himself and don't let anyone else have them. Perhaps," he suggested as an afterthought, "you'd like to be shown through the bindery. It's rather an interesting place."

"Indeed I should. Anything that has to do with books interests me."

He scribbled a note on a bit of paper.

"That'll let you through," he smiled, "and no thanks due. 'One good turn,' you know." He bowed her out of the room.

She found Mr. Silver to be a brisk person with a polite and obliging manner. It was with a deep sense of relief that she saw the books safely in his hands. She had seen so much of vanishing books these last few days that she feared some strange magic trick might spirit them from her before they reached their destination.

The note requesting that she be taken through the bindery she kept for another time. She must hurry back to the university now.

"It will be a real treat," she told herself. "There are few really famous binderies in our country. And this is one of them." Little she realized as she left the long, low building which housed the bindery, what part it was destined to play in the mystery she was attempting to unravel.

She returned to the university and to her studies. That night she and Florence went once more to Tyler street, to the tumble-down cottage where the two mysterious persons lived, and there the skein of mystery was thrown into a new tangle.

CHAPTER IX
SHADOWED

A cold fog hung low over the city as the two girls stole forth from the elevated station that night on their way to Tyler street. From the trestlework of the elevated there came a steady drip-drip; the streets reeked with damp and chill; the electric lamps seemed but balls of light suspended in space.

"B-r-r!" said Florence, drawing her wraps more closely about her. "What a night!"

"Sh!" whispered Lucile, dragging her into a corner. "There's someone following us again."

Scarcely had she spoken the words when a man with collar turned up and cap pulled low passed within four feet of them. He traveled with a long, swinging stride. Lucile fancied that she recognized that stride, but she could not be sure; also, for the moment she could not remember who the person was who walked in this fashion.

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