u hadn't."

"What made you so sure?" asked Mamie.

"How can I tell you?" I cried. "We had been all through her. We _were_
sure; that's all that I can say."

"I begin to think you were," she returned, with a significant emphasis.

Jim hurriedly intervened. "What I don't quite make out, Loudon, is, that
you don't seem to appreciate the peculiarities of the thing," said he.
"It doesn't seem to have struck you same as it does me."

"Pshaw! why go on with this?" cried Mamie, suddenly rising. "Mr. Dodd is
not telling us either what he thinks or what he knows."

"Mamie!" cried Jim.

"You need not be concerned for his feelings, James; he is not concerned
for yours," returned the lady. "He dare not deny it, besides. And this
is not the first time he has practised reticence. Have you forgotten
that he knew the address, and did not tell it you until that man had
escaped?"

Jim turned to me pleadingly--we were all on our feet. "Loudon," he said,
"you see Mamie has some fancy, and I must say there's just a sort of a
shadow of an excuse; for it _is_ bewildering--even to me, Loudon, with
my trained business intelligence. For God's sake clear it up."

"This serves me right," said I. "I should not have tried to keep you in
the dark; I should have told you at first that I was pledged to secrecy;
I should have asked you to trust me in the beginning. It is all I can do
now. There is more of the story, but it concerns none of us. My tongue
is tied. I have given my word of honour. You must trust me, and try to
forgive me."

"I daresay I am very stupid, Mr. Dodd," began Mamie, with an alarming
sweetness, "but I thought you went upon this trip as my husband's
representative and with my husband's money? You tell us now that you are
pledged, but I should have thought you were pledged first of all to
James. You say it does not concern us; we are poor people, and my
husband is sick, and it concerns us a great deal to understand how we
come to have lost our money, and why our representative comes back to
us with nothing. You ask that we should trust you; you do not seem to
understand--the question we are asking ourselves is whether we have not
trusted you too much."

"I do not ask you to trust me," I replied. "I ask Jim. He knows me."

"You think you can do what you please with James; you trust to his
affection, do you not? And me, I suppose, you do not consider," said
Mamie. "But it was perhaps an unfortunate day for you when we were