e cheerful
follower of Poe, as he wrote it down. "Address as yet unknown. Blond,
probably. Have you noticed that it is almost always the blond men who
affect a very light gray, with a touch of red in the scarf? Fact, I
assure you. I kept a record once of the summer attire of men, and ninety
per cent, followed my rule. Dark men like you affect navy blue, or
brown."

In spite of myself I was amused at the man's shrewdness.

"Yes; the suit he took was dark--a blue," I said. He rubbed his hands
and smiled at me delightedly. "Then you wore black shoes, not tan," he
said, with a glance at the aggressive yellow ones I wore.

"Right again," I acknowledged. "Black low shoes and black embroidered
hose. If you keep on you'll have a motive for the crime, and the
murderer's present place of hiding. And if you come back to the smoker
with me, I'll give you an opportunity to judge if he knew good whisky
from bad."

I put the articles from the pockets back again and got up. "I wonder
if there is a diner on?" I said. "I need something sustaining after all
this."

I was conscious then of some one at my elbow. I turned to see the young
woman whose face was so vaguely familiar. In the very act of speaking
she drew back suddenly and colored.

"Oh,--I beg your pardon," she said hurriedly, "I--thought you were--some
one else." She was looking in a puzzled fashion at my coat. I felt all
the cringing guilt of a man who has accidentally picked up the wrong
umbrella: my borrowed collar sat tight on my neck.

"I'm sorry," I said idiotically. "I'm sorry, but--I'm not." I have
learned since that she has bright brown hair, with a loose wave in it
that drops over her ears, and dark blue eyes with black lashes and--but
what does it matter? One enjoys a picture as a whole: not as the sum of
its parts.

She saw the flask then, and her errand came back to her. "One of the
ladies at the end of car has fainted," she explained. "I thought perhaps
a stimulant--"

I picked up the flask at once and followed my guide down the aisle. Two
or three women were working over the woman who had fainted. They had
opened her collar and taken out her hairpins, whatever good that might
do. The stout woman was vigorously rubbing her wrists, with the idea,
no doubt, of working up her pulse! The unconscious woman was the one for
whom I had secured lower eleven at the station.

I poured a little liquor in a bungling masculine fashion between her
lips as she leaned