sing from among its contents."

"What?"

The expression which had made Mr. Sylvester's brow so terrible had
vanished, but his wonder remained.

"It is impossible," he declared. "Our vaults are too well watched for
any such thing to occur. He has made some mistake; a robbery of that
nature could not take place without detection."

"It would seem not, and yet the fact remains. Mr. Stuyvesant himself
informed me of it, to-night. He is not a careless man, nor reckless in
his statements. Some one has robbed the bank and it remains with us to
find out who."

Mr. Sylvester, who had been standing all this while, sat down like a man
dazed, the wild lost look on Bertram's face daunting him with a fearful
premonition. "There are but four men who have access to the vault where
the boxes are kept," said he: then quickly, "Why did Mr. Stuyvesant wait
till to-night to speak to you? Why did he not notify us at once of a
loss so important for us to know?"

The flush on Bertram's brow slowly subsided, giving way to a steady
pallor. "He waited to be sure," said he. "He had a memorandum at home
which he desired to consult; he was not ready to make any rash
statement: he is a thinking man and more considerate than many of his
friends are apt to imagine. If the lock had not been found open he would
have thought with you that he had made some mistake; if he had not
missed from the box some of its contents, he would have considered the
condition of the lock the result of some oversight on his own part or of
some mistake on the part of another, but the two facts together were
damning and could force upon him but one conclusion. Uncle," said he,
with a straightforward look into Mr. Sylvester's countenance, "Mr.
Stuyvesant knows as well as we do who are the men who have access to the
vaults. As you say, the opening of a box during business hours and the
abstracting from it of papers or valuables by any one who has not such
access, would be impossible. Only Hopgood, you and myself, and possibly
Folger, could find either time or opportunity for such a piece of work;
while after business hours, the same four, minus Folger who contents
himself with knowing the combination of the inner safe, could open the
vaults even in case of an emergency. Now of the four named, two are
above suspicion. I might almost say three, for Hopgood is not a man it
is easy to mistrust. One alone, then, of all the men whom Mr. Stuyvesant
is in the habit of meeting at