aper, covered with penciled words in
print characters. Most of these had been crossed out in favor of other
words or sentences, which in turn had been "scratched." Evidently the
writer had been toilfully experimenting toward some elegance or emphasis
of expression, which persistently eluded him. Amidst the wreck and ruin
of rhetoric, however, one phrase stood out clear:

"Stupendous scientific sensation."

Below this was a huddle and smudge of words, from which adjectives
darted out like dim flame amidst smoke. "Gigantic" showed in its entity
followed by an unintelligible erasure. At the end this line was the
legend "3 Feet High." "Verita Visitor," appeared below, and beyond it,
what seemed to be the word "Void." And near the foot of the sheet
the student of all this chaos could make faintly but unmistakably,
"Marvelous Man-l--" the rest of the word being cut off by a broad black
smear. "Monster 3 Feet." The remainder was wholly undecipherable.

Average Jones looked up from this curio, and there was a strange
expression in the eyes which met the minister's.

"You--er--threw this in the--er--waste-basket." he drawled. "In which
pocket was it?"

"The waistcoat. An upper one, I believe. There was a pencil there, too."

"Have you an old pair of shoes of Bailey's," asked the visitor abruptly.

"Why, I suppose so. In the attic somewhere."

"Please bring them to me."

The Reverend Mr. Prentice left the room. No sooner had the door closed
after him than Average Jones jumped out of his chair stripped to his
shirt, caught up the pepper-and-salt waistcoat, tried it on and buttoned
it across his chest without difficulty; then thrust his arm into the
coat which went with it, and wormed his way, effortfully, partly into
that. He laid it aside only when he had determined that he could get
it no farther on. He was clothed and in his right garments when the
Reverend Mr. Prentice returned with a much-worn pair of shoes.

"Will these do?" he asked.

Average Jones hardly gave them the courtesy of a glance. "Yes," he said
indifferently, and set them aside. "Have you a time-table here?"

"You're going to leave?" cried the clergyman, in sharp disappointment.

"In just half an hour," replied the visitor, holding his finger on the
time-table.

"But," cried Mr. Prentice, "that is the train back to New York."

"Exactly."

"And you're not going to see Tuxall?"

"No."

"Nor to examine the place where the clothes were found?"