the
island of Japat. Inasmuch as he had not, to his dying day, solved the
manifold mysteries of the structure, it is not surprising that he never
developed sufficient confidence to call it other than "the place."

Now and then, officers from some British man-of-war stopped off for
entertainment in the chateau, and it was only on such occasions that
Skaggs realised what a gorgeously beautiful home it was that he lived
in. He had seen Windsor Castle in his youth, but never had he seen
anything so magnificent as the crystal chandelier in his own hallway
when it was fully lighted for the benefit of the rarely present guests.
On the occasion of his first view of the chandelier in its complete
glory, it is said that he walked blindly against an Italian table of
solid marble and was in bed for eleven days with a bruised hip. The
polished floors grew to be a horror to him. He could not enumerate the
times their priceless rugs had slipped aimlessly away from him, leaving
him floundering in profane wrath upon the glazed surface. The bare
thought of crossing the great ballroom was enough to send him into a
perspiration. He became so used to walking stiff-legged on the hardwood
floors that it grew to be a habit which would not relax. The servants
were authority for the report, that no earlier than the day before his
death, he slipped and fell in the dining-room, and thereupon swore that
he would have Portland cement floors put in before Christmas.

Lord and Lady Deppingham, being first in the field, at once proceeded to
settle themselves in the choicest rooms--a Henry the Sixth suite which
looked out on the sea and the town as well. It is said that Wyckholme
slept there twice, while Skaggs looked in perhaps half a dozen
times--when he was lost in the building, and trying to find his way back
to familiar haunts.

There was not a sign of a servant about the house or grounds. The men
whom Bowles had engaged, carried the luggage to the rooms which Lady
Deppingham selected, and then vanished as if into space. They escaped
while the new tenants were gorging their astonished, bewildered eyes
with the splendors of the apartment.

"We'll have to make the best of it," sighed Deppingham in response to
his wife's lamentations. "I daresay, Antoine and the maids can get our
things into some sort of shape, my dear. What say to a little stroll
about the grounds while they are doing it? By Jove, it would be exciting
if we were to find a ruby o