t-niece Monica, especially commending to her
the volumes in my library, and advising her to pursue the study of
botany'? I remember those were the exact words. This must have been the
reason. He had written the secret of the hiding-place inside the _Floral
Calendar_, and he thought she would find it there. Perhaps he wasn't so
very mad after all."

"I wonder if Monica has seen it and puzzled it out?"

"I don't know. She said she didn't often trouble about the books."

"Then is the treasure hidden inside some old settle in the house?"

"It seems likely."

"In that case we must be wrong about the lantern room."

"Perhaps we are. Well, at any rate this throws new light on the subject,
and gives us a clue as to where to hunt. We'll go over the Manor again,
and look carefully at every settle."

"I hope we're really on the right track at last," sighed Cicely. "What a
glorious day it would be if we could actually say to Monica: 'Here's
your fortune!'"

CHAPTER XIII

Lindsay Makes a Resolve

Lindsay and Cicely thought they understood what a settle was, but, to
avoid the possibility of any mistake, they looked the word up in the
dictionary. "Settle--a long bench, with high back, for sitting on," was
the explanation given by that authority.

"So it 'settles' the matter," said Cicely, trying to make a pun.

"Well, it shows us it's not a chest, anyhow," replied Lindsay, "though
the oak bench in the passage near the top of the stairs has a kind of
box under it. The seat lifts up like a lid."

There were four pieces of old furniture in the Manor which might claim
to answer to the description given in the dictionary. Two were in the
dining-room, one in the picture gallery, and another, as Lindsay had
said, at the head of the stairs. The girls made a most lengthy and
careful inspection of them all, but without the slightest result.
Neither their backs nor their seats were hollow, or capable of
containing anything. Three of them stood upon carved oak legs, like
chairs, and though the last was made in the fashion of a chest, it
proved on investigation to be absolutely empty. It was a bitter
disappointment.

"Can we have been mistaken about the enigma?" said Cicely, almost in
tears.

"I don't believe so. What I think is, that Mrs. Wilson and Scott have
been clever enough to find the money and carry it off. Perhaps there was
another settle somewhere in the house, and they took it bodily away."

"Wouldn't Monica