly.

There was a pause. The murmuring of the tide grew louder, and it seemed to sing now, as it rose higher and higher.

"Do you?" he repeated, wistfully.

"Yes," was the whispered reply. "And, Lee, I'll help you to come through—clean! I believe in you!"

And the tide washed up the shores of the creek so that, even in the darkness, the white sands seemed to gleam.



CHAPTER. XXIII. MOROCCO KATE, ALLY

"Who are you? Who is trailing me? Is that you, LeGrand?"

The challenge came sharply out of the darkness, and Colonel Ashley, who had been following Morocco Kate, plodding along through the sand, stumbling over the hillocks of sedge grass, halted.

"Who's there?" was the insistent demand. "I know some one is following me. Is it you, LeGrand Blossom? Have you—have you—"

The voice died out in a choking sob. "She's gamer than I thought," mused the detective. "And, strange as it may seem, I believe she cares." Then he answered, almost as gently as to a grieving child:

"It is not LeGrand Blossom. But it is a friend of his, and I want to be a friend to you. Wait a moment."

Then, as he came close to her side and flashed on his face a gleam from an electric torch he always carried, she started back, and cried:

"Colonel Ashley! Heavens!"

"Exactly!" he chuckled. "You didn't expect to see me here, did you? Well, it's all right."

"Then you're not after me for—" She gasped and could not go on. "That last deal was straight. I'm not the one you want."

"Don't get Spotty's habit, and throw up your hands just because you see me, Kate," went on the colonel soothingly. "I'm not after you professionally this time. In fact, if things turn out the way I want, I may shut my eyes to one or two little phases of your—er—let us call it career. I may ignore one or two little things that, under other circumstances, might need explaining."

"You mean you want me for a stool pigeon?"

"Something like that, yes."

"And suppose I refuse?"

"That's up to you, Kate. I may be able to get along without you—I don't say I can, but I may. However it would mean harder work and a delay, and I don't mind, seeing it's you, saying that I'd like to get back to my fishing. So if you'll come to reason, and tell me what I want to know, it will help you and—Blossom."

"Blossom!" she gasped. "Then you know—"

"I may as well tell you that I was back there—a while ago," and the colonel nodded vaguely to the splotch of blackness from whence Morocco Kate had rushed with that despairing cry on her lips.

"I'm a friend of LeGrand Blossom's—at least, I am now since I overheard what he had to say to you and Miss Webb," went on the detective. "Now then, if you'll tell me what I want to know, I'll help him to come across—clean, and I'll help you to the extent I mentioned."

Morocco Kate seemed to be considering as she stood in the darkness. Then a long sigh came from her lips, and it was as though she had come to the end of everything.

"I'll tell," she said simply. "What do you want to know? But first, let me say I didn't no more have an idea that Sport Carwell was going to die than you have Do you believe that?" she asked fiercely.

"I believe you, Kate. Now let's get down to brass tacks. Who is Jean Carnot, and where can I find him?"

"Oh!" she murmured. "You want him?"

"Very much, I think. Don't you?"

"Yes, I do! I—I would like to tear out his eyes! I'd like to—"

"Now, Kate, be nice! No use losing your temper. That's got you into trouble more than once. Try to play the lady—you can do it when you have to. Calling names isn't going to get us anywhere. Just tell me where I can find your former husband—or the one you thought was your husband—Jean Carnot."

"You're right, Colonel Ashley, I did think him my husband," said Morocco Kate simply. "And when I found out he had tricked me by a false marriage, and wouldn't make it good—well, I just went to the devil and hell—that's all."

"I know it, Kate, and I appreciate your position. I'm not throwing any stones at you. I've seen enough of life to know that none of us can do that with impunity. Now tell me all you can. And I'll say this—that after this is all over, if you want to try and do as Blossom is going to do—come through clean—I'll help you to the best of my ability."

"Will you, Colonel?" the big blonde woman asked eagerly.

"I will—and here's my hand on it!"

He reached out in the darkness, but there was no answering clasp. The woman seemed to shrink away. And then she said:

"I don't believe it would be of any use. I guess I'm too far down to crawl up. But I'll help you all I can."

"Don't give up, Kate!" said the detective gently. "I've seen lots worse than you—you notice I'm not mincing words—I've seen lots worse than you start over again. All I'll say is that I'll give you the chance if you want it. There's nothing in this life you're leading. You know the end and the answer as well as I do. You've seen it many a time."

"God help me—I have!" she murmured. "Well, I—I'll think about it."

"And, meanwhile, tell me about this Jean Carnot," went on the colonel. "You were married to him?"

"I thought I was."

"What sort of man was he? Come, sit down on this sand dune and tell me all about it. I think I want that man."

"No more than I do," she said fiercely. "He left me as he would an old coat he couldn't use any more! He cast me aside, trampled on me, left me like a sick dog! Oh, God—"

For a moment she could not go on. But she calmed herself and resumed. Then, by degrees, she told the whole, sordid story. It was common enough—the colonel had listened to many like it before. And when it was finished, brokenly and in tears, he put forth his hand on the shoulder of Morocco Kate and said:

"Now, Kate, let's get down to business. Are you willing to help me finish this up?"

"I'll do all I can, Colonel Ashley. But I don't see how we're going to find this devil of a Jean."

"Leave that to me. Now where can I find you when I want you—in a hurry, mind. I may want you in a great hurry. Where can I find you?"

"I'm stopping in the village. I'll arrange to be within call for the next few days. Will it take long?"

"No, not very. If I can I'll clean it all up tomorrow. Things are beginning to clear up. And now allow me the pleasure of walking back to town with you. It's getting late and beginning to rain. I have an umbrella, and you haven't."

And through the rain which began to fall, as though it might wash away some of the sordid sin that had been told of in the darkness, the strangely different couple walked through the dark night, Morocco Kate as an ally of Colonel Ashley.

The clean, fresh sun was shining in through the windows of Colonel Ashley's room at The Haven when he awakened the next morning. As he sprang up and made ready for his bath he called toward the next apartment:

"Are you up, Jack?"

"Just getting. Any rush?"

"Well, I think this may be our busy day, and again it may not. Better tumble out."

"Just as you say. How you feeling, Colonel?"

"Never better. I feel just like fishing, and you—"

"'Nough said. I'm with you."

And then, as he started toward his bath, the colonel saw a dirty slip of paper under the door of his room.

"Ha!" he ejaculated. "Another printed message. The writer is getting impatient. I think it's time to act."

And he read:

"Why does not the great detective arrest the poisoner of her father? If he will look behind the book case he will find something that will prove everything—the poison book and—something else."

The printed scrawl was signed: "Justice."

"Well, 'Justice,' I'll do as you say, for once," said the colonel softly, and there was a grim smile on his face.

And so it came about that after his bath and a breakfast Colonel Ashley, winking mysteriously to Jack Young, indicated to his helper that he was wanted in the library.

"What is it?" asked Jack, when they were alone in the room. "A new clew?"

"No, just a blind trail, but I want to clean it up. Help me move out some of the bookcases."

"Good night! Some job! Are you looking for a secret passage, or is there a body concealed here?" and Jack laughed as he took hold of some of the heavy furniture and helped the colonel move it.

Not until they had lifted out the third massive case of volumes was their search successful. There was a little thud, as though something had fallen to the floor, and, looking, the colonel said:

"I have it."

He reached in and brought out a thin volume. Its title page was inscribed "The Poisonous Plants of New Jersey."

Something was in the book—something more bulky than a mere marker; and, opening the slender volume at page 4, a spray of dried leaves and some thin, whitish roots were disclosed.

"Somebody trying to press wild flowers?" asked Jack. "Why all this trouble for that? Hum! Doesn't smell like violets," he added, as he picked up the spray of leaves and roots.

"No, it doesn't," agreed the colonel. "But if you are not a little careful in handling it you'll be a fit subject for a bunch of violets—tied with crepe."

"You mean—"

Jack was startled, and he dropped the dried leaves on the library floor.

"A specimen of the water hemlock," went on the colonel. "One of the deadliest poisons of the plant world. And as we don't want any one else to suffer the fate of Socrates, I'll put this away."

He looked at the compound leaves, the dried flowers, small, but growing in the characteristic large umbels, and at the cluster of fleshy roots, though now pressed flat, and noted the hollow stems of the plant itself. The bunch of what had been verdure once had made a greenish, yellow stain in the book, which, as the colonel noted, was from the local public library, and bore the catalogue number 58 C. H.—I6I*.

"Well, maybe you see through it, but I don't," confessed Jack. "Now, what's the next move?"

"Get these book cases back where they belong."

This was done, and then the colonel, sitting down to rest, for the labor was not slight, went on:

"You are sure that the French chauffeur has been told that The Haven is to be closed, and that he will be no longer required here, nor in the city? That he must leave at once though his month is not up?"

"Oh, yes, I heard Miss Viola tell him that herself. She told me she didn't see why you wanted that done, but as you had charge of the case the house would be closed, even if they had to open it again, for they stay here until late in the fall, you know.

"Yes, I know. Then you are sure Forette thinks they are all going away and that he will have to go, too?"

"Oh, yes, he's all packed. Been paid off, too, I believe, for he was sporting a roll of bills."

"And he is to see Mazi—when?"

"This evening."

"Very good. Now I don't want you to let him out of your sight. Stick to him like a life insurance agent on the trail of a prospect. Don't let him suspect, of course, but follow him when he goes to see the pretty little French girl to-night, and stay within call."

"Very good. Is that all?"

"For now, yes."

"What are you going to do, Colonel?"

"Me? I'm going fishing. I haven't thrown a line in over a week, and I'm afraid I'll forget how. Yes, I'm going fishing, but I'll see you some time to-night."

And a little later Shag was electrified by his master's call:

"Get things ready!"

"Good lan' ob massy, Colonel, sah! Are we suah gwine fishin'?"

"That's what we are, Shag. Lively, boy!"

"I'se runnin', sah, dat's whut I'se doin'! I'se runnin'!" And Shag's hands fairly trembled with eagerness, while the colonel, opening a little green book, read:

"Of recreation there is none So free as fishing is alone; All other pastimes do no less Than mind and body both possess; My hand alone my work can do, So I can fish and study too!"

"Old Isaac never wrote a truer word than that!" chuckled the colonel. "And now for a little studying."

And presently he was beside a quiet stream.

Luck was with the colonel and Shag that day, for when they returned to The Haven the creel carried by the colored man squeaked at its willow corners, for it bore a goodly mess of fish.

"Oh, Colonel, I've been so anxious to see you!" exclaimed Viola, when the detective greeted her after he had directed Shag to take the fish to the kitchen.

"Sorry I delayed so long afield," he answered with a gallant bow. "But the sport was too good to leave. What is it, my dear? Has anything happened?" Her face was anxious.

"Well, not exactly happened," she answered; "but I don't know what it means. And it seems so terrible! Look. I just discovered this—or rather, it was handed to me by one of the maids a little while ago," and she held out the postal from the library, telling of the overdue book.

"Well?" asked the colonel, though he could guess what was coming.

"Why, I haven't drawn a book from the library here for a long time," went on Viola. "I did once or twice, but that was when the library was first opened, some years ago. This postal is dated a week ago, but the maid just gave it to me."

"Very likely it was mislaid."

"That's what I supposed. But I went at once to the library, and I found that the book had been taken out on my card. And, oh, Colonel Ashley, it is a book on—poisons!"

"I know it, my dear."

"You know it! And did you think—"

"Now don't get excited. Come, I'll show you the very book. It's been here for some time, and I've known all about it. In fact I have a copy of it that I got from New York. There isn't anything to be worried about."

"But a book on poisons—poisonous plants it is, as I found out at the library—and poor father was killed by some mysterious poison! Oh—"

She was rapidly verging on an attack of hysterics, and the colonel led her gently to the dining room whence, in a little while, she emerged, pale, but otherwise self-possessed.

"Then you really want Aunt Mary and me to go away?" she asked.

"Yes, for a day or so. Make it appear that the house is closed for the season. You dismissed Forette, didn't you, as I suggested?"

"Yes, and paid him in full. I never want to see him again. He's been so insolent of late—he'd hardly do a thing I asked him. And he looked at me in such a queer, leering, impudent way."

"Don't worry about that, my dear. Everything will soon be all right."

"And will—will Harry be cleared?"

The colonel did not have time to answer, for Miss Mary Carwell appeared just then, lamenting the many matters that must be attended to on the closing of the house for even a short time. The colonel left her and Viola to talk it over by themselves.

On slowly moving pinions, a lone osprey beat its way against a quartering south-east wind to the dead tree where the little birds waited impatiently in the nest, giving vent to curious, whistling sounds. Slowly the osprey flew, for it had played in great luck that day, and had swooped down on a fish that would make a meal for him and his mate and the little ones. The fish was not yet dead, but every now and then would contort its length in an effort to escape from the talons which were thrust deeper and deeper into it, making bright spots of blood on the scaly sides.

And a man, walking through the sand, looked up, and in the last rays of the setting sun saw the drops of blood on the sides of the fish.

"A good kill, old man! A good kill!" he said aloud, and as though the osprey could hear him. "A mighty good kill!"

When it was dark a procession of figures began to wend its way over the lonely moor and among the sand dunes to where a tiny cottage nestled in a lonely spot on the beach. From the cottage a cheerful light shone, and now and then a pretty girl went to the door to look out. Seeing nothing, she went back and sat beside a table, on which gleamed a lamp.

By the light of it a woman was knitting, her needles flying in and out of the wool. The girl took up some sewing, but laid it down again and again, to go to the door and peer out.

"He is not coming yet, Mazi?" asked the woman in French.

"No, mamma, but he will. He said he would. Oh, I am so happy with him! I love him so! He is all life to me!"

"May you ever feel like that!" murmured the older woman.

Soon after that, the first of the figures in the procession reached the little cottage. The girl flew to the door, crying:

"Jean! Jean! What made you so late?"

"I could not help it, sweetheart. I but waited to get the last of my wages. Now I am paid, and we shall go on our honeymoon!"

"Oh, Jean! I am so happy!"

"And I, too, Mazi!" and the man drew the girl to him, a strange light shining in his eyes.

They sat down just outside the little cottage, where the gleam from the lamp would not reflect on them too strongly, and talked of many things. Of old things that are ever new, and of new things that are destined to be old.

The second figure of the procession that seemed to make the lonely cottage on the moor a rendezvous that evening, was not far behind that of the lover. It was a figure of a man in a natty blue serge suit. A panama hat of expensive make sat jauntily on top of his head on which curled close, heavy black hair.

"I wonder if the colonel is coming?" mused Jack Young, as he stopped to let Jean Forette hurry on a little in advance. Then a backward lance told him that two other figures were joining the procession. These last two—a man and a woman—walked more slowly, and they did not talk, except now and then to pass a few words.

"Then the marriage was legal, after all?" the woman asked.

"Yes, Kate, it was," answered Colonel Ashley. "You are his lawful wife."

"And he only told me I wasn't, so as to shame me—to make me leave him, and render me desperate?"

"That, and for other reasons. But the fact remains that you are his wife."

"And this other ceremony—this other woman?"

"No legal wife at all."

"I am sorry for her."

"Yes, she is but a girl. If I had known in time I might have stopped it. But it is too late now. Is he there, Jack?" he asked, as he joined the man in the panama hat.

"Yes, sitting outside with Mazi. Going to close in?"

"Might as well. Watch him carefully. He's desperate, and—"

"I know—full of dope. Well I'm ready for him."

And so the trio—the last of the procession, if we except Fate—went closer to the cottage whence so cheerfully gleamed the light.

"Who is there? What do you want?"

It was the snarling voice of Jean Forette, late chauffeur for the Carwells, challenging.

"Who is it?" he cried.

The three figures came on.

Suddenly there was a blinding flash, and the gleam from a powerful electric torch shone in the faces of Jack Young, Morocco Kate and Colonel Ashley.

There was a gasp of surprise and terror from the man beside Mazi—the man who had thrust out the torch to see who it was advancing and closing in on him through the darkness.

"Ah!" sneered the Frenchman, recovering his self-possession. "It is my friend the officer. Ah, I am glad to see you—but just now—not!" and he seemed to spit out the words.

"Maybe not. I can't always come when I'm expected, nor where I'm wanted," said Colonel Ashley coolly. "Now, my friend—Jack!" he cried sharply.

"I've got him, Colonel," was the cool answer, and there was a cry of agony from the chauffeur as his wrist was turned, almost to the breaking point, while there dropped from his paralyzed hand a magazine pistol, thudding to the sand at his feet.

"Go on, Colonel," said Jack, who had slipped off to one side, out of the focus of the glaring light, just in time to prevent Jean Forette from using the weapon he had quickly taken from a side pocket. "Go on, close in. I've drawn his stinger."

"Messieurs, what does this mean?" demanded the girl beside Jean. "Who are you? What do you want? Ah, it is you—and you!" and she turned first to Colonel Ashley and then to Jack Young. "You who have talked so kindly to me—who have asked me so much about—about my husband! It is you who come like thieves and assassins! Speak to them, Jean! Tell them to go!"

The Frenchman was breathing heavily, for Jack had a merciless grip on him.

"Speak to them, Jean!" implored the girl, while her mother, standing in the door with her knitting, looked wonderingly on. "Why do they come to take you like a traitor?"

"It—it's all a mistake!" panted the chauffeur.

"You've got me wrong, messieurs. I—I didn't do it. It was all an accident. He—I—Oh, my God! You!" and he started back as Morocco Kate stepped toward him, pulling from her face the veil that had covered it when the glaring light showed. Jack Young now held the electric torch.

"You!" he murmured hoarsely.

"Yes, I!" she cried. "The woman you kicked out like a sick dog! I've found you at last, and now I'll make you suffer all I did and more—you—devil!"

"Softly, Kate, softly!" murmured the colonel. But she did not heed him.

"You—you spawn of hell!" she cried. "It was you who sent me down where I am—where not a decent woman will look at me and a decent man won't speak to me. You did it—you left me to rot in my shame so you could find some one else—some one younger and prettier to fondle and kiss and—Oh, God!"

She sank in a shuddering heap on the sand at the feet of the man who had broken her body and spirit, and lay there, sobbing out her anger.

"Let her stay there a little," said the colonel softly. "She'll feel better after this outburst."

"Jean! Jean! What is it all about?" begged the girl who still maintained her place beside him. "Oh, speak to me! Tell me! Who is she?" and she pointed to the huddled figure on the sand.

"I'll tell you who she is," said Colonel Ashley. "She is the legal wife of Jean Carnot, alias Jean Forette, and—"

A scream from Mazi stopped him.

"Tell me it isn't true, Jean! Tell me it isn't true!" begged the girl.

Jean Carnot did not speak.

"He knows it is true," said the colonel. "And now, my French auto friend, I've come to take you into custody on a charge of—"

"I didn't do it! I didn't do it!" cried the man. "I swear I didn't do it. I was going to throw the glass away but he grabbed it from me, and—"

"I arrest you on a charge of bigamy," went on the calm voice of Colonel Ashley. And then, as he saw Mazi stagger as though about to fall, he added:

"All right, Jack. I'll take care of her. You put the bracelets on him. And see that they're good and tight. We don't want him slipping out and getting married again. He doesn't have much regard for bonds of any sort, matrimonial or legal."

And then he lifted poor, little Mazi up and carried her into the cottage, while Morocco Kate got slowly to her feet and sat down on the bench in the darkest shadows, sobbing.



CHAPTER XXIV. STILL WATERS

"The records show that Henri Margot, alias Jean Carnot alias Jean Forette was married to Isabel Pelubit in Paris on March 17, four years ago, and that she died under suspicious circumstances three months later, leaving her husband all of a snug little fortune she possessed.

"All lies, monsieur—all lies! I do not believe anything you tell me!"

"Well, that's very foolish of you, Mazi, for you can easily prove for yourself everything I tell you, and it will be better for you, in the end, if you do believe."

"I do not. But go on with—more lies!" She shrugged her shoulders contemptuously.

Colonel Ashley leafed over a sheaf of papers he had spread out on the table in front of him. He and Mazi sat in a room in police headquarters in Lakeside. It was the day following the procession to the cottage on the moor.

"The records show," went on the detective, "that Henri Margot was arrested in Paris, charged with having poisoned his wife so that he might spend on another woman the money she possessed. But he was not convicted, chiefly because the chemists could not agree on the kind of poison that had caused death."

"All lies—I do not believe," said Mazi, stolidly.

"Um!" mused the colonel. "Well, Mazi, you're more stubborn than I thought. But it doesn't make any difference to me, you know. I'm paid for all this. Now let's see—what's next? Oh, yes. Then the records show that Henri, or Jean, whichever you choose to call him, came to this country. He fell in love with a pretty girl—she wasn't as pretty as you, Mazi, I'll say that—but he fell in love with her and married her—or pretended to. However, it was a fake ceremony, and she couldn't prove anything when he had spent all her money and tossed her aside. So there wasn't anything we could do to him that time."

"More lies," said Mazi, calmly—or at least with the appearance of calmness.

"The records show," went on the inexorable voice of Colonel Ashley, "that next Jean Carnot, as he called himself then, became infatuated with a pretty girl—and this time I'll say she was just about as pretty as you, Mazi—and her name was Annie Tighe. She was an Irish girl, and she insisted on being married by a priest, so there wasn't any faking there. Jean was properly married at least."

"What do I care for all these lies?" sneered the girl, impatiently tapping her foot on the floor. "Why do you bore me? I am not interested! I should like to see Jean. Ha! Where have you put him?"

"You'll see him soon enough, Mazi. I've got just a few more records to show you, and then I'm done. Now we come to the time when, after he found he couldn't get out of a legal marriage, Jean put his foot in it, so to speak. He was tied right, this time, so he took refuge in a lie when he wanted to shake off the bonds of matrimony, as my friend Jack Young would say. He told his wife—and she was his wife, and is yet—he told her the ceremony was a fake, that the priest was a false one, in his pay."

"All lies! What do I care?" sneered Mazi, again shrugging her shoulders.

"Well, now let's get along. After our friend Jean found he was tired of his wife he shamed her into leaving him and she went—well, that isn't pleasant to dwell on, either. Except that he's the villain responsible for her going to the dogs. He sent her there just as he would have sent you, Mazi, except for what has happened."

"You mean he is not my husband?"

"Not in the least."

"I do not believe you. It is all lies. These women are but jealous. Proceed."

"That's about all there is to it, Mazi, except to show you the letter from your own priest, who confirms the fact that the priest who married Jean Carnot and Annie Tighe was legally authorized to do so, both by the laws of his own church and those of New York State, where the ceremony took place. You will believe Father Capoti, won't you?" and he laid beside the girl a letter which she read eagerly.

This time she said nothing about lies, but her face turned deadly pale.

"And this is the last exhibit," went on the colonel, as he laid a photograph before Mazi. It showed a man and a girl, evidently in their wedding finery, and the face of the man was that of Jean Forette, and that of the girl was of the woman who had groveled on the sand at the feet of the chauffeur the night before,—Morocco Kate.

"Look on the back," suggested the detective, and when Mazi turned the photograph over she read:

"The happiest day of my life—Jean Carnot."

"If you happen to have any love letters from him—and I guess you have," went on the colonel, "you might compare the writing and—"

"I have no need, monsieur," was the low answer. "I—God help me.—I believe now! Oh, the liar! If I could see him now—"

"I rather thought you'd want to," murmured the colonel. "Bring him in!" he called.

The door opened, and, handcuffed to a stalwart officer, in slunk Jean of the many names.

Mazi sprang to her feet, her face livid. She would have leaped at the prisoner, but the colonel held her back. But he could not hold back the flood of voluble French that poured from her lips.

"Liar! Dog!" she hissed at him. "And so you have deceived me as you deceived others! You lied—and I thought he lied!" and she motioned to the colonel. "Oh, what a silly fool I've been! But now my eyes are open! I see! I see!"

With a quick gesture, before the colonel could stop her, she tore in half the picture that had swept away all her doubts.

"Mustn't do that!" chided the colonel, as he picked up the pieces which she was about to grind under her feet. "I'll need that at the trial."

"You—you beast!" whispered the girl, but the whisper seemed louder than a shout would have been. "You beast! No longer will I lie for you. Why you wanted me to, I do not know. Yes, I do! It was so that you might be with some one else when you should have been with me. Listen, all of you!" she cried, as she flung her arms wide. "No longer will I shield him. He told me to say that he was with me when that golf man—Monsieur Carwell died—before he died—but he was not. No more will I lie for you, Jean of the many names! You were not with me! I did not even see you that day. Bah! You were kissing some other fool maybe! Oh, my God! I—I—"

And the colonel gently laid the trembling, shrieking girl down on a bench, while the eyes of the shrinking figure of Jean the chauffeur followed every movement.

He raised his free hand, and seemed to be struggling to loosen his collar that appeared to choke him. For a moment the attention of Colonel Ashley was turned toward Mazi, who was sobbing frantically. Then, when he saw that she was becoming quieter, he turned to the prisoner.

"You heard all that went on, I know," said the detective. "That's why I put you in the next room."

"Yes, I heard," was the calm answer. "But what of it? You can prove nothing only that women are fools. I shall hire a good lawyer and—poof! What would you have—a man must live. Bigamy, it is not such a serious charge."

"Oh, no, there are worse," said the colonel calmly. "You're going to hear one presently. She told me just what I wanted to know, as I thought she would if I could get her roused up enough against you. So, you weren't riding, as you said, with her the day Mr. Carwell came to his end. I never thought you were, Jean of the many names. And now, officer, if you'll take him back and lock him up, I guess this will be about all to-day."

"But I want to get bail!" exclaimed the prisoner. "I have a right to be bailed. My lawyer says so."

"There isn't any bail in your case," said the detective.

"Pooh! Nonsense! Bigamy, it is not such a serious charge."

"Oh, didn't I tell you? I meant to," said the colonel gently. "You're under another accusation now. Jean Forette, to call you by your latest alias, you're under arrest, charged with the murder, by poison, of Horace Carwell, and I think we'll come pretty near convicting you by the testimony of Mazi. Ah, would you—not quite!"

He struck down the hand the prisoner had raised to his mouth, and there rolled over the floor a little capsule. The top came off and a white powder spilled out.

"Don't step on it!" warned the colonel as several other officers came in to assist in handling the prisoner, who was struggling violently. "It's probably the same poison, mixed with French dope, that killed Mr. Carwell. Jean had it hidden in the collar band of his shirt ready for emergencies. But you shan't cheat the chair, Jean of the many names!"

They led the Frenchman away, struggling and screaming that he was innocent, that it was all a mistake. By turns he prayed and blasphemed horribly.

"That's the way they usually do when they can't get a shot of their dope," said the jail physician, after he had visited the prisoner and given him a big dose of bromide. "He'll be a wreck from now on. He's rotten with some French drug, the like of which I've never seen used before."

The coroner's jury had been called together again. Once more the sordid evidence was gone over, but this time there was more of it, and it had to do with a story told weepingly on the stand by Mazi, and corroborated by Colonel Ashley.

And a little later, when the jury filed in, it was to report:

"We find that Horace Carwell came to his death through poison administered by Jean Carnot, alias Jean Forette, with intent to kill."

And a little later, when the grand jury had indicted him, the man's nerve failed him completely, because his supply of drug was kept from him and he babbled the truth like a child, weeping.

He had stolen two hundred dollars from the pocketbook of Mr. Carwell the day before the championship golf game, and, the crime having been detected by Viola's father, the chauffeur had been given twenty-four hours in which to return the money or be exposed. He was in financial straits, and, as developed later, had stolen elsewhere, so that he feared arrest and exposure and was at his wit's end. He had spent much of the money on Mazi, whom he induced to go through a secret marriage ceremony with him.

Then Jean, like a cornered rat, and crazy from the drug he had filled himself with, conceived the idea of poisoning Mr. Carwell. That would prevent arrest and exposure, he reasoned.

The chauffeur found his opportunity when he was ordered to stop the big red, white and blue car at a roadhouse just prior to the game. Mr. Carwell was thirsty, and in bad humor, and ordered the chauffeur to bring out some champagne. It was into this that Jean slipped the poison, mixed with some of his own drug which he knew would retard the action of the deadly stuff for some time. And it worked just as he had expected, dropping Mr. Carwell in his tracks about two hours later, as he made the stroke that won the game.

"But how did a chauffeur know so much about poison and dope as to be able to mix a dose that would fool the chemists?" asked Jack Young of his chief, a little later.

"Jean's father was a French chemist, and a clever one. It was there that Jean learned to mix the powder dope he took, and he learned much of other drugs. I suspect, though I can't prove it, that he poisoned his first wife. A devil all the way through," answered the colonel.

"But what did Bartlett and Mr. Carwell quarrel about so seriously that Bartlett wouldn't tell?"

"It was about Morocco Kate. Harry learned that she had sold Mr. Carwell a set of books, and, knowing her reputation, he feared she might have compromised Mr. Carwell because of his sporting instincts. So Harry begged Viola's father to come out plainly and repudiate the book contract. But Mr. Carwell was stiff about it, and told Harry to mind his own business. That was all. Naturally, after Harry found that Morocco Kate really was mixed up in the case—though innocently enough—he didn't want to tell what the quarrel was about for fear of bringing out a scandal. As a matter of fact there never was any shadow of one."

"And the mysterious notes to you about Viola having a poison book?"

"All sent by Jean, of course, to throw suspicion on her. I heard it rumored, in more than one quarter, that Viola strongly disapproved of her father's sporty life, and it was said she had stated that she would rather see him dead than disgraced. Which was natural enough. I've said that myself many a time about friends.

"Jean found Miss Carwell's library card, and took out the poison book in her name, afterward anonymously sending me word about it. I admit that, for a moment, I was staggered, but it was only for a moment. Here is what I found in his room."

Colonel Ashley held out a piece of paper. There was no writing on it, but it bore the indentations, identical with one of the penciled, printed notes.

"He wrote it on a pad," said the colonel, "and tore off the top sheet. But he used a hard pencil, and the impression went through. Just one of the few mistakes he made."

"Fine work on your part, Colonel."

"As for Captain Poland, the money transactions did look a bit queer, but we've since found the receipt and it's all right. A new clerk in Carwell's office had mislaid it. It wasn't Blossom's fault, either. He's a weak chap, but not morally bad. The worst thing he did was to fall for Morocco Kate. But better men than he have done the same thing. However, they won't again."

"Why, she hasn't—"

"Oh, no; nothing as rash as that. She's going to take a new route, that's all. She's a natural born saleswoman, and I've gotten her a place with a big firm that owes me some favors."

"And did Blossom come through 'clean' as he said he would?"

"He did, and he didn't. It seems that a year or so ago he inherited eleven thousand dollars. He invested half of the money in copper and made quite a little on the deal. Then, a short while before Carwell died, he got Blossom to lend him some money, which he was to pay back inside of a month or two. When Carwell's death occurred, Blossom was in financial difficulties on account of the demands of Morocco Kate. He could not get hold of the money he had invested, nor could he get hold of the money he had loaned Carwell. In his quandary he took certain securities belonging to Carwell and hypothecated them, expecting, later on, to make good as soon as he got some of his own money back. Of course the whole transaction was a rather shady one, and yet I still believe the young fellow wanted to be honest."

"How does he stand now?"

"Oh, he has managed to get hold of some of his money, and with that got back the Carwell securities. And, of course, the Carwell estate will have to settle with him later on, and Viola and Miss Mary Carwell are going to keep him in his present position.

"He and Minnie Webb are to be married very soon—which reminds me that I have an invitation for you."

"For me?"

"Yes. It's to the wedding of Viola and Harry Bartlett. The affair is going to be very quiet, so you can come without worrying about a dress-suit, which I know you hate as much as I do."

"I should say so!"

"And did Bartlett's uncle really mulct Mr. Carwell in that insurance deal?"

"Well, that's according to how you look at the ins and outs of modern high finance. It was a case of skin or be skinned, and I guess Harry's uncle skinned first and beat Mr. Carwell to it. It was six of one and a half dozen of the other. The deal would have been legitimate either way it swung, but it made Mr. Carwell sore for a time, and that, more than anything else, made him quarrel with Harry when Morocco Kate was mentioned."

The letters in the secret drawer, which had so worried Viola, proved to be very simple, after all. They referred to a certain local committee, organized for an international financial deal which Mr. Carwell was endeavoring to swing with Captain Poland. The latter thought, because of his intimate association with Viola's father, that the latter might use his influence in the captain's love affair. But that was not to be. So Viola's worry was for naught in this respect.

And so the golf course mystery was cleared up, though even to the end, when he had paid the penalty for his crime, the chauffeur would not reveal the nature of the poison he had mixed with the dope which had made him a wreck.

Beside the still water, that ran in a deep eddy where the stream curved under the trees, Colonel Ashley sat fishing. Beside him on the grass a little boy, with black, curling hair, and deep, brown eyes, sat clicking a spare reel. Off to one side, in the shade, a colored man snored.

"Hey, Unk Bob!" lisped the little boy. "Don't Shag make an awful funny noise?"

"He certainly does, Gerry! He certainly does!"

"Just 'ike a saw bitin' wood."

"That's it, Gerry! I'll have to speak to Shag about it. But now, Gerry, my boy, you must keep still while Unk Bob catches a big fish."

"Ess, I keep still. But you tell me a 'tory after?"

"Yes, I'll tell you a story."

"Will you tell me how you was a fissin', an' a big white ball comed an', zipp! knocked ze fiss off your hook? Will you tell me dat fiss 'tory?"

"Yes, Gerry, I'll tell you that if you'll be quiet now."

And Shag's snores mingled with the gentle whisper of the water and the sighing of the wind in the willows.

And then, when the creel had been emptied and Colonel Robert Lee Ashley sat on the porch with Gerry Ashley Bartlett snugly curled in his lap and told the story of the golf ball and the fish, while Shag cleaned the fish fresh from the brook, two figures stood in the door of the house.

"Look, Harry!" softly said the woman's voice. "Isn't that a picture?"

"It is, indeed, my dear. Gerry adores the colonel."

"No wonder. I do myself. Oh, by the way, Harry, I had a letter from Captain Poland today."

"Did you? Where is he now?" asked Harry Bartlett, as his eyes turned lovingly from the figure of his little son in the colonel's lap to that of his wife beside him.

"In the Philippines. He says he thinks he'll settle there. He was so pleased that we named the Boy after him."

"Was he?" and then, as his wife went over to steal up behind her little son and clasp her hands over his eyes, the man, standing alone on the porch, murmured:

"Poor Gerry!" And it was of the lonely man in the Philippines he was speaking.

In the silent shadows Colonel Robert Lee Ashley fished again. This time he was alone, save for the omnipresent Shag. And as the latter netted a fish, and slipped it into the grass-lined creel, he spoke and said:

"Mr. Young, he done ast me to-day when we gwine back t' de city. He done say dere's a big case waitin' fo' you, Colonel, sah. When is we-all gwine back?"

"Never, Shag!"

"Nevah, Colonel, sah?"

"No. I'm going to spend all the rest of my life fishing. I've resigned from the detective business! I'll never take another case Never!"

And Shag chuckled silently as he closed the creel.

THE END