even to you, but I know that there is something wrong; and I firmly believe that somehow or other all these things work into it. Now, if you can throw any light at all, help me out." "I've told you all I know. I'm not exactly an intimate of these people, but I've known them off and on for three or four years, and there simply isn't anything unusual about them. They're just like every one else, only a little nicer—the last people on earth to act queerly or have a closet skeleton." "At any rate, they seem to want to get rid of me," I said. "Well, they can't do it. If they've got some scandalous idea of me, they're going to apologize; and if they're in trouble, I'm going to make myself useful. I've fallen into an adventure, and I'm going through with it."[Pg 70] [Pg 70] "I'll tell you one thing," said Bob, very solemnly for him, "if there is any family secret, it's nothing against Lady. She's about as good and white and honest—but you don't need to be told that." "No," said I, "I don't. And perhaps that's the reason." I waited where I was for the rest of the week; partly because I was resolved not to put myself in the wrong afresh by following Miss Tabor's movements too immediately, and partly to give time for Bob's promised vindication of my character to take effect. I could not, however, believe that it would, in itself, make any great difference; for the more I considered, the more it seemed to me that I had been right in my suspicion, and that the whole empty charge had been merely an excuse for driving me from the house and a device for terminating the acquaintance. I discovered during those few days the truth of the saying that to think is the hardest thing in the world; for my attempts to reason out the situation persistently resolved themselves into adventurous dreams and emotional reminiscences until I suspended judgment in despair and put the whole matter from my mind. And it was with an eager relief at last that I bade good-by to the[Pg 71] Ainslies and retraced my journey. Bob had received in the meantime no answer to his letter; but by that time I was not to be surprised. [Pg 71] I took my old room at the inn, got myself into white flannels with leisurely determination, and set forth to call upon Miss Tabor. It was not hot, and all the air was clear with that sparkling zest common enough in autumn but rare in the heat of midsummer; and as I hurried along, the
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