"That is all very well in cases of doubt. But here you have the
evidences of wrong-doing directly before you."

Three dishes were taken up, dried, and put down before she answered me.
I threw pebbles into the brook, and wished I had held my tongue.

"What evidence?" inquired she.
"Well," said I, "I must finish, I suppose. I had a notion you knew of
what I inferred. First, let me say that I have no desire to prejudice
you against a person whom you admire."

"Impossible."

Something in her tone made me look up.

"Very good, then," I answered. "I, for one, can have no use for a man
who devotes himself to a girl long enough to win her affections, and then
deserts her with as little compunction as a dog does a rat it has shaken.
And that is how your Celebrity treated Miss Trevor."

"But Miss Trevor has recovered, I believe," said Miss Thorn.

I began to feel a deep, but helpless, insecurity.

"Happily, yes," I assented.

"Thanks to an excellent physician."

A smile twitched the corners of her mouth, as though she enjoyed my
discomfiture. I remarked for the fiftieth time how strong her face was,
with its generous lines and clearly moulded features. And a suspicion
entered my soul.

"At any rate," I said, with a laugh, "the Celebrity has got himself into
no end of a predicament now. He may go back to New York in custody."

"I thought you incapable of resentment, Mr. Crocker. How mean of you to
deny him!"

"It can do no harm," I answered; "a little lesson in the dangers of
incognito may be salutary. I wish it were a little lesson in the dangers
of something else."

The color mounted to her face as she resumed her occupation.

"I am afraid you are a very wicked man," she said.

Before I could reply there came a scuffling sound from the bank above us,
and the snapping of branches and twigs. It was Mr. Cooke. His descent,
the personal conduction of which he lost half-way down, was irregular and
spasmodic, and a rude concussion at the bottom knocked off a choice bit
of profanity which was balanced on the tip of his tongue.

"Tobogganing is a little out of season," said his niece, laughing
heartily.

Mr. Cooke brushed himself off, picked up the glasses which he had dropped
in his flight and pushed them into my hands. Then he pointed lakeward
with bulging eyes.

"Crocker, old man," he said in a loud whisper, "they tell me that is an
Asquith cat-boat."

I followed his finger and saw for the first time a s