were equally unsatisfactory. Nobody to be lifting some burden and carrying stirred from the house until the follow- it carefully into the house. Mr. Truming morning, when a young man having per strained his eyes until they seemed the appearance of a valet sauntered out to be starting from his head; he could carelessly, made some market purchases, not be sure, but the burden certainly received them at the door when they ar- resembled a woman's form. Sleepless rived; and this daily routine was carried before, his mind was tingling with on for about six months, without vari- wakefulness now, and for an hour he ation, and about the house nobody but sat at the open window, determined not this young man, who admitted that his to stir until he had seen the end of this name was Crow, was seen. Shutters very strange proceeding. He would were kept tight closed at night, and have greatly liked to dare go down and when any of the tradespeople ventured talk with the driver, who sat at his post to question Crow, they met either a cold apparently half asleep, but to this he stare and silence or some evasive or was hardly equal. Though not a timid jocular answer that but increased the man, the incomprehensibleness of his mystery. All bills were promptly paid, neighbors put him rather in awe of them. however, so the tradesmen had no cause At last, when he began to feel the moof financial complaint. notonous silence very depressing, the door of the brick house was thrown open with violence, and Trumper started to his feet, for a woman's scream rang out upon the quiet night, and a female, bare-headed, clothed in some material of light color, was seen to pass out and dart down the street with great rapidity. The figures of two men followed in quick pursuit, and as they with their longer strides neared her, she screamed again and again, until, quite coming up, they threw a cloak or some dark object over her. She was rapidly brought back to the carriage, placed in it, and driven off at a gallop. The tall man reentered the house, and the door closed, leaving Mr. Trumper standing spellbound, with perspiration on his forehead in beads. But after the first six months matters began to change. Occasionally upon very dark nights other figures than that of Crow were observed to issue forth from the portal of the brick house sometimes the tall man alone, sometimes with two shorter, fairer men. The most inquisitive neighbors kept a sort of watch and remarked that these strange beings never went out before ten at night, and sometimes returned as late as two in the morning. Then it began to be breathed about that they were evil-doers of some kind; the dark, tall man had been seen under a streetlamp by a workman returning home, who testified that his face was one of the most terrible he had ever seen. Nine months passed; it was summer now, and one night after the public house was closed Tom Trumper, being troubled with sleeplessness, rose quietly, slipped on his coat and trousers, and tried a pipe at the open window without disturbing his wife or lighting the gas. A far-off rattle coming nearer told of the approach of a carriage. To his great astonishment it turned finally into the street he looked upon almost as his personal property, and with a last clatter and dash drew up at the house opposite. All was seemingly dark; but no, the door swung open without the necessity of a knock, and the tall man stood in the light shining out from the hall for a moment before he re-entered; then Crow ran out and, with another man who descended from the carriage, seemed The following evening as John Ridley the printer, Hart the stationer, old Mr. Eagle, who lived on his income, and several other steady customers were sitting in the public room over their ale, discussing exhausted topics, Mr. Trumper sat silent, with restrained but conscious importance. Hart, who in his business capacity of stationer and bookseller had picked up fragments of learning, was enlightening the company with anecdotes of some genius, not badly recounted and not always spoiled for want of an addition or so from the stores of his own imagination. "Oh, the loneliness of great minds," remarked Mr. Trumper, when he thought Hart had monopolized public attention long enough. "Ah?" said John Ridley; "what makes you think so?" "Think so," said Mr. Trumper; "I know so. I've felt it many times." Hart ungraciously conceded his audience, and smoked in silence while Mr. Trumper spoke again. "Gentlemen," said he, we have often discussed the mysterious goings on over there," jerking his thumb in the direction of the brick house; "but last night I saw something, I won't say what, which showed me plain enough there is much that is wrong. I do not say," said Trumper, mysteriously, "where it may all end, but I've reason not to be surprised if it went far-even so far as murder." "It's none of our business if it does," said Hart, still smarting over Trumper's having taken the conversation away from him. Maybe not," retorted Mr. Trumper; "but would you see a man's pocket picked and not speak because it wasn't your business; or see a man set upon by five or six roughs without lending a helping hand?” "If you're not satisfied, why don't you report the case to the police?" said Hart. "I spoke to Bradley of the force, and he laughed at me and said the people were quiet enough. He didn't look on 'em as a suspicious lot, and I had no real complaint to make." "I think he's right," said Hart; "you're inquisitive, Trumper, that's where it is." "Well, if I was as young as some of you men," said Mr. Trumper, his face growing redder, "I'd find out what is going on behind those blinds." "Oh, you would," cried Hart, laughing. "I would," said Trumper, with dignity. "I don't believe you could," said Hart; "you're not cut out for a detective, Trumper. You haven't got tact for it; you're too fat. I believe you haven't the courage to do it." "Since you set me on, Hart," cried Trumper, growing imprudent in his anger, "I'll bet you twenty pounds that within a month I am on the inside of the brick house and find out what those people are up to." "Done," said Hart, who was, if the truth be told, very inquisitive himself. "A fair bet," Mr. Eagle announced; "I'll hold the stakes." "The first thing," thought Mr. Trumper to himself the next day, "will be to discover where these people pass their time until midnight and later." So he kept a pretty constant watch during the evening, and about nine perceived the two fair complexioned men starting out together. He clapped on his hat and coat and followed them at a convenient distance. As they passed under a street-lamp he saw that something white had been dropped by one; he picked the object up and found it a white handkerchief with the initials H. B. in a corner; but by the time he had concluded his inspection of this trophy, his men had disappeared around a corner, and all his looking and running to and fro to find them proved ineffectual. "I see I'm but a green hand at this business," said Mr. Trumper, retracing his steps. The evening wore on; all the visitors had gone, and Trumper was sitting alone in the public room, when, hearing footsteps outside, he started to the window and saw the fair-haired men just entering the house. Behind them, a hundred paces or so, he remarked another man, but as this seemed a stranger he took no further notice, and returning to his seat sought with closed eyes some clue to the solution of the mystery of his neighbors. When he opened them again after a few moments Mr. Trumper, to his astonishment, discovered that he was not alone. His companion was a man, small and dark, with a sly look of the eye, and not badly dressed. "Well," said Trumper, angrily, "what do you want? "Not much," said the stranger, laying his hand on a bottle. "I'll help myself," and he did so with evident satisfaction. "I was just walking along the street," he said, "when I met two of the finest looking men I ever saw. They look like brothers, and went into the large house opposite." 66 'Do you know them?" exclaimed Trumper, eagerly. "It seems to me I have seen them," said the stranger, with a sly look; "but my memory for faces is so bad that I cannot be sure. If you will kindly let me know the name, it may assist." "I don't know the name," said Trum per. "No? that's very strange; I suppose they're new comers then? دو Not at all; been here nearly a year." "You surprise me, my dear sir; you are an enigma. Pray explain yourself." The stranger was such a seductive fellow that Trumper gave him information without intending to, yet perhaps expecting some in return. He told of the curiosity of the neighbors, the strange way these men acted, and indeed all except the adventure of the woman. The stranger seemed more than interested, but when he became satisfied that Trumper would tell nothing more, he bade him a pleasant good-night and ran to the nearest telegraph office and sent a message bearing strongly upon Mr. Trumper's communications. Two days elapsed before Mr. Trumper saw his neighbors again; it was once more in the evening about nine that the man who had dropped the handkerchief emerged from the house, and in a moment our friend was in pursuit. followed to the busy parts of town and on into the aristocratic dwelling quarter. He Here before a certain house the man paused and remained in contemplation for some moments, after which he went nearer and approached his face to the window of the ground-floor room, then hastened away, while Trumper as rapidly as possible took his place at the window. He looked in upon a pleasant room with two occupants: one a young man, the other elderly, both sitting at a table with some steaming beverage before them. Upon the table lay the fragments of a shattered glass, and the two gentlemen were staring at the window and at Mr. Trumper through it with such peculiar intensity that he came to the conclusion they had already discovered his predecessor. Mr. Trumper therefore hastened away, and he often said afterward that he had never seen a face so terrified as that of the young man who sat at the table with the broken glass in front of him. that during his visit to the window his He thought his adventures at an end for that night; he had no idea that they were only just begun, and that it was destined he should not go to bed before dawn. III. MR. JOHN CROSSE, M.P., of considerable reputation as a rising member of the House, had the misfortune to be left a widower at the time his daughter was ten years of age. Involved in a multitude of public affairs, he yet did not neglect to provide for his little girl's future welfare and happiness; he furnished suitable companions, learned preceptors, and luxuries and amusements to a proper degree. As she grew to a marriageable age and more beautiful each year, he stole time from affairs of state to cast about his eyes critically for a husband in whom would be combined the advantages of manly virtues, wealth, and social position. And to whom should he incline favorably if not to young Craven, a relative of his, a sort of cousin to his daughter, a man of dashing appearance, insinuating manners, and clever abilities? It is a striking instance of the way we sometimes overlook those near us and see only those who are further away, that the young man had never presented himself to the Rising Member's mind as a possible suitor until he one day saw his name in the newspaper, upon which he immediately said: "How could I have overlooked Francis Craven? He must be invited to dinner." The paragraph in the newspaper related to an unfortunate accident by which two uncles of Craven had come to their death and he to their fortune. It is true that ugly rumors had been heard of the young man's wild courses, To Trumper's annoyance he found but Mr. John Crosse thought it no dis grace not to be a milksop if only one would settle down after marriage. And so young Craven was invited to a dinner, then to another, then to suppers, to theatre parties (as soon as he had recovered from the shock of his uncles' death; indeed he had a very rapid recovery) and all sorts of parties, and really was made as much of as though he had been an ambassador from a Continental power. It is not to be imagined that a young man of his shrewdness could long be blind to the object of the Rising Member's diplomacy; whatever Craven was (and many people said he was much that he should not have been), nobody accused him of being asleep; but although he was quite alive to the matrimonial net, he yet quietly allowed it to be slipped over him; for was not Mr. Crosse a Rising Member? was his wealth not as great and was his daughter not as beautiful, as accomplished, as could be desired by the most ambitious of young men? Thus the two gentlemen talked the matter over in metaphors they both understood perfectly well, until John Crosse believed his darling scheme achieved and rubbed his hands over his success. And in this moment of victory an unlooked-for obstacle presented itself: Amelia Crosse, the hitherto meek and obedient, displayed a will of her own, which had lain dormant and unsuspected all her life, and declared that young Craven was not the man of her choice as though that had anything to do with the question in this century. We do not mean to say that she openly rebelled or threatened to run away with the butler or drown her lovely self in the Serpentine, but she appealed to her father in her soft graceful way, with perhaps not a few tears, to save her from that dreadful man for whom she had always felt, if she had not expressed, the utmost detestation; whom she knew to be a hypocrite, and thought might be worse. Now John Crosse in his politically conservative fashion did care for his daughter; her tears worried him; her unhappiness bewildered him; how she could be unhappy or tearful over such a brilliant match he was at a loss to understand; but he declared to himself that he would not strangle his little girl's affections or marry her against her will. With this statement he deluded himself and her. Probably he did not realize how seldom he abandoned a project he had once conceived; in this case abandonment of the siege merely meant that he would not take the citadel by storm, but would retreat a little, go into comfortable quarters, and wait for time to starve and freeze such occupants as natural affection and old-fashioned ideas of marriage out of his daughter's heart, upon which he might take possession peaceably. But Mr. Crosse had an enemy whom he had not included in his calculations, and as this is not a love story, he will not appear in person in these pages. The poor child Amelia had seen him, we will not inquire where, and her tender heartstrings had twined so tightly around his image (he was poor, she knew, but working hard to win fame and fortune before he dared to ask her to share his lot) that all Craven's arts and the Rising Member's gentle but unflinching persuasions were powerless to loosen them again; and so the siege went on, quietly enough, with no force or storm or bluster, but the enemy's lines were always there, ever drawing closer, and as time passed Amelia's face grew pale. And one day news was brought to our little friend from many sources that the man she loved was down, that the world was trampling him under foot, that he could never hold up his head again, beaten in the struggle-do you think she would have surrendered him for that? But the news was also that he was untrue to her, that she, being far away, was forgotten and replaced; to be sure these reports were soon contradicted and disproved, at least so far as faithlessness was concerned, but, alas! too late. For before Amelia knew the truth, in her sorrow and despair she had promised to be Frank Craven's wife. A few days later what would she not have given to recall that hasty word? But she loved her father; he had spread news of his joy; she felt she could not break his heart, and so determined to accept and bury her sorrow. And thus tears and laces and remorse and satins were jumbled together as usual, and the day before the wedding came, and as Amelia was sitting in her boudoir alone with her trouble, her maid said that a gentleman desired to speak but a word with her. She entered the little reception room listlessly, and found a little old gentleman with the hackneyed combination of a bald head, kind expression, and gold spectacles. He said but a few words, in a quiet voice; it was an exasperating mystery to Jane, who happened to be glancing through the keyhole at the moment, what could cause Miss Amelia to start up so suddenly and then to fall down so that her head would have struck the chimneypiece had not the little old gentleman caught her in his arms; and Jane wondered more still, when, as soon as the old gentleman had sprinkled water in her face, rubbed her hands, and restored her and taken his departure, Miss Amelia, in a state of repressed excitement, called out for the brougham to be brought around immediately. And Jane was still more tantalized when she learned from James that he had driven Miss into a queer, musty, legal part of town; "blessed if he'd hever driv a lady there before." And it may be added that Jane, and James too, would have been still more mystified could they have followed their mistress up three gloomy flights of stairs and there, in a dingy room full of books, seen her, with the little gold-spectacled gentleman as witness, throw herself into the arms of a gentleman who was decidedly of too matured an age to be mistaken for Somebody, but who certainly resembled the fair-haired gentlemen, Mr. Trumper's neighbors. This was an eventful day. It was in the evening of this day that John Crosse, M.P., and his son-in-law that was to be sat drinking their wine cosily after din ner. The gentlemen were in great good humor, and bandied wit and jokes in a most lively and diverting way. The Rising Member proposed the health of the bride. With a flushed and animated face Craven rose to the toast, and in a few words added a pretty tribute to her beauty and talents, and lifted the glass to his lips, but as he was about to drink his face turned white and the glass dropped from his fingers. John Crosse clapped a hand to his back. What's the matter, Frank? Are you ill? What do you see?" Catching the young man's fixed expression at the window of the room, he looked there, too, and sawnothing. Craven fell back breathless in his chair. As his color returned he tried to smile and said: "By Heaven, sir, my nerves are unstrung. I thought I saw a ghost;" but he never once took his eyes from the window. In a moment appeared Mr. Trumper's face at the same window; they both saw this time, and Craven gave a kind of gasp. The head vanished, and John Crosse rushed across the room and threw open the sash. There was nobody in sight; but Frank Craven still sat upon his chair pale and trembling. IV. WE left Mr. Trumper staring up at the windows of the brick house, annoyed and discouraged. It was not the loss of the twenty pounds he cared for; he could well afford that; but he knew what an amount of ridicule he would be called upon to endure in consequence of a failure. Probably Hart was correct in his statement that Trumper was not "cut out" for a detective. It is true he had not displayed any deep ingenuity thus far in his adventures. A gust of wind blew up the silent street, causing shutters and windows to rattle and Mr. Trumper to clap a guarding hand to his hat. Then as he was turning away he perceived that the door of the brick house could not have been tightly closed, for the wind had blown it slightly open again. Our worthy friend trembled, perhaps not with delight-he would have scorned to call it fear-but with nervous excitement. His chance had come at last, and he quietly went up the steps and applied his eye to the aperture. He perceived that there was a small vestibule and an inner door, but this was open also, and the hallway beyond was dimly lighted by a candle. At the far end of the hall a brightly lighted room was seen. Trumper's heart beat rapidly; two steps inside the door would afford him a better view of the room. Should he take them? He felt his courage rise with the |