transparency!" So much
for Benson the son.

The ball was to take place that very night; and the knowledge of this
fact threw a different light over the letter I had read. The word _mask_
had no longer any special significance, neither the word _counterfeit_,
and yet such was the tenor of the note itself, and such the exaggerated
nature of its phrases, I could not but feel that some plot of a
reprehensible if not criminal nature was in the process of formation,
which, as a rising young detective engaged in a mysterious and elusive
search, it behooved me to know. And moved by this consideration, I
turned to a new leaf in my memorandum-book, and put down in black and
white the following facts thus summarily collected:

"A mysterious family with a secret.

"Rich, but with no visible means of wealth.

"Secluded, with no apparent reason for the same.

"A father who is a hermit.

"A son who is impenetrable.

"A daughter whose tastes are seldom gratified.

"The strange fact of a ball being given by this family after years of
reserve and non-intercourse with their neighbors.

"The still stranger fact of it being a masquerade, a style of
entertainment which, from its novelty and the opportunities it affords,
makes this departure from ordinary rules seem marked and startling.

"The discovery of a letter appointing a rendezvous between two persons
of the male sex, in the grounds of the party giving this ball, in which
the opportunities afforded by a masquerade are to be used for forwarding
some long-cherished scheme."

At the bottom of this I wrote a deduction:

"Some connection between one or more members of this family giving the
ball, and the person called to the rendezvous; the entertainment being
used as a blind if not as a means."

It was now four o'clock, five hours before the time of rendezvous. How
should I employ the interval? A glance at the livery-stable hard by,
determined me. Procuring a horse, I rode out on the road toward Mr.
Benson's, for the purpose of reconnoitring the grounds; but as I
proceeded I was seized by an intense desire to penetrate into the midst
of this peculiar household, and judge for myself whether it was worth
while to cherish any further suspicions in regard to this family. But
how to effect such an entrance? What excuse could I give for my
intrusion that would be likely to serve me on a day of such tumult and
preoccupation? I looked up and down the road as if for inspiration. It