awyer, "you're a lucky man. Everybody safe
and sound and a very ugly old colonial house burned flat to the ground,
with plenty of insurance. Now that you have the new appointment and are
going to leave town, it makes a very convenient sale for you."

"Hush!" said his daughter. "The hot coffee is more important. You had
better bring the baby down with you. We have sent for milk and
nursing-bottles. There, John, that is the baby. You've never seen it.
Wasn't I right? Isn't it pretty?"

"My God!" cried the Judge.

"What!" said they.

"I must be tired," he answered. "It has been a strain. It was nothing."

We went out onto the porch for a moment when we were below, and stood
out of sight behind the vines. The street was still crowded with
curious people, and there was a great black hole with the elm trees,
scorched brown, drooping over it--a hole filled with the ashes that were
all that was left of the home. Men were playing a hose into it and every
time they moved the stream, here or there, a great hiss and cloud of
vapor came up. Some one had hung the Judge's straw hat on a lilac bush
and there it advertised itself. But the Judge drew himself up and
stiffened his body and set his teeth, as he looked at that scene, and I
knew then he would not break down again, but would play the game he had
begun to the end.

Indeed, I felt his fingers at my sleeve.

"I shall slip away to get the locket," he whispered. "Do you understand?
Just a moment. Tell them I will be right back."

He went around the house and I into the hall.

"Judge Colfax will return in a minute," I explained.

"Of course!" said Miss Danforth. "We will wait for him."

The minutes passed. He did not come back.

"Where did you say he went?" asked the old barrister--or lawyer, as you
call them.

I shook my head and turned the baby onto my other arm. In a second more
I heard his voice on the porch.

"Margaret!" he called.

I went out to him.

His face showed his nervousness again. His fingers trembled as he took
the baby from me.

"Go! Look!" he whispered. "I cannot find it!"

This was my chance! I went. The grass below the window had grown long
and was matted down; people on the street were watching me and I did not
dare to drop on my knees for fear some well-meaning and unwelcome
assistance might come for the search. Nevertheless I pushed my toes, I
thought, over every inch of the ground below the window. I doubled and
redoubled the space. At