he details of the mill affair. Caxton
proved intelligent, zealous, and singularly sympathetic with his
client's views and plans. They had not been together a week before the
colonel realised that he had gained immensely by the change.

The colonel took a personal part in the effort to procure signatures,
among others that of old Malcolm Dudley and on the morning following
the drive with Graciella, he drove out to Mink Run to see the old
gentleman in person and discover whether or not he was in a condition
to transact business.

Before setting out, he went to his desk--his father's desk, which Miss
Laura had sent to him--to get certain papers for old Mr. Dudley's
signature, if the latter should prove capable of a legal act. He had
laid the papers on top of some others which had nearly filled one of
the numerous small drawers in the desk. Upon opening the drawer he
found that one of the papers was missing.

The colonel knew quite well that he had placed the paper in the drawer
the night before; he remembered the circumstance very distinctly, for
the event was so near that it scarcely required an exercise, not to
say an effort, of memory. An examination of the drawer disclosed that
the piece forming the back of it was a little lower than the sides.
Possibly, thought the colonel, the paper had slipped off and fallen
behind the drawer.

He drew the drawer entirely out, and slipped his hand into the cavity.
At the back of it he felt the corner of a piece of paper projecting
upward from below. The paper had evidently slipped off the top of the
others and fallen into a crevice, due to the shrinkage of the wood or
some defect of construction.

The opening for the drawer was so shallow that though he could feel
the end of the paper, he was unable to get such a grasp of it as would
permit him to secure it easily. But it was imperative that he have the
paper; and since it bore already several signatures obtained with some
difficulty, he did not wish to run the risk of tearing it.

He examined the compartment below to see if perchance the paper could
be reached from there, but found that it could not. There was
evidently a lining to the desk, and the paper had doubtless slipped
down between this and the finished panels forming the back of the
desk. To reach it, the colonel procured a screw driver, and turning
the desk around, loosened, with some difficulty, the screws that
fastened the proper panel, and soon recovered the pap