om other lips.

Meantime it rained.

CHAPTER VIII

ELIMINATION

At about three o'clock in the afternoon Mr. Ransom left his room. He had
been careful almost from his first arrival to sit with his door ajar. He
had, therefore, only to give it a slight push and walk out when he heard
the bustle of preparation going on in the two rooms in whose future
occupancy he was so vitally interested. A maid stood in the hall. A man
within was pushing about furniture. The landlady was giving orders. His
course down-stairs did not lead him so far as those rooms, so he called
out pleasantly:

"I have written till my head aches, Mrs. Deo. I must venture out
notwithstanding the rain. In which direction shall I find the best
walking?"

She came to him all eagerness and smiles. "It's all bad, such a day,"
said she, "but it's muddiest down by the factories. You had better climb
the hill."

"Where the cemetery is?" he asked.

"Yes; do you object to cemeteries? Ours is thought to be very
interesting. We have stones there whose inscriptions are a hundred and
fifty years old. But it's a bad day to walk amongst graves. Perhaps you
had better go east. I'm sorry we should have such a storm on your first
day. Must you go out?"

He forced a suffering look into his eyes, and insisting that nothing but
outdoor air would help him when he had a headache, hastened down-stairs
and so out. A blinding gust seized him as he faced the hill, but he drew
down his umbrella and hurried on. He had a purpose in following her
suggestion as to a walk in this direction. Dark as the grasses were, he
meant to search the cemetery for the graves of the Hazens and see what he
could learn from them.

He met three persons on his way, all of whom turned to look at him.
This was in the village. On the hillside he met nobody. Wind and rain
and mud were all; desolation in the prospect and all but desolation in
his heart. At the brow he first caught sight of the broken stone wall
which separated the old burying place from the road. There lay his path.
Happily he could tread it unnoticed and unwatched. There was no one
within sight, high or low.

He spent a half hour among the tombs before
he struck the name he was looking for.
Another ten minutes before he found those
of his wife's family. Then he had his reward.
On a low brown shaft he read the names of
father and mother, and beneath them the following
lines:

Sacred to the memory of
A