t he found that his right there was not questioned, and that the
police accepted him as a member of the household. He suspected that
they did not think it necessary to push inquiry very actively in such a
home as this.

After the police had gone, he called Wassaquam into the library and
brought the lists and clippings out again.

"Do you know at all what these are, Judah?" he asked.

"No, Alan. I have seen Ben have them, and take them out and put them
back. That is all I know."

"My father never spoke to you about them?"

"Once he spoke to me; he said I was not to tell or speak of them to any
one, or even to him."

"Do you know any of these people?"

He gave the lists to Wassaquam, who studied them through attentively,
holding them to the lamp.

"No, Alan."

"Have you ever heard any of their names before?"

"That may be. I do not know. They are common names."

"Do you know the places?"

"Yes--the places. They are lake ports or little villages on the lakes.
I have been in most of them, Alan. Emmet County, Alan, I came from
there. Henry comes from there too."

"Henry Spearman?"

"Yes."

"Then that is where they hear the Drum."

"Yes, Alan."

"My father took newspapers from those places, did he not?"

Wassaquam looked over the addresses again. "Yes; from all. He took
them for the shipping news, he said. And sometimes he cut pieces out
of them--these pieces, I see now; and afterward I burned the papers; he
would not let me only throw them away."

"That's all you know about them, Judah?"

"Yes, Alan; that is all."

Alan dismissed the Indian, who, stolidly methodical in the midst of
these events, went down-stairs and commenced to prepare a dinner which
Alan knew he could not eat. Alan got up and moved about the rooms; he
went back and looked over the lists and clippings once more; then he
moved about again. How strange a picture of his father did these
things call up to him! When he had thought of Benjamin Corvet before,
it had been as Sherrill had described him, pursued by some thought he
could not conquer, seeking relief in study, in correspondence with
scientific societies, in anything which could engross him and shut out
memory. But now he must think of him, not merely as one trying to
forget; what had thwarted Corvet's life was not only in the past; it
was something still going on. It had amazed Sherrill to learn that
Corvet, for twenty years, had kept trace of Alan; but Corve