see her?"

"I promised to take her a recipe for a cous-cous I described to her the
other day. Anyway, I like her, even if you don't. But that has
nothing to do with our muttons! While I was chatting with her I
happened to mention our experience yesterday with the monk--"

"You did! What in the world _for_?"

"Well, Simon, when I go to call on any one I like to talk about
_something_--I can't sit like a dummy--"

"You can't!"

"And that was certainly the most interesting bit of news that I had.
It quite woke her up. She's something of a blue-stocking, you know,
and has read a lot about the early history of this country. When I
spoke of the monk she looked very queer and went straight to a shelf of
books and took out this one--" Miss Ocky held up the one she was
carrying, and Varr saw that she was keeping a place in it with one
forefinger. "When she showed me a certain passage in it, I put it
right under my arm and brought it--"

"You needn't have," he told her abruptly. "I recognize the thing,
though I've never bothered to read it; Jennison's 'History of Wayne
County,' isn't it? There's a copy among your father's books in the
library."

"Is there? I wish I'd known it!" She opened the book at her place,
steadied the heavy volume on her knees and cleared her throat. "I am
going to read this to you, Simon--it isn't long."

"Go ahead." He had tried overnight to put the disagreeable subject out
of his mind but had not succeeded very well. He was consumed by
curiosity now to learn what she had discovered, though nothing would
have induced him to admit it. "What's it all about?"

She began to read in a soft, well-modulated voice.

"'Wayne County is not without its share of legends and quaint scraps of
folklore, some of them nicely calculated to chill the blood o' nights.
One fable, at least, has risen from a base of fact; I refer to the
famous Monk of Hambleton. Ancient chronicles of this town record the
arrival--in pre-Revolutionary times--of an unfortunate individual whose
face had been shockingly mutilated by accident or disease. He drifted
to Hambleton from the outer world and apparently quartered himself on
the countryside, living the life of a hermit in a small dry cave that
still shows traces of his presence. He habitually wore the garb of a
friar--a penance, perhaps, for former sins--and his disfigured face was
always concealed from curious eyes by a mask of black cloth.

"'After his de