riend a man ever had?"

The answering look out of the brown eyes was age-old in its infinite
wisdom.

"How little you men know when you think you know the most," she said
half-musingly; then she broke off abruptly. "Let us talk about something
else. If Major Guilford is wrecking the railroad, why is he spending so
much money on improvements? Have you thought to ask yourself that
question?"

"A good many times," he admitted, following her promptly back to first
principles.

"And you have not found the answer?"

"Not one that fully satisfies me--no."

"I've found one."

"Intuitively?" he smiled.

"No; it's pure logic, this time. Do you remember showing me a letter that
Mr. Hunnicott wrote you just before the explosion--a letter in which he
repeated a bit of gossip about Mr. Semple Falkland and his mysterious
visit to Gaston?"

"Yes, I remember it."

"Do you know who Mr. Falkland is?"

"Who doesn't?" he queried. "He has half of Wall Street in his clientele."

"Yes; but particularly he is the advisory counsel of the Plantagould
System. Ever since you showed me that letter I have been trying to account
for his presence in Gaston on the day before Judge MacFarlane's spring
term of court. I should never have found out but for Mrs. Brentwood."

"Mrs. Brentwood!"

Miss Van Brock nodded.

"Yes; the mother of my--of the young person for whom I am the alternative,
is in a peck of trouble; I quote her _verbatim_. She and her two daughters
hold some three thousand shares of Western Pacific stock. It was purchased
at fifty-seven, and it is now down to twenty-one."

"Twenty and a quarter to-day," Kent corrected.

"Never mind the fractions. The mother of the incomparable--Penelope, has
heard that I am a famous business woman; a worthy understudy for Mrs.
Hetty Green; so she came to me for advice. She had a letter from a New
York broker offering her a fraction more than the market price for her
three thousand shares of Western Pacific."

"Well?" said Kent.

"Meaning what did I do? I did what you did not do--what you are not doing
even now; I put two and two together in the twinkling of a bedstaff. Why
should a New York broker be picking up outlying Western Pacific at a
fraction more than the market when the stock is sinking every day? I was
curious enough to pass the 'why' along to a friend of mine in Wall
Street."

"Of course he told you all about it," said Kent, incredulously.

"He told me what I needed to