There was some sort of telepathy or some subconscious impulse that made Anita Austin open her bedroom door in response to a light tap, although she had resolved to talk to nobody just then.

But when she saw Gordon Lockwood she was glad she had, and, without waiting for an invitation he stepped inside the room and closed the door.

He looked at her with a face full of compassion and love, but he spoke as one who must attend to an important business.

“Anita,” he said, speaking very low, “the crisis has come. They have learned of the check Doctor Waring gave you that night, and it is the last straw. Stone is already, I think, convinced of your guilt, and that young chap, McGuire, will get at the bottom of everything, I’m sure.”

“Check? What do you mean?” Miss Mystery said, with a blank look on her face.

“Don’t equivocate with me, dear.” Lockwood laid his hand gently on hers. “There’s no time now to tell you of my love, as I want to tell it. Now, we can only assume that it is all told, that we are engaged, and that we are to be married at once. We are going to elope, Anita.”

“Elope!” she stared at him, but her eyes grew soft and her pale cheeks flushed. “What do you mean?”

“It isn’t a pretty word,” Gordon smiled, “but it’s the only thing to do, you see. If you stay here, you’ll be arrested. If you go, I go with you. So – we both go, and that makes it an elopement.”

“But, Gordon – ”

“But, Anita – answer me just one question – do you love me?”

“Yes,” with an adorable upward glance and smile.

“More than you loved Doctor Waring?”

Their eyes met. Lockwood’s usually inscrutable face was desperately eager, and his deep eyes showed smouldering passion. He held her by the shoulders, he looked steadily at her, awaiting her answer.

“Yes,” she said, at last, her lovely lips quivering.

“That’s all I want to know!” he whispered, triumphantly, as he kissed the scarlet lips, and drew the slender form into his embrace.

“You must know more – ” she began, “and – and I can’t tell you. Oh, Gordon – ”

She hid her face on his broad shoulder, and he gently stroked her hair, as he said:

“Don’t tell me anything now, dearest. Don’t ever tell me, unless you choose. And, anyway, I know it all. I know you had never known the Doctor before, and I’ll tell you how I know. I found in his scrap basket a note to you – ”

“A note to me!” Fresh terror showed in the dark eyes.

“Yes – don’t mind. No one else ever saw it. I burned it. But it said, ‘Darling Anita. Since you came into my life, life is worth living’ – or something like that – ”

“When – when did he write that?”

“Sometime on that fatal Sunday. I suppose after he met you in the afternoon, and before you came that evening. Remember, Sweetheart, if ever you want to tell me all about that late visit to him, do so. But, if not, I never shall ask or expect you to. But that’s all in the future – our dear future, which we shall spend together – together, Anita! Are you glad?”

“Oh, so glad!” and the soft arms crept round his neck and Miss Mystery gave him a kiss that thrilled his very soul. “Will you take care of me, Gordon?”

“Take care of you, my little love! Take care of you, is it? Just give me the chance!”

“You seem to have a pretty big chance, right now,” a smiling face reached up to his. “But – ” she seemed suddenly to recollect something, “about a check – he didn’t give me a check – ”

Lockwood laid a hand over her mouth.

“Hush, dearest. Don’t tell me things that aren’t – aren’t so. I saw the stub – a check for ten thousand dollars – made out to Anita Austin, and dated that very Sunday. Now, hush – ” as she began to speak, “we’ve no time to talk these things over. I tell you the police are on your track. They will come here, they will arrest you – try to get that in your head. I am going to save you – first, for your own sweet sake, and also for my own.”

“But, Gordon, wait a minute. Do you believe I killed John Waring?”

Lockwood looked at her.

“Don’t ask me that, Anita. And, truly, I don’t know whether I believe it or not. I know you have told falsehoods, I know you were there that night, I know of his letter to you, of the check and of the ruby pin and the money. But I – no, I do not know that you killed him. There are many other theories possible – there’s Nogi – but, my darling, it all makes no difference. I love you, I want you, whatever the circumstances or conditions of your life, or your deeds. I love you so, that I want you even if you are a criminal – for in that case, I want to protect and save you. Now, don’t tell me you did or didn’t kill the man, for – ” he gave her a whimsical smile, “I couldn’t believe you in either case! I’ve not much opinion of your veracity, and, too, it’s too big a matter to talk about now. Of course I don’t believe you killed him! You, my little love! And yet, the evidence is so overpowering that I – believe you did kill him! There, how’s that for a platform? Now, let all those things be, and get ready to go away with me. I tell you we’re going to elope and mighty quickly too. The difficulty is, to get away unseen. But it must be done. Pack a small handbag – a very small one. I’ll plan our way out – and if we can make a getaway under the noses of Stone and his boy, we’ll soon be all right. I’ve a friend who will motor us to a nearby town, where a dear old minister, who has known and loved me from boyhood, will marry us.”

“Doesn’t he know about – about me?”

“My little girl, leave all the details of this thing to me. Don’t bother your lovely head about it. It will be all right – trust me – if we can escape.”

“Is it right for me to go? Oughtn’t I stay and – what do they call it? give myself up?”

“Anita, if I didn’t love you so, I’d scold you, hard! Now, you obey your future lord and master, and get ready for a hurry-up wedding, I’m sorry that you can’t have bridesmaids and choir boys – but, you’ll pardon me, I know, if I remind you that that isn’t my fault.”

Miss Mystery looked up and broke into laughter. Truly, she was a mystery! Her gayety was as spontaneous and merry as if she had never heard of crime or tragedy.

Lockwood gazed at her curiously, and then nodded his handsome head, as he said, “You’ll do, Anita! You’re a little bit of all right.”

But in a moment her mood changed.

“Gordon, we can’t,” she said, slowly. “We never can get away from this house – let alone the detectives. Miss Bascom is on continual watch and Mrs. Adams – ”

“I know, dear. That’s it. I thought if you could manage that part, I’d see to evading the Stone faction. Can’t you think up a plan?”

“Love will find a way,” she whispered, and unable to resist the inviting smile, Gordon again caught her in his arms, and held her close in an ecstasy of possession.

“You are so sweet,” he murmured, with an air of saying something important. “Oh, my Little Girl, how I love you! The moment I first saw you – ”

“When was that?”

“That night at – at the Doctor’s lectures. I sat behind you, I changed my seat to do so – and I counted the buttons on your dear little gray frock – that was one way I discovered your presence in the study that night.” He spoke gravely now. “And there was another way. I heard you talking. Yes, I heard your blessed voice – remember, I loved you then – and I heard Waring talking to you. I could make out no word – I didn’t try – but now I wish I had – for it might help you.”

“I wish you had, Gordon,” she returned, solemnly, “it would have helped me.”

“But you can tell me, dear, tell me all the conversation. Surely you trust me now.”

“I trust you – but – oh, as you say, there’s no time. It’s a long story – a dreadful story – I don’t want to tell you – ”

“Then you shan’t. I’ve promised you that, you know. Not until you want to tell me, will I ask for a word of it.”

“Now, here’s another thing,” and Anita blushed, deeply, “if we go away – as you say – what about – about money?”

Lockwood stared at her. “I have money,” he said; “why do you ask that?”

“But – but the awful detective people – said you – you were terribly in debt.”

“Brave little girl, to say that. I know you hated to. Well, my darling, those precious bills that those precious detectives dug up in my desk, are old bills that were owed by my father – his name was the same as mine – ”

“The same as yours! How queer!”

“Oh, not a unique instance. Anyway, those bills I am paying off as I can. I’m not legally responsible for them, but I want to clear my dad’s name, and all that. Now, all that can wait – while I take unto me a wife, and arrange for her comfort and convenience. But, is there – now remember, I’m not prying – is there any one whose permission you must ask to marry me?”

“No, I’m twenty-one – that’s of age in any state.”

“Why, you aged person! I deemed you about eighteen.”

“Do you mind?”

“No; you goosie! But – your mother, now?”

“Oh – my mother. She doesn’t care what I do.”

“And your father? Forgive me, but I have to ask.”

“My father is dead.”

“Then come along. Let’s begin to get ready to go.”

“Wait a minute – Gordon – to get married – must I – must I tell my real name?”

His eyes clouded a trifle.

“Yes, dear heart,” he said, very gently, “yes, you must.”

“Then I can’t get married, Gordon.”

Miss Mystery sat down and folded her little hands in her lap, her whole attitude that of utter despair.

“But, Sweetheart, no one need know except the minister and witnesses – ”

“And you?”

“Yes – and I – ”

“Oh, I can’t marry you, anyway. I can’t marry anybody. I can’t tell who I am! Oh, let them take me away, and let them arrest me and I hope they’ll convict me – and – ”

“Hush, my precious girl, hush.” Lockwood took her in his arms, and let her stifle her sobs on his breast. He was bewildered. What was the truth about this strange child? For in her abandonment of grief, Anita seemed a very child, a tortured irresponsible soul, whose only haven was in the arms now around her.

“You will go with me, anyway, Anita,” he said, with an air of authority. “I must take care of you. We will go, as I planned. The minister I told you of, is a great and good man, he will advise you – ”

“Oh, no, I don’t want to talk to a minister!”

“Yes, you do. And his wife is a dear good woman. They will take you into their hearts and home – and then we can all decide what to do. At any rate, you must get away from here. Come, now, pack your bag – and would you mind – Anita – if I ask you not to take the – the money and the ruby pin – ”

“But he gave them to me! I tell you, Gordon, John Waring gave me those of his own free will – ”

“Because of his affection for you?”

“Yes; for no other reason! I will keep the pin, anyway – I will!”

“Anita, have you any idea how you puzzle me? how you torture me? Well, take what you like. Will you get ready now, and I will let you know as soon as I can, how and when we can start.”

A loud rap was followed by an immediate opening of the door, and Mrs. Adams came into the room.

She stared at Lockwood, but made no comment on his presence there.

“Miss Austin,” she began, “I do not wish you to stay in my house any longer. I have kept you until now, because my husband was so sorry for you, and refused to turn you out. Nor am I turning you out, but – I wish you would leave us alone, Mr. Lockwood.”

Gordon started to speak, but Anita interrupted him.

“Go, please,” she said, quietly, and Lockwood obeyed.

“I cannot blame you, Mrs. Adams,” Miss Mystery said; “I daresay you have to consider your other boarders, and I thank you for your kindness and forbearance you have shown me so far.”

The tears were in the big dark eyes, and even as they moved Mrs. Adams to sympathy, she also wondered if they were real. “A girl who would redden her lips would be capable of any deceit and duplicity,” Esther Adams reasoned.

But she went on, calmly.

“I come now, Miss Austin, to tell you that Mr. Trask is down stairs and wants to see you. He wants you to go to his house to stay. The Peytons are there, of course, and he offers you the shelter of his roof and protection until this dreadful matter is settled up.”

“Mr. Trask!” Anita looked her amazement.

“Yes; now don’t be silly. You very well know he is mad about you, and he hopes to get you freed and then marry you.”

“Oh, he does!” It was the old, scornful Miss Mystery who spoke. “Well, will you please tell him from me – ”

“Now, don’t you be too hoity-toity, miss! You’re mighty lucky to have a home offered you – ”

“Yes, that’s quite true. Well, Mrs. Adams, will you go down, then and say I’ll be down in a moment or two. Give me time to freshen my appearance a bit.”

“Yes, with paints and powders and cosmetics!” Esther Adams grumbled to herself, as she went down the stairs.

As a matter of fact she quite misjudged the girl. Very rarely did Anita resort to artificial aid of that sort, but when she so desired, she used it as she would any other personal adornment.

“She’s coming down,” Mrs. Adams announced, as she returned to Trask and they waited.

But when the minutes grew to a quarter of an hour, and then nearly to a half, Mrs. Adams again climbed the stairs to hasten proceedings.

This time she found the room empty.

The absence, too, of brushes and combs, the disappearance of a small suitcase, and the fact that her hat and coat were gone all pointed unmistakably to the assumption that the girl had fled.

“Well!” Mrs. Adams reported, “she’s lit out, bag and baggage.”

“Gone!” exclaimed Trask in dismay.

“Well, she isn’t in her room. Her trunk is locked and strapped and her suitcase is missing. Her hat and coat’s gone, too, so you can make your own guess.”

But Maurice Trask didn’t stay there to make his guess.

He went back home as fast as he could and told Fleming Stone the news.

“Run away, has she?” said Stone. “I rather looked for that.”

“You did! And took no steps to prevent it! You’re a nice detective, you are. Well, if you’re so smart, where’d she go?”

“Where’s Lockwood?” was Stone’s laconic response.

“Lockwood!” exclaimed Trask. “Wherever he is, he hasn’t run off with Anita Austin! If he has – by Jove, I’ll break every bone in his body!”

“You’ll have to catch him first,” smiled the detective.

“I’ll catch him! I’ll set you to do it. And, looky here, if she’s gone off with that man, you can go ahead and catch her, catch them both, and then go ahead and prove her guilty.”

“Is she?”

“Is she? You bet she is! And I know it.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ll tell you. I know her eyebrows!”

“So do I know her eyebrows. But they don’t tell me she’s a murderer.”

“Well, they tell me that! It’s this way. Her eyebrows, are not only heavy and dark, but they almost meet over the bridge of her nose.”

“Darling nose!” put in Fibsy, who was interested in Anita but not in Trask’s deductions.

“Does your knowledge of physiognomy tell you that those meeting eyebrows are a sign of a criminal?” asked Stone.

“Nothing of that sort. But they are the Truesdell brows.”

“The Truesdell brows?” Stone raised his own. “Sounds like a proprietary article. Not artificial, are they?”

“Now, see here, Mr. Stone, I’m in no mood to be guyed. Those eyebrows are frequently seen in the Truesdell family. My grandfather’s brother married a Truesdell.”

“Your grandfather’s brother married a Truesdell. And your own grandfather didn’t?”

“No; I haven’t those brows.”

“Well, you’re not entitled to them, having no Truesdell blood in your veins.”

“But that girl has.”

“Indeed! Interesting, is it not?”

“Aw, come off that line o’ talk, F. S.,” said Fibsy, knitting his brows, which were not Truesdellian. “I’m seein’ a chink o’ light. The brother of your grandfather, now, Mr. Trask, he was named – ?”

“Waring, of course. Henry Waring. My grandfather was James Waring.”

“And this Henry Waring – he was the father of Doctor John Waring?”

As Fibsy said this, Stone sat upright, and gazed hard at Trask.

“Yes, John Waring’s father was Henry, and my grandfather was Henry’s brother James. That’s how I’m related. And being the only one, that’s why I’m the heir here. But, don’t you see, Doctor Waring’s mother was a Truesdell – ”

“And Miss Austin is a relative of hers – a connection of the Truesdell family somehow – ” exclaimed the now excited Fibsy, “and she found out about it, and came here and – ”

“Yes,” Trask said, “and tried to get some money from John Waring on the ground of relationship.”

“What relation could she be?”

“Maybe a niece of Doctor Waring – or a cousin. Maybe the same relation to Doctor Waring’s mother that I am to his father. Then, that would explain his giving her money and the pin – and maybe she burnt the will! and then she – ”

“But it complicates everything,” said Stone, who was thinking quickly. “However, if Miss Austin is connected with the Truesdell family it gives us a way to look to learn her history.”

“Well, learn it,” said Trask, abruptly. “I’m not afraid of losing my inheritance for I’m in the direct Waring line and she can’t be.”

CHAPTER XVIII
MISS MYSTERY NO LONGER

Trask, helped along by Fleming Stone, investigated the family tree of the Warings. But they ran up against a blank wall. As far as they could learn Doctor Waring never had brother or sister. His mother, who was a Truesdell, had also been an only child. But of course, Miss Mystery could be of the Truesdell family, and could, as Trask observed, be the same relation to John Waring’s mother that Trask was to John Waring’s father. Which relation was that of second cousin.

“It gives a reason for the girl’s presence here,” Stone said, “and as it’s the only reason we can think of, it must be followed up.”

“And I’ll follow it up,” Trask said, “if I once get hold of that girl. Where can she be, Mr. Stone?”

“Not very far away, I think, as all the stations and routes out of town are watched. She’d have trouble to leave Corinth.”

“She could get out in a motor car.”

“Who’d take her?”

“Lockwood, of course.”

But just then, Gordon Lockwood came into the Waring study. His usual calm was entirely gone, his eyes wildly staring and his voice quivered as he said, “She’s gone! Anita’s gone!”

“Yes, I know it – I thought you went with her!” and Stone stared in turn.

“No, I didn’t!” Lockwood said, quite unnecessarily. “Find her, Mr. Stone – you can, can’t you?”

“I can find her,” said Fibsy, “if you’ll tell me one thing, Mr. Lockwood, right straight out.”

“What is it? I’ll tell you anything. I’m afraid – ”

“You’re afraid she’s killed herself,” said Fibsy, calmly. “Well you tell me this. Are you two – aw – you know – ”

The boy blushed, and Stone smiled a little as he said:

“McGuire is a bit shy of romantic matters. He means are you and Miss Austin lovers?”

“We are,” said Lockwood, emphatically. “She is my fiancee – ”

“All right,” said Fibsy, “then I’ll find her. She hasn’t done anything rash, in that case.”

He wagged his wise little head.

“Where is she?” Stone asked, confident that the boy could tell. He knew of Fibsy’s almost clairvoyant powers of divining truth in certain situations.

“Want her here?” he asked, laconically.

“Yes.”

“I’ll get her.”

Snatching his cap, he darted from the house, but he was closely followed by Maurice Trask. Lockwood would have stopped Trask, but Stone said:

“Let him go. This thing is coming to a crisis – Trask will help it along.”

Fibsy went toward the Adams house, but stopped at the house next door to it. This was the home of Emily Bates.

Ringing that lady’s doorbell, Fibsy asked to see her.

“Mrs. Bates,” he said, politely, while Trask listened, “we want to see Miss Austin, please.”

“Anita!” said Mrs. Bates, flurriedly; “why – she – she isn’t – ”

“Oh, yes, she is here,” said the boy, patiently, rather than rudely. “We have to see her, you see.”

“Here I am,” said Miss Mystery, coming in from the next room. “I think,” she said turning to Mrs. Bates, “I think, as you advised me, I’ll tell all.”

“Don’t tell it here!” cried Fibsy. “Please, Miss Austin – don’t spill your yarn here – oh, I mean, don’t – don’t divulge – ”

The unusual word nearly choked the excited boy, who always in moments of strong emotion lapsed into careless English, but who tried not to.

“Now, look here,” Maurice Trask put in. “Here’s where I take hold. Miss Austin, you have told your story to Mrs. Bates?”

“Yes,” said, Anita, looking very sad, but determined.

“Then you tell it to me. I’m heir to the Waring estate, and so I have a right to know all you know about – the family.”

His knowing look proved to Anita that he assumed also her right to be classed with “the family” and she looked at him in astonishment.

“You know?” she cried.

“Yes – I know,” he spoke very sternly. “And I insist upon a private interview with you, before you tell your story to any one else.”

“You shall have it, then,” she said, and her eyes grew grave. “Mrs. Bates, will you and Terence leave us alone for ten minutes. That will be long enough, and then, I’ll go to see Mr. Stone – if necessary.”

“Now, look here,” Trask said, as the door closed after the others, “I know who you are.”

“I don’t believe it,” and Miss Mystery looked at him straight from beneath the “Truesdell brows.”

“Well, anyway, I know you are a Truesdell connection.”

“Yes, I am. Go on.”

“I don’t know just what branch,” he went on, a little lamely.

“But it’s a branch strong enough to hold me – and also to interfere with this heirship of yours.”

“Can’t be. There’s no Truesdell so close to John Waring as I am.”

“You think so? Then listen.”

As Miss Mystery told him her story, the man’s face fell, he sat, almost petrified with astonishment, and when she had finished the short but amazing recital, he said:

“My heavens! What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know what to do.”

“If you tell – I – ”

“Of course you do.”

“And if you don’t tell – then John Waring’s name is left unstained – ”

“There is no shadow of stain on John Waring’s name! What do you mean?”

“Now, look here, Miss Austin, you keep quiet about all this, will you? I’ll call off those sleuths and I’ll arrange to close up and cover up the whole matter. Then, you marry me – there’s only a distant cousinship between us – and I’ll put up the biggest memorial to Waring you ever heard of.”

“Omit the clause about my marrying you,” she returned, “and I may agree to your plans. I haven’t quite decided what to do – and beside, Mr. Trask, who killed my – Doctor Waring?”

“Never mind who killed him. Call it suicide – it must have been anyway – ”

“No – I’m not sure it was – oh, I don’t know what to do.”

“Time’s up,” called Fibsy through the closed door. “And, I say, Miss Austin, you take my tip, and come along and tell your story to F. Stone. It’ll be your best bet in the long run.”

Perhaps it was the boy’s speech, perhaps it was the gleam of disappointed greed that Anita saw in Trask’s eyes, but she rose, with a sudden decision, and said, as she opened the door:

“That’s just what I’ll do. Come with me, Mrs. Bates – or, would you rather not?”

“Oh, I can’t,” said Emily Bates, “don’t ask me, Anita, dear.”

“No, you stay here. I’ll come back soon.”

And so Miss Mystery again walked across the snow-covered field to the Waring house, this time to remove all occasion for using her nickname.

“You found her?” said Stone, as the trio came into the study, where he and Lockwood still sat.

“Yes,” said Fibsy. “I just thought where would a poor, hunted kid go? And I said to myself, she’d go to the nearest and nicest lady’s house she knew of. And of course, that was Mrs. Bates’ and sure enough there she was. And – she’s going to tell all!”

Fibsy was melodramatic by nature, and his gesture indicated an important revelation.

“I am,” said Anita, quietly.

She went straight to Lockwood’s side, and he took her hand calmly, and led her to a seat on the wide davenport, then sat beside her.

Her hand still in his, she told her story.

“I am of Truesdell blood,” she began, “as Mr. Trask surmised. But, also, I am of Waring blood. Doctor John Waring was my father.”

No one spoke. The surprise was too great. In his wildest theories, Fleming Stone had never thought of this.

Fibsy’s great astonishment was permeated with the quick conviction, “then she didn’t kill him!”

Gordon Lockwood was conscious of a rapturous reassurance that he had no rival as a lover.

Trask, already knowing the truth, sat gloomily realizing he was not the heir.

Anita, her beautiful face sad, yet proud to acknowledge her ancestry, went on:

“This is his story. When John Waring was twenty years old, he met a young woman – an actress – who so infatuated him that he married her. They were absolutely uncongenial and unfitted for one another, and after a few weeks, they agreed to separate. There was no question of divorce, they merely preferred to live apart. He sent her money at stated intervals but he pursued his quiet, studious life, and she her life of gayety and sport. She was a good woman – she is a good woman – she is my mother.”

Another silence followed this disclosure. Is, she had said – not was. And John Waring her father!

Gordon Lockwood held her hand closely. He was content to listen. Whatever she could say could not lessen his love and adoration.

“I tell you this, for her sake and – my father’s also. There is no stigma to be attached to either, they were merely so utterly opposite in character and disposition that they could not live together.

“As I said, after a few weeks they separated, and – my father did not know of my birth. My mother would not let him know, lest he come back to her. She was a light-hearted, carefree girl, and while she loved me, she did not love my father. Later on – when I was about four, I think, she caused a notice of her death to be sent to my father. This was because she wanted to sever all connection, and take no chance of ever meeting him again. She was at that time a successful actress, and earned all the money she wanted. She adored me, she had no love affairs, she lived only for me and her art. Though a good actress, she was not widely renowned, and in California, where she had chosen to make her home, she was liked and respected. The climate just suited her love of ease, freedom and indolence – as a New England life of busy activity would have been impossible to her. I want you to understand my mother. She was – she is, a mere butterfly, caring only for trifles and simple gayety. Her home is charming, her personality, that of a delightful child. But her temperament is one that cannot stand responsibilities and chafes at demands. However, all that matters little. The facts are that John Waring, learning of his wife’s death, devoted himself utterly to his books and his study.

“When my mother saw in the papers he was about to marry, she was appalled. She didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t let him marry another woman, unaware of her existence. She couldn’t raise a question of divorce for she knew that would tend to reflect unpleasantly on his past.

“And, too, at last, she was beginning to feel as if she might like to resume her position as his wife, now that he was prominent and wealthy. She told me the whole story – of which I had been utterly ignorant, and she sent me here. I was to see Doctor Waring and use my own judgment as to when and how I should tell him all this.

“I came here, with a feeling of dislike and resentment toward a father who had been no father to me. Mother exonerated him, to be sure, but it was all such a surprise to me, that I accepted the errand in a spirit of bravado and was prepared to make trouble if necessary.

“But when I saw John Waring – when I realized that splendid man was my father – I knew that all my love, all my allegiance was his, and that my mother was as nothing to me, compared with my wonderful father!

“Except for what Mr. Trask calls the Truesdell brows, I look exactly like my mother. Also she resumed her maiden name of Anita Austin after they separated. So you may imagine the shock when Doctor Waring first heard the name, and first saw the living image of his wife, whom, you must remember, he supposed dead.

“But I had my mission to perform – and so, I came here, that Sunday night.”

The audience sat motionless. Lockwood, holding her hand, felt every tremor of her emotion as the girl told her story. Fleming Stone, realizing that he was hearing the most dramatic revelation of his career, listened avidly. Fibsy, with staring eyes and open mouth, clenched his fists in enthralled interest, and Maurice Trask heard it all with ever growing conviction that he must give up his supposed inheritance.

As Anita began to tell of that Sunday night, the situation became even more tense.

“I came to the French window, and tapped lightly. Doctor Waring let me in, and I sat by him in that plush chair.

“The conversation I had with my father I shall not detail. It is my most sacred and beloved memory. We were as one in every way. We loved each other from the first word. We proved to be alike in our tastes and pursuits. Oh, if he could have lived! I told him of my mother and myself, and he was crushed. I wanted to spare him, but what could I do? He had to know – although the knowing meant the ruining of his career. He said, at once, he could not take the Presidency of the College, with the story of his past made public, nor could he honorably suppress it. He couldn’t marry Mrs. Bates – nor could he instal my mother as mistress here.

“He had done no real wrong, in making that early and ill-advised marriage, but it seemed to him a blot on his scutcheon, and an indelible one.

“He would sit and brood over these fearful conditions, then, suddenly he would realize my existence afresh, and rejoice in it. He loved me at once and deeply – and I adored him. Never father and daughter, I am sure, crowded a lifetime of affection into such a few moments.”

Bravely Anita went on, not daring to pause to think. Her hand, tightly clasped in Lockwood’s, trembled, but her voice was steady, for it was her opportunity to clear her father’s name, and she must neglect no slightest point.

“At last, he told me I must go away, and he would think out what he could do. He gave me the money, for he was afraid I hadn’t sufficient cash with me, and he gave me the ruby pin, saying I must keep it forever as my father’s first gift to me. With infinite gentleness he bade me good-by, and softly opened the glass door for me. I went away and he closed the door.