. Gorham's husband."

The lines deepened a little in Gorham's face. "What is his name?" he
asked.

"Buckner, sir--Ralph Buckner."

"H'm! And why do you think he intends to try to make trouble for me?"

"Well, sir, you see it's this way. This feller come to the same
boardin'-house where I live, but I didn't pay no attention to him 'til I
see him playin' pool in the saloon opposite. I'm a Tammany man, sir, and
I has to mix with all the new ones what come into my ward. I got
acquainted with him over there, and he drank awful heavy. He's quiet
enough when he's sober, but he talks free and easy like when he gets
tanked. One night he says to me, 'I'm goin' to make a lot o' money.'

"'Good!' says I, more to be agreeable than because I had any 'special
interest--'how're you goin' to do it?'

"Then he laughed, silly-like, and winked at me. I didn't say no more,
but the next night he talked again.

"'What do you think,' he says; 'I see my wife to-day ridin' up Fifth
Avenue behind the swellest pair o' horses in New York City. No wonder
she shook me for that.'

"'What do you mean?' says I, surprised at his line o' talk.

"'She's Mrs. Robert Gorham now,' says he, 'but perhaps she won't be
long.'

"Then I laughed at him, and that made him mad.

"'That's right,' says he. 'There're people here in this town who tell me
that her divorce from me warn't reg'lar, and I may be takin' the lady
back to New Orleans with me, and a heap o' money besides.'

"0' course, all this don't mean nothin' to me, but I thought it might to
you, sir."

Mr. Gorham did not reply for so long a time that James became anxious.

"I hope I done right, sir, to come to you with this."

"Yes, James; quite right. You are evidently influenced by your loyalty
to my family," Gorham answered. "It is right that you should be, but it
shall not be forgotten. There probably is nothing in all this, but,
since Mrs. Gorham's name was mentioned, I should like to get to the
bottom of it. I shall depend upon you to keep me posted."

"I will, sir," James responded, eagerly. "I'll do that as long as he
stays in New York, but he says they're trying to get him to go back to
New Orleans."

"Who are 'they'?"

"I don't know, sir."

"That is the first thing to discover, James. I shall trust you to do
it."

Gorham rose, and James, vastly satisfied with himself, followed the
suggestion.

"I'll do it for you, sir," he said at the door. "You can depend on me
for that