es being here, Matilda. But running this
place just now as a hotel, who knows but it may let out the fact that
we're here!"

Mr. Pyecroft's eyebrows went up--ever so little.

"Ah, I understand. You wish your presence in the house to be a
secret."

"Of course! Hasn't Matilda told you?"

"I only just arrived. She hasn't had time. But of course she would
have done so. You are--ah"--his tone was delicate--"evading the
police?"

"The police! We don't care a hang about the police, though, of course,
we don't want them to know. It's the infernal reporters we care
about."

"The reporters?" softly pursued Mr. Pyecroft.

"Yes, but one reporter in particular--a beast by the name of Mayfair,
I've had a tip that he suspects something; already he's tried to get
into the house as a gas-meter inspector."

At the mention of that indomitable, remorseless, undeceivable
newsgatherer, Mayfair, and the possibility of his gaining entrance
into the house, Mrs. De Peyster experienced a new shudder.

"What would be the harm if Mr. Mayfair did get in?" Imperceptibly
prodded Mr. Pyecroft. "He would merely write a piece about you for his
paper."

"And his confounded piece, or the main facts in it, would be cabled to
Europe!"

"Ah, I think I see," said Mr. Pyecroft. "Mrs. De Peyster would read
about your marriage in the Paris 'Herald' or some other European
paper. You do not wish your mother to know of your marriage--yet."

"I supposed Matilda had already told you that," said Jack.

"Ah, so that is why you are here in hiding," said Mr. Pyecroft, very
softly, chiefly to himself; and his eyes had another momentary flash,
only brighter than any heretofore, and his mouth twitched upward, and
he pleasantly rubbed his hands.

At that moment, from the stairway, came the sound of descending steps.
Jack and Mary appeared undisturbed. Mr. Pyecroft became taut, though
no one could have observed a change, Mrs. De Peyster quivered with yet
deeper apprehension. Would the trials and tribulations and Pharaonic
plagues never cease descending on her!

Matilda gazed wildly at Jack. "Who's that?" she quavered.

"Only Uncle Bob," Jack answered carelessly.

Only Uncle Bob! Mrs. De Peyster, in her dim corner, tried to shrivel
up into yet darker obscurity. Breathlessly she felt herself upon the
precipitous edge of ultimate horror. For Judge Harvey--Judge Harvey
of all persons--to be the one to discover her amid her humiliating
circumstances!

Diml