r own niece and
nephew, Julia! You don't mean you deny it, do you, Julia?"

She was in great confusion: "Do I deny what?"

"That his name's Crum!" Noble said passionately. "That his name's Crum
and that he's a widower and he's been divorced and's got nobody knows
how many children!"

Julia sought to collect herself. "I don't know what you're talking
about," she said. "If you mean that I happened to meet a very charming
man while I was away, and that his name happened to be Crum, I don't
know why I should go to the trouble of denying it. But if Mr. Crum has
had the experiences you say he has, it is certainly news to me! I think
someone told me he was only twenty-six years old. He looked rather
younger."

"You 'think someone told' you!" Noble groaned. "Oh, Julia! And here it
is, all down in black and white, in my pocket!"

"I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about." Julia's tone
was cold, and she drew herself up haughtily, though the gesture was
ineffective in the darkness of that quivering interior. The quivering
stopped just then, however, as the taxicab came to a rather abrupt halt
before her house.

"Will you come in with me a moment, please?" Julia said as she got out.
"There are some things I want to ask you--and I'm sure my father hasn't
come home from downtown yet. There's no light in the front part of the
house."

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

There was no light in any other part of the house, they discovered,
after abandoning the front door bell for an excursion to the rear.
"That's disheartening to a hungry person," Julia remarked: and then
remembered that she had a key to the front door in her purse. She opened
the door, and lighted the hall chandelier while Noble brought in her
bags from the steps where the taxicab driver had left them.

"There's nobody home at all," Julia said thoughtfully. "Not even Gamin."

"No. Nobody," her sad companion agreed, shaking his head. "Nobody at
all, Julia. Nobody at all." Rousing himself, he went back for the golf
tools, and with a lingering gentleness set them in a corner. Then,
dumbly, he turned to go.

"Wait, please," said Julia. "I want to ask you a few things--especially
about what you've got 'all down in black and white' in your pocket. Will
you shut the front door, if you please, and go into the library and
turn on the lights and wait there while I look over the house and see if
I can find why it's all closed up like this?"

Noble went into