"

Ellen was silent. She was convinced that there was some mystery about
the pale old man.

"He said a lot of awfully queer things to me," she admitted, after a
pause during which Jim turned the car into a side road.... "I thought
you were going to the village."

"This will take us to the village--give you a longer ride, Ellen.
I'll take you home afterwards."

"After what?"

"Why, after we've got the mail--or whatever you want."

"Don't you think Miss Orr and that queer old Mr. ---- If his name
isn't Orr, Jim, what is it?" She shot a quick glance at him.

"Good Lord!" muttered Jim profanely.

He drew the car up at the side of the road and stopped it.

"What are you going to do?" inquired Ellen, in some alarm. "Won't it
go?"

"When I get ready," said Jim.

He turned and faced her squarely:

"We'll have this out, before we go a foot further! I won't have the
whole town talking," he said savagely.

Ellen said nothing. She was rather angry.

"The devil!" cried Jim Dodge. "What's the matter with you, Ellen?"

"With me?" she repeated.

"Yes. Why can't you talk?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "I want to go home," she said.

He seized her roughly by the wrist. "Ellen," he said, "I believe you
know more than you are willing to tell." He stared down into her
eyes. "What did he say to you, anyway?"

"Who?"

"You know well enough. The old man. Lord, what a mess!"

"Please let me go, Jim," said Ellen. "Now look here, I know
absolutely nothing except what I have told you, and I want to go
home."

_"Ellen!"_

"Well?"

"Can you keep a secret?"

"Of course I can, Jim!" She met his dark gaze squarely.

"Well, rather than have you spreading a piece of damnable gossip over
the village-- Of course you would have told everybody."

"You mean about meeting the old man? But won't everybody know? If he
goes out and talks to people as he did to me?"

"You haven't told me what he said."

Ellen raised her brows with a mischievous air.

"I didn't care to spread any--what sort of gossip did you say, Jim?"

"Confound it! I didn't mean that."

"Of course I could see he was some one who used to live here," she
went on. "He knew father."

Jim had thrust his hands deep into his trousers' pockets. He uttered
an impatient ejaculation.

"And he said he should go out whenever he felt like it. He doesn't
like the automobile."

"Oh, it's an impossible proposition. I see that plainly enough!" Jim
said, as if to