sk such questions," he declared.

"Why mustn't I?"

"'Cause you mustn't. Your uncles wouldn't like it a mite if they knew
you was pryin' into their affairs. You mustn't ever say a word about
your Uncle Zoeth's gettin' married."

"Wouldn't he like me any more if I did?"

"No, you bet he wouldn't; he'd--I don't know's he wouldn't come to hate
you. And you mustn't say it to Cap'n Shad neither."

The idea of being hated by Uncle Zoeth was a dreadful one and
Mary-'Gusta avoided the tabooed subject. But she thought about it a good
deal. She noticed that in neither of the two lots in the cemetery, one
where the Goulds were buried and the other the Hamiltons, was a stone
erected to the memory of the "beloved wife of Zoeth Hamilton," although
other beloved wives of the former generations were commemorated. This
seemed odd. As her education progressed she read more and more and from
her reading she built up several imaginative romances with Zoeth as the
hero, and as the heroines beautiful creatures who had died young, in
shipwreck, probably, and whose names were not to be mentioned because.
. . . She could not find a satisfactory solution of the because.
Shipwreck or burial at sea she deduced from the fact of there being no
grave in the cemetery. Mothers and fathers of several of her schoolmates
had been buried at sea. Perhaps the late Mrs. Hamilton had been so
buried. But Zoeth had never been a seafaring man.

One Saturday afternoon--she was about ten years old at the time--she
was in the garret. The garret had taken the place of the old surrey at
Ostable, and thither she retired when she wished to be alone to read, or
play, or study. This afternoon she was rummaging through the old trunks
and sea chests in search of a costume for Rose. It was to be a masculine
costume, of course, for there was no feminine apparel in that garret,
but in the games which the girl played when alone with her dolls, Rose,
the largest of the family, was frequently obliged to change her sex with
her raiment.

Mary-'Gusta had ransacked these trunks and chests pretty thoroughly on
previous occasions, but this time she made a discovery. In an old trunk
which had obviously belonged to Captain Shadrach she found a sort of
pocket on the under side of the lid, a pocket closing with a flap and a
catch. In this pocket were some papers, old receipts and the like, and a
photograph. The photograph interested her exceedingly. It was yellow and
faded but sti