e group about the
breakfast table, it wouldn't have made a bigger change. Madge clapped
her hands in joy; Mr. Cullen said "God bless you!" with real feeling;
Frederic jumped up and slapped me on the shoulder, crying, "Gordon,
you're the biggest old trump breathing;" while Albert and the captain
shook hands with each other, in evident jubilation. Only Lord Ralles
remained passive.

"Have you breakfasted?" asked Mr. Cullen, when the first joy was over.

"Yes," I said. "I only stopped in on my way to the station to
telegraph the Postmaster-General."

"May I come with you and see what you say?" cried Fred, jumping up.

I nodded, and Miss Cullen said, questioningly, "Me too?" making me
very happy by the question, for it showed that she would speak to me.
I gave an assent quite as eagerly and in a moment we were all walking
toward the platform. Despite Lord Ralles, I felt happy, and especially
as I had not dreamed that she would ever forgive me.

I took a telegraph blank, and, putting it so that Miss Cullen could
see what I said, wrote--

"Postmaster-General, Washington, D.C. I hold, awaiting your
instructions, the three registered letters stolen from No. 3 Overland
Missouri Western Express on Monday, October fourteenth, loss of which
has already been notified you."

Then I paused and said, "So far, that's routine, Miss Cullen. Now
comes the help for you," and I continued--

"The letters may have been tampered with, and I recommend a special
agent. Reply Flagstaff, Arizona. RICHARD GORDON, Superintendent K. &
A.R.R."

"What will that do?" she asked.

"I'm not much at prophecy, and we'll wait for the reply," I said.

All that day we lay at Flagstaff, and after a good sleep, as there was
no use keeping the party cooped up in their car, I drummed up
some ponies and took the Cullens and Ackland over to the Indian
cliff-dwellings. I don't think Lord Ralles gained anything by staying
behind in a sulk, for it was a very jolly ride, or at least that was
what it was to me. I had of course to tell them all how I had settled
on them as the criminals, and a general history of my doings. To hear
Miss Cullen talk, one would have inferred I was the greatest of living
detectives.

"The mistake we made," she asserted, "was not securing Mr. Gordon's
help to begin with, for then we should never have needed to hold the
train up, or if we had we should never have been discovered."

What was more to me than this ill-deserved admir