anced sparkle.

Mr. Mallory's sauntering steps took him to the side of the reclaimed
ground nearest to the railway line immediately under the embankment. To
the casual observer his movements might have seemed somewhat erratic,
and based only on a desire to get away from the chatter of the
tea-tables and enjoy his cigar in peace. To any one really interested in
his sudden detachment, however, it would have become apparent that there
was system, carefully cloaked, perhaps, but none the less thorough, in
every step he took.

The place where, by Travers Nugent's advice, the picnic camp had been
pitched lay some two hundred yards beyond the little glade at the side
of the raised marshland path where Reggie Beauchamp and Enid Mallory had
rested on the occasion of their prowl in the dark two evenings ago.
Here, for the purpose of raising the railway to the proper level, the
bank of the old river bed had been destroyed for a short distance, and
instead of the miniature red cliffs, with their leafy screen of brambles
and dwarf oaks, the marsh was skirted by the ugly side of the
embankment. This break in the beauties of nature caused by the
exigencies of engineering was but a score or two of yards in length, and
it was while the train had been in view on this short section that the
third-class passenger had played such strange antics.

At the foot of the embankment the ground was swampy, nowhere yielding
firm foothold, and here and there deepening into pools formed by the
brackish water that had drained in from the tidal dykes at the other
side of the path. For the most part the pools were surrounded and
studded with sedges, which concealed them from passers-by.

It was among these offshoots of the marsh that, at the risk of getting
bogged in the quagmires, Mr. Mallory pottered about by himself. Poking
and prying everywhere, he, however, devoted most attention to the pools
in the ground nearest the fence at the base of the embankment, which
were furthest removed, and therefore less visible, from the path. Ten
minutes must have been spent in this apparently unprofitable employment
when he suddenly straightened himself, and, regaining the firmer ground,
made his way slowly back to the gay gathering under the trees.

Many of the people had left the vicinity of the tables and were
promenading the grassy strip while listening to the band. Montague
Maynard, assiduous in his care for his guests, was a difficult man to
catch, but Mr