as the sort
who must have been crazy indeed before he spoke of the Almighty and
cards in the same breath.

I remembered taking his measly solitaire pack out of his pocket at the
Halfway, and wished I had brought them along with me. But it was simple
enough to go and get them from Billy Jones. Meantime I had no desire to
speak to Macartney of them or the scrawled, torn-off flap from
Thompson's envelope: he was sick enough already about old Thompson's
aberration, without any more proofs of it. It hurt even me to remember I
had always laughed at the poor devil and his forlorn cards. I had no
heart to burn the scrap of his envelope either, while old Thompson lay
unburied. I put it away in my letter case, and locked it up.

Which seemed a tame ending; I had not sense enough to know it was not
tame at all!

CHAPTER IX

TATIANA PAULINA VALENKA!

Poor old Thompson seemed a closed incident. There was nothing to be
found out about him, even regarding his departure from La Chance. Nobody
remembered his going through Caraquet, or even the last time he had been
there. He was not a man any one would remember, anyhow, or one who had
made friends. We put a notice of his death and the circumstances in a
Montreal paper, and I thought that was the end of it all, till Dudley,
to my surprise, stuck obstinately to his idea of tracing Thompson from
Montreal. He told Macartney and me that he had written to a detective
about it, and I think we both thought it was silly. I know I did; and I
saw Macartney close his lips as though he kept back the same thought.
But we gave old Thompson the best funeral we could, over at the Halfway,
with a good grave and a wooden cross. All of us went except Marcia. She
said she had never cared about the poor old thing, and she wasn't going
to pretend it.

It was a bitter day, with no snow come yet. Macartney looked sick and
drawn about the mouth as he stood by the grave, while Dudley read the
prayers out of Paulette's prayer book. I saw her notice Macartney when I
did, and I think neither of us had guessed he had so much feeling. I
stayed a minute or two behind the others, because I'd ridden over,
instead of driving with them; and just before I started for La Chance I
remembered that torn scrap of paper in my room there. I turned hastily
to Billy Jones.

"Those solitaire cards of Thompson's," said I, from no reason on earth
but that to find them had been the last request of the dead man, even if