t
been very clever. There was a tell-tale smudge on the stove--a smudge
made by a hand that had blackened itself by diving down into the ashes
to search among the burned papers. Mark knew that Saunders had lost no
time in searching his room, and he was happy to be still under
suspicion.

But Mark was not so happy in contemplating the rest of the situation.
He was getting deeper into a game he knew nothing about. What was the
reason for the suspicion against the girl? Could she be a thief--or
worse? Mark had heard of pretty criminals before, and he knew that
beauty without is no guarantee of virtue within. But he had resolved
to go through with the adventure, and he would not change his mind. He
argued, too, that it was not entirely the beauty of Ruth Atheson that
interested him. There was an indefinable "something else." Anyhow,
innocent or guilty, he made up his mind to stand by her.

At lunch he met Saunders again and found him overly friendly, even
anxious to talk. The detective opened the conversation.

"Going to see the Padre again?"

"I have an engagement with him this afternoon. I rather like the
Padre!"

"Sure you do," said the detective. "Everybody does. The Padre's a
wonder, and the last man one might expect to find in a little parish
like this."

Mark wanted to learn more on that score.

"True enough," he said. "In the Anglican Church they would make such a
man a bishop, or at least a dean."

"Well, they didn't do that with the Padre." The detective shook his
head as if to express his regret that something of the kind had not
been done. "He was the right hand man of the old Bishop of the
diocese; but the new Bishop had to have new counselors. That's one way
of the world that the church fellows have gotten into. Some say that
it broke the Padre's heart, but he doesn't look it. Must have hurt him
a little, though. Human nature is human nature--and after all he did
for the Church, too."

"Did he do so much?" questioned Mark.

"Sure he did! You saw the Cathedral, didn't you, when you passed
through the city? Well, the Padre built that, and the big college,
too, the one you see from the train. He was president of the college.
He was the life and soul of the Catholic Church in this section."

"Why was he dropped?"

"Search me," offered the detective. "No one knows that except the
Bishop, I guess. Padre came here six months ago. Some of the young
priests used to come to see