ession--a Saturday afternoon and
a legislative recess when Kent had borrowed Ormsby's auto-car, and had
driven Elinor and Penelope out to Pentland Place to look at a house he was
thinking of buying. For with means to indulge it, Kent's Gaston-bred mania
for plunging in real estate had returned upon him with all the acuteness
of a half-satisfied passion.

They had gone all over the house and grounds with the caretaker, and when
there was nothing more to see, Penelope had prevailed on the woman to open
the Venetians in the music-room. There was a grand piano in the place of
honor, presided over by a mechanical piano-player; and Penelope went into
ecstasies of mockery.

"Wait till I can find the music scrolls, and I'll hypnotize you," she said
gleefully; and Kent and Elinor beat a hasty retreat to the wide entrance
hall.

"I don't quite understand it," was Elinor's comment, when they had put
distance between themselves and Penelope's joyous grinding-out of a Wagner
scroll. "It looks as if the owners had just walked out at a moment's
notice."

"They did," said Kent. "They went to Europe, I believe. And by the way; I
think I have a souvenir here somewhere. Will you go up to the first
landing of the stair and point your finger at that window?"

She did it, wondering; and when he had the line of direction he knelt in
the cushioned window-seat and began to probe with the blade of his
pen-knife in a small round hole in the woodwork.

"What is it?" she asked, coming down to stand beside him.

"This." He had cut out a flattened bullet and was holding it up for her to
see. "It was meant for me, and I've always had an idea that I heard it
strike the woodwork."

"For you? Were you ever here when the house was occupied?"

"Yes, once; it is the Senator Duvall place. This is the window where I
broke in."

She nodded intelligence.

"I know now why you are going to buy it. The senator is another of those
whom you haven't forgiven."

His laugh was a ready denial.

"I have nothing against Duvall. He was one of Bucks' dupes, and he is
paying the price. The property is to be sold at a forced sale, and it is a
good investment."

"Is that all it means to you? It is too fine to be hawked about as a thing
to make money with. It's a splendidly ideal home--leaving out that thing
that Penelope is quarreling with." And she made a feint of stopping her
ears.

He laughed again.

"Ormsby says I ought to buy it, and marry and settle