a, in common with other villages of its
kind, was utterly destitute of any natural attractions. There was
the one principal street leading to the station, with a few
scattered stores on either side, a church and a bank. Happily,
too, for those who were unable to survive the monotony of the
place, it boasted of a pretty cemetery. There were also a number
of attractive cottages with spacious porches hung with honeysuckle
and of these the Rossmores occupied one of the less pretentious
kind.

But although Massapequa, theoretically speaking, was situated only
a stone's throw from the metropolis, it might have been situated
in the Great Sahara so far as its inhabitants took any active
interest in the doings of gay Gotham. Local happenings naturally
had first claim upon Massapequa's attention--the prowess of the
local baseball team, Mrs. Robinson's tea party and the highly
exciting sessions of the local Pinochle Club furnishing food for
unlimited gossip and scandal. The newspapers reached the village,
of course, but only the local news items aroused any real
interest, while the women folk usually restricted their readings
to those pages devoted to Daily Hints for the Home, Mrs. Sayre's
learned articles on Health and Beauty and Fay Stanton's Daily
Fashions. It was not surprising, therefore, that the fame of Judge
Rossmore and the scandal in which he was at present involved had
not penetrated as far as Massapequa and that the natives were
considerably mystified as to who the new arrivals in their midst
might be.

Stott had been given a room in the cottage so that he might be
near at hand to work with the judge in the preparation of the
defence, and he came out from the city every evening. It was now
June. The Senate would not take action until it convened in
December, but there was a lot of work to be done and no time to be
lost.

The evening following the day of their arrival they were sitting
on the porch enjoying the cool evening air after dinner. The judge
was smoking. He was not a slave to the weed, but he enjoyed a
quiet pipe after meals, claiming that it quieted his nerves and
enabled him to think more clearly. Besides, it was necessary to
keep at bay the ubiquitous Long Island mosquito. Mrs. Rossmore had
remained for a moment in the dining-room to admonish Eudoxia,
their new and only maid-of-all-work, not to wreck too much of the
crockery when she removed the dinner dishes. Suddenly Stott, who
was perusing an even