ld uncle?" cried poor Peggy. "I never even
saw his uncle. I don't care if he is dead. Something has happened to
Harry. Oh, Aunt Elizabeth, what is it?"

I was never in such a strait in my life. There was that poor child
staring at the letter as if she could eat it, and then at me. I dared
not open the letter before her. We were out on the porch. I said:

"Now, Peggy Talbert, you keep quiet, and don't make a little fool of
yourself until you know you have some reason for it. I am going up to my
own room, and you sit in that chair, and when I have read this letter I
will come down and tell you about it."

"I know he is dead!" gasped Peggy, but she sat down.

"Dead!" said I. "You just said yourself it was his handwriting. Do have
a little sense, Peggy." With that I was off with my letter, and I locked
my door before I read it.

Of all the insane ravings! I put it on my hearth and struck a match, and
the thing went up in flame and smoke. Then I went down to poor little
Peggy and patched up a story. I have always been averse to lying, and
I did not lie then, although I must admit that what I said was open to
criticism when it comes to exact verity. I told Peggy that Harry thought
that he had done something to make her angry (that was undeniably true)
and did not dare write her. I refused utterly to tell her just what was
in the letter, but I did succeed in quieting her and making her think
that Harry had not broken faith with her, but was blaming himself
for some unknown and imaginary wrong he had done her. Peggy rushed
immediately up to her room to write reassuring pages to Harry, and her
old-maid aunt had the horse put in the runabout and was driven over to
Whitman, where nobody knows her--at least the telegraph operator does
not. Then I sent a telegram to Mr. Harry Goward to the effect that if he
did not keep his promise with regard to writing F. L. to P. her A. would
never speak to him again; that A. was about to send L., but he must keep
his promise with regard to P. by next M.

It looked like the most melodramatic Sunday personal ever invented. It
might have meant burglary or murder or a snare for innocence, but I sent
it. Now I have written. My letter went in the same mail as poor Peggy's,
but what will be the outcome of it all I cannot say. Sometimes I catch
Peggy looking at me with a curious awakened expression, and then I
wonder if she has begun to suspect. I cannot tell how it will end.

III. THE GRAN