uch are Doctor Graham, "The Man with a
Scar," the Mosk family--father, mother, and daughter--Gabriel Pendle,
Miss Winchello, and, last but not least, Mr. Baltic--a detective so
unique in character and methods as to make Conan Doyle turn green with
envy.

All in all, this story is so rich in the essential elements of worthy
fiction--in characterization, exciting adventure, suggestions of the
marvelous, wit, humor, pathos, and just enough of tragedy--that it is
offered to the American public in all confidence that it will be
generally and heartily welcomed.

THE PUBLISHERS.

CHAPTER I

'ENTER MRS PANSEY AS CHORUS'

Of late years an anonymous mathematician has declared that in the
British Isles the female population is seven times greater than the
male; therefore, in these days is fulfilled the scriptural prophecy that
seven women shall lay hold of one man and entreat to be called by his
name. Miss Daisy Norsham, a veteran Belgravian spinster, decided, after
some disappointing seasons, that this text was particularly applicable
to London. Doubtful, therefore, of securing a husband at the rate of one
chance in seven, or dissatisfied at the prospect of a seventh share in a
man, she resolved upon trying her matrimonial fortunes in the country.
She was plain, this lady, as she was poor; nor could she rightly be said
to be in the first flush of maidenhood. In all matters other than that
of man-catching she was shallow past belief. Still, she did hope, by
dint of some brisk campaigning in the diocese of Beorminster, to capture
a whole man unto herself.

Her first step was to wheedle an invitation out of Mrs Pansey, an
archdeacon's widow--then on a philanthropic visit to town--and she
arrived, towards the end of July, in the pleasant cathedral city of
Beorminster, in time to attend a reception at the bishop's palace. Thus
the autumn manoeuvres of Miss Norsham opened most auspiciously.

Mrs Pansey, with whom this elderly worshipper of Hymen had elected to
stay during her visit, was a gruff woman, with a scowl, who 'looked all
nose and eyebrows.' Few ecclesiastical matrons were so well known in
the diocese of Beorminster as was Mrs Pansey; not many, it must be
confessed, were so ardently hated, for there were few pies indeed in
which this dear lady had not a finger; few keyholes through which her
eye did not peer. Her memory and her tongue, severally and combined, had
ruined half the reputations in the county. In s