surprise, and in any event you might be far more
comfortable."

"Perhaps I will return--some time to-morrow," she said. "I'll see."

Garrison went to the door and she walked at his side.

He merely said: "Good-night--and Heaven bless you, Dorothy."

She answered: "Good-night, Jerold," and gave him her hand.

He held it for a moment--the riches of the world. And when he had gone
they felt they had divided, equally, a happiness too great for
terrestrial measurement.

CHAPTER XXXV

JOHN HARDY'S WILL

Garrison slept the sleep of physical exhaustion that night in
Branchville. The escape from New York's noise and turmoil was welcome
to his weary body. He had been on a strain day after day, and much of
it still remained. Yet, having cleared away the mystery concerning
Hardy's death, he felt entitled to a let-down of the tension.

In the morning he was early on the road to Hickwood--his faculties all
eagerly focused on the missing will. He felt it might all prove the
merest vagary of his mind--his theory of his respecting old Hardy and
this testament. But stubbornly his mind clung fast to a few important
facts.

Old Hardy had always been secretive, for Dorothy had so reported. He
had carried his will away with him on leaving Albany. It had not been
stolen--so far as anyone could know. Coupled with all this was the
fact that the dead man's hands' had been stained upon the
knuckles--stained black, with a grimy something hard to wash
away--perhaps the soot, the greasy, moldy old soot of a chimney,
encountered in the act of secreting the will, and later only partially
removed. It seemed as clear as crystal to the reasoning mind of
Garrison as he hastened along on the road.

He passed the home of Scott, the inventor, and mentally jotted down a
reminder that the man, being innocent, must be paid his insurance now
without delay.

Mrs. Wilson was working in her garden, at the rear of the house, when
Garrison arrived. She was wonderfully pleased to see him. She had
read the papers--which Garrison had not--and discovered what a truly
remarkable personage he was.

The credit of more than ordinarily clever work had been meted out by
the columnful, and his name glared boldly from the vivid account of all
he had done in the case. All this and more he found himself obliged to
face at the hands of Mrs. Wilson, before he could manage to enter the
house and go as before to Hardy's room.

It was just precis