was comin' to see ye, and it's
important. I was goin' to that Miss Jenrys, but I forgot the number
her aunt give me, and so I struck right out for that office where Adam
and me met ye that first time when I wanted ye arristed right off, ye
know. But, land! I be actin' like a plum fool. Come right along!' She
caught my arm and turned me about. 'My place ain't fur, and I s'pose
we can't talk in the streets.'

I began to fear that I should not easily escape her, and moved on
beside her, her hand still gripped upon my arm as if for support.

'I shan't open my head ag'in,' she said as we went, 'till we git
there.' And she did not, but when we had reached her door and I was
about to make an excuse, and after seeing her safe indoors hasten on
in my search for Dave, she said, much more like her usual self:

'Come right in now and find out what kind of a detective I'd make if I
had a chance. It's your business, too, I guess;' and then, as I seemed
to hesitate, 'an' it's about that counterfittin' man.'

Suddenly, somehow, the notion of her insanity vanished from my mind,
and I followed her into the house.

She opened a door near the entrance, and, after peeping in, threw it
wide.

'It's the parlour of the hull fambily,' she explained as I entered,
'and I'm thankful it ain't ockerpied jest now, for our room ain't
more'n half as big.'

It was the tiniest of parlours, but not ill-furnished, and the moment
she had dragged forward a chair for me, after the manner of the
country hostess, and had made sure that the door was close shut, she
drew a small 'rocker' close to my own seat and began eagerly:

'I've had an adventer to-day, a reg'lar story-book sort of one. It's
made me pretty nervous and excited like, and I hope you'll excuse
that; but I'm going to tell it to you the quickest way, for, 'nless
I'm awful mistook, them folks'll git out quick's they find out who I
be, or who I ain't, one or t'other.'

'My time----' I began, hoping to hasten her story, but she went on
hurriedly:

'Ye see, Camp has got so sot and took up with them machines, and
windmills, and dead folks, and dry bones down to'rds that south pond
that he ain't no company for nobody no more; so this afternoon--we
didn't neither one go out this mornin', for we'd been to see Buffaler
Bill las' night, and we was tuckered all out--so this afternoon I
went with Camp down street instead of goin' the t'other way, for he
thought 'twould be a good idee to go in a ne