es remained passive.

"Have you breakfasted?" asked Mr. Cullen, when the first joy was
over.

"Yes," I said. "I only stopped in on my way to the station to
telegraph the Postmaster-General."

"May I come with you and see what you say?" cried Fred, jumping
up.

I nodded, and Miss Cullen said, questioningly, "Me too?" making
me very happy by the question, for it showed that she would speak
to me. I gave an assent quite as eagerly and in a moment we were
all walking towards the platform. Despite Lord Ralles, I felt
happy, and especially as I had not dreamed that she would ever
forgive me.

I took a telegraph blank, and, putting it so that Miss Cullen
could see what I said, wrote,--

"Postmaster-General, Washington, D. C. I hold, awaiting your
instructions, the three registered letters stolen from No. 3
Overland Missouri Western Express on Monday, October fourteenth,
loss of which has already been notified you."

Then I paused and said, "So far, that's routine, Miss Cullen. Now
comes the help for you," and I continued:--

"The letters may have been tampered with, and I recommend a
special agent. Reply Flagstaff, Arizona. RICHARD GORDON,
Superintendent K. & A. R. R."

"What will that do?" she asked.

"I'm not much at prophecy, and we'll wait for the reply," I said.

All that day we lay at Flagstaff, and after a good sleep, as
there was no use keeping the party cooped up in their car, I
drummed up some ponies and took the Cullens and Ackland over to
the Indian cliff-dwellings. I don't think Lord Ralles gained
anything by staying behind in a sulk, for it was a very jolly
ride, or at least that was what it was to me. I had of course to
tell them all how I had settled on them as the criminals, and a
general history of my doings. To hear Miss Cullen talk, one would
have inferred I was the greatest of living detectives.

"The mistake we made," she asserted, "was not securing Mr.
Gordon's help to begin with, for then we should never have needed
to hold the train up, or if we had we should never have been
discovered."

What was more to me than this ill-deserved admiration were two
things she said on the way back, when we two had paired off and
were a bit behind the rest.

"The sandwiches and the whiskey were very good," she told me,
"and I'm so grateful for the trouble you took."

"It was a pleasure," I said.

"And, Mr. Gordon," she continued, and then hesitated for a
moment,--"my--Frederic told me that you-