r under the Maitland place. Have you looked there?" He
was disappointed when I said we had, and I was about to go when he
called me back.

"Miss Jane didn't get her mail on Thursday, but on Friday that niece of
hers came for it--two letters, one from the city and one from New York."

"Thanks," I returned, and went out into the quiet street.

I walked past the Maitland place, but the windows were dark and the
house closed. Haphazard inquiry being out of the question, I took the
ten o'clock train back to the city. I had learned little enough, and
that little I was at a loss to know how to use. For why had Margery gone
for Miss Jane's mail _after_ the little lady was missing? And why did
Miss Jane carry on a clandestine correspondence?

The family had retired when I got home except Fred, who called from his
study to ask for a rhyme for mosque. I could not think of one and
suggested that he change the word to "temple." At two o'clock he banged
on my door in a temper, said he had changed the rhythm to fit, and now
couldn't find a rhyme for "temple!" I suggested "dimple" drowsily,
whereat he kicked the panel of the door and went to bed.

CHAPTER XIV

A WALK IN THE PARK

The funeral occurred on Monday. It was an ostentatious affair, with a
long list of honorary pall-bearers, a picked corps of city firemen in
uniform ranged around the casket, and enough money wasted in floral
pillows and sheaves of wheat tied with purple ribbon, to have given all
the hungry children in town a square meal.

Amid all this state Margery moved, stricken and isolated. She went to
the cemetery with Edith, Miss Letitia having sent a message that, having
never broken her neck to see the man living, she wasn't going to do it
to see him dead. The music was very fine, and the eulogy spoke of this
patriot who had served his country so long and so well. "Following the
flag," Fred commented under his breath, "as long as there was an
appropriation attached to it."

And when it was all over, we went back to Fred's until the Fleming house
could be put into order again. It was the best place in the world for
Margery, for, with the children demanding her attention and applause
every minute, she had no time to be blue.

Mrs. Butler arrived that day, which made Fred suspicious that Edith's
plan to bring her, far antedated his consent. But she was there when we
got home from the funeral, and after one glimpse at her thin face and
hollow eyes, I b