at last, "do you believe in reincarnation?" Miss Finch tried to look as if she understood the meaning of the word. With an adroitness for which few would have given her credit, she replied, "I won't say I do, and I won't say I don't." "Well, it's true, Fritz. I am my own great-aunt." "Land alive!" cried Miss Finch, startled into close attention. "Mr. Burton Forbes wants to engage board for the summer with Miss Agatha Kent. Well, I'm Agatha Kent. He imagines that I'm a nice comfortable old lady with white hair and a double chin. Very well. It would be a hard heart that would disappoint a blind man in such a trifle." [Pg 17] [Pg 17] "You mean," gasped Miss Finch, "that you're going to deceive him?" "Heaven forbid. But I'm not going to undeceive him, Fritz. He assumed certain things about me. Let him keep his illusions, poor soul. He'll spend a happy summer with his father's old friend, and then go away and recover, I hope." No trace of Agatha's shadowing perplexity remained. Her eyes had the mischievous brightness of a naughty child's. Miss Finch gazed aghast. "He's bound to find out sooner or later. And no good comes of cheating anybody, least of all a blind man." "You're not the stuff for a conspirator, I can see that," Agatha laughed. "You look positively frightened. But Howard will be delighted. He'll feel like the hero of a detective story." The window by which her brother had made his exit was still open and Agatha took her departure in the same informal fashion. But little Miss Finch sat bowed in her chair, as if the responsibility for this newly hatched plot rested upon her narrow shoulders, and crushed her under its weight. [Pg 18] [Pg 18] CHAPTER II THE CURTAIN RISES
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