or he has grown reckless, for
another letter has been missed since. To-night, however, will settle all
doubt in the matter. When I open that bag in this office to-night, and
do not find a certain decoy letter in it, which was last checked at
Heavy Tree Crossing, I shall know that it remains in Green's possession
at Hickory Hill."

She was sitting back in her chair, white and breathless. He glanced at
her kindly, and then took up his hat. "Come, Mrs. Baker, don't let this
worry you. As I told you at first, YOU have nothing to fear. Even your
thoughtlessness and ignorance of rules have contributed to show your own
innocence. Nobody will ever be the wiser for this; we do not advertise
our affairs in the Department. Not a soul but yourself knows the real
cause of my visit here. I will leave you here alone for a while, so as
to divert any suspicion. You will come, as usual, this evening, and be
seen by your friends; I will only be here when the bag arrives, to open
it. Good-by, Mrs. Baker; it's a nasty bit of business, but it's all in
the day's work. I've seen worse, and, thank God, you're out of it."

She heard his footsteps retreat into the outer office and die out of the
platform; the jingle of his spurs, and the hollow beat of his horse's
hoofs that seemed to find a dull echo in her own heart, and she was
alone.

The room was very hot and very quiet; she could hear the warping
and creaking of the shingles under the relaxing of the nearly level
sunbeams. The office clock struck seven. In the breathless silence that
followed, a woodpecker took up his interrupted work on the roof,
and seemed to beat out monotonously on her ear the last words of the
stranger: Stanton Green--a thief! Stanton Green, one of the "boys" John
had helped out of the falling tunnel! Stanton Green, whose old mother in
the States still wrote letters to him at Laurel Run, in a few hours
to be a disgraced and ruined man forever! She remembered now, as a
thoughtless woman remembers, tales of his extravagance and fast living,
of which she had taken no heed, and, with a sense of shame, of presents
sent her, that she now clearly saw must have been far beyond his means.
What would the boys say? What would John have said? Ah! what would John
have DONE!

She started suddenly to her feet, white and cold as on that day that
she had parted from John Baker before the tunnel. She put on her hat
and mantle, and going to that little iron safe that stood in the co