Nelly, I will go and see him," said Constance, beginning to
despair of finding out whether this visitor were the tramp of the night
previous, or the new actor expected on the scene. "You know I never
allow you to turn a tramp away hungry, and if one comes who seems worthy
of help, I wish you always to let me know it."

This she said, thinking of the manner in which it was probable the
detective tramp would seek access to her presence.

"By the way, Nelly," pausing with one foot on the steps of the
dining-room terrace. "You may wake Mrs. Aliston and tell her that if I
wish her to join me in the little parlor I will send you to her," then
_sotto voce_, as she entered the house and went carelessly toward the
drawing-room: "If this visitor proves a bore I will turn him over to
Aunt Honor; I can't have two days of constant boredom."

Coming forward from the lower entrance, Constance encountered the gaze
of the strange man, whom, arriving at the front door, Nelly had not
ventured to set down as a tramp, and whose clothes made her doubt the
propriety of showing him the drawing-room. Being of Hibernian
extraction, and not to be nonplussed, Nelly had adapted a happy medium,
and seated the visitor in the largest hall chair, where he now awaited
the approach of Constance.

"I think you wished to see me," said Constance, in the unaffected kindly
tone usual to her when addressing strangers or inferiors, "I am Miss
Wardour."

The stranger arose, making a stiff salute, and saying in a low, guarded
tone:

"Yes, Miss Wardour, I have a message for you;" at the same moment he
presented her a card, and glanced in a suggestive manner toward Nelly,
who was traveling up the stairs in a very leisurely manner, _en route_
for Mrs. Aliston's rooms.

Constance glanced at the card which bore the inscription,

"JERRY BELKNAP,
_Private Detective_."

"Come this way," she said, throwing open the drawing-room door and
preceding him into that apartment.

Jerry Belknap, private detective, followed close behind her, and himself
closed the door carefully. Constance crossed the room, drew back the
curtains, and pushed open the shutters of the terrace windows, thus
letting in a flood of light. Then turning, she seated herself upon a
fauteuil, and, motioning the detective to a chair opposite, said:

"Now, sir, I am ready to receive your message."

"It's a verbal one," returned the detective, in a voice soft and smooth,
not at all in