s carefully. In two years I have followed
several clues. A bricklayer disappeared, but his drowned body was
finally found; a college professor was missing, but he was sixty years
of age; a young man in New York embezzled a large sum and hid himself. I
followed that trail, although regretfully, but the real embezzler was
caught the day I presented myself in his place. Perhaps the most curious
experience was in the case of a young husband who deserted his wife and
infant child. She advertised for him; he had disappeared about the time
I had found myself; so I went to see her."

"What was the result?" asked Beth.

"She said I was not her husband, but if he failed to come back I might
take his place, provided I would guarantee to support her."

During the laugh that followed, Thursday Smith went back to his work and
an animated discussion concerning his strange story followed.

"He seems honest," said Louise, "but I blame a man of his ability for
becoming a mere tramp. He ought to have asserted himself and maintained
the position in which he first found himself."

"How?" inquired Patsy.

"At that time he was well dressed and had a watch and diamond ring. If
he had gone to some one and frankly told his story he could surely have
obtained a position to correspond with his personality. But instead of
this he wasted his time and the little capital he possessed in doing
nothing that was sensible."

"It is easy for us to criticise the man," remarked Beth, "and he may be
sorry, now, that he did not act differently. But I think, in his place,
I should have made the same attempt he did to unravel the mystery of his
lost identity. So much depended upon that."

"It's all very odd and incomprehensible," said Uncle John. "I wonder who
he can be."

"I suppose he calls himself Thursday because that was the day he first
found himself," observed Patsy.

"Yes; and Smith was the commonest name he could think of to go with it.
The most surprising thing," added their uncle, "is the fact that a man
of his standing was not missed or sought for."

"Perhaps," suggested Louise, "he had been insane and escaped from some
asylum."

"Then how did he come to be lying in a ditch?" questioned Patsy; "and
wouldn't an escaped maniac be promptly hunted down and captured?"

"I think so," agreed Mr. Merrick. "For my part, I'm inclined to accept
the man's theory that it was an automobile accident."

"Then what became of the car, or of the others