o. It is better for both of us to have it end
this way. But let us make sure that it is an end. There must be no more
of it. I have given you all I can. You must go away as you promised."

"Yes, I suppose I must," and her voice was broken. "Oh, I wish I had
never met you!"

"Perhaps it would have been better that way," was Blossom's cold
response. "However, it's too late for that now. Good-bye," he added, as
the boat was grating her way along the Loch Harbor slip. "I'm not going
to get off. Don't telephone me again. This is all I can ever give you."

"Oh, yes, I suppose, now you've finished, you can get rid of me. Well,
let it be so," she said bitterly. And then, as the boat bumped to a
landing she cried: "If I could only find--"

But the rattle of the chains and the clatter of the wheels on the ferry
bridge drowned her voice. She rushed away from LeGrand Blossoms's side
and, clutching her shawl close around her as if to make sure of the
package the man had given her, she disappeared into the interior of the
ferryboat.

Colonel Ashley started to follow, but as LeGrand Blossom remained
on board he decided to watch him instead of the woman, though he was
vaguely disquieted trying to remember where he had heard her voice
before.

CHAPTER XVIII. A LARGE BLONDE LADY

Reaching The Haven, Colonel Ashley, who had trailed LeGrand Blossom to
the latter's boarding place without anything having developed, was met
by Shag, who was up later than usual, for it was now close to midnight.

"What now, Shag!" exclaimed the colonel. "Don't tell me there are any
more detective cases for me to work on. I simply won't listen. I wish I
hadn't to this one. It's getting more and more tangled every minute, and
the fish are biting well. Hang it all, Shag, why did you let me take up
this golf course mystery?"

"I didn't do it, Colonel, no, sah!"

"What's the use of talking that way, Shag! You know you did!"

"Yes, sah, Colonel. Dat's whut I did!" confessed Shag with a grin. When
the colonel was in this mood there was nothing for it but to agree with
him.

"And it's the worst tangle you ever got me into!" went on Shag's master.
"There's no head or tail to it."

"Den it ain't laik a fish; am it?" asked Shag, with the freedom of long
years of faithful service.

"No, it isn't--worse luck!" stormed the colonel. "I never saw such a
case. The diamond cross mystery was nothing like it."

"But I thought, Colonel, sah, dat de mo' of