s. He had to see the
manager before he got any satisfaction, but he did learn that her
accumulated mail had been called for by some one whose identity was not
disclosed. Of course this isn't much to hang a hope on, but if that play
is what I think it is and Miss Violet Dewing ever reads it she's going
to jump for the telegraph office the moment she finishes the last act. I
have no plans for returning East; the folks at home let me do as I
please, and it's a relief to be in seclusion where I hear nothing of the
doings of Broadway. I hope your ancient globe-trotting aunt still
lingers in the Far East! Keep the ink flowing, son. That novel ought to
be well under way when I get back."

The tale I had begun seemed utter trash in comparison with the story of
Alice Bashford, in which, much against my will, I had become a minor
character. I had rather prided myself on my ability to see through a
plot in the first chapter of the most complicated mystery story, but
there were points in this unwritten tale that baffled me.

I kept away from the house until dinnertime, when I was received quite
as an old friend by Alice and Mrs. Farnsworth. The table talk was of
Celtic poetry, and proved less disturbing to Antoine than the previous
night's discussion of ghosts.

Their day had been spent, they explained, in a further examination of my
uncle's Japanese loot, and they had taken a long walk beyond the
estate's boundaries and were enthusiastic about the landscape.

"It's so beautifully peaceful all about here," Alice murmured. "I feel
that I never want to move again."

"That's a real tribute to America," Mrs. Farnsworth remarked; "for Alice
dearly loves new scenes. She inherited a taste for travel from her
father, who put some new places on the maps, you know."

I didn't know and I wanted to ask questions about Alice's father, but as
though anxious to frustrate such inquiries my aunt asked how close we
were to the place made famous by Israel Putnam's spectacular escape from
the British. She had read the story and would motor to the scene, she
declared. It was quite clear that there were chapters in her life that
were not to be opened for my perusal. No sooner had I caught a glimpse
of a promising page than the book was politely closed. A curtain hung
between the immediate present at Barton-on-the-Sound and other scenes
and incidents of the girl's life; and Mrs. Farnsworth was equally
detached from any tangible background. It seeme