"Wish I had not told it, or wish I had not gone to Professor Darling's house as you requested?"
"Wish you had not told it. I dare not wish the other. But you spoke of seeing Miss Dare; how was that? Where did you run across her?"
"Do you want to hear?"
"Of course, of course."
"But I thought——"
"Oh, never mind, old boy; tell me the whole now, as long as you have told me any. Was she in the house?"
"I will tell you. I had asked the girl all these questions, as I have said, and was about to leave the observatory and go below when I thought I would cast another glance around the curious old place, and in doing so caught a glimpse of a huge portfolio of charts, as I supposed, standing upright in a rack that stretched across the further portion of the room. Somehow my heart misgave me when I saw this rack, and, scarcely conscious what it was I feared, I crossed the floor and looked behind the portfolio. Byrd, there was a woman crouched there—a woman whose pallid cheeks and burning eyes lifted to meet my own, told me only too plainly that it was Miss Dare. I have had many experiences," Hickory allowed, after a moment, "and some of them any thing but pleasant to myself, but I don't think I ever felt just as I did at that instant. I believe I attempted a bow—I don't remember; or, at least, tried to murmur some excuse, but the look that came into her face paralyzed me, and I stopped before I had gotten very far, and waited to hear what she would say. But she did not say much; she merely rose, and, turning toward me, exclaimed: 'No apologies; you are a detective, I suppose?' And when I nodded, or made some other token that she had guessed correctly, she merely remarked, flashing upon me, however, in a way I do not yet understand: 'Well, you have got what you desired, and now can go.' And I went, Byrd, went; and I felt puzzled, I don't know why, and a little bit sore about the heart, too, as if—— Well, I can't even tell what I mean by that if. The only thing I am sure of is, that Mansell's cause hasn't been helped by this day's job, and that if this lady is asked on the witness stand where she was during the hour every one believed her to be safely shut up with the telescopes and charts, we shall hear——"
"What?"
"Well, that she was shut up with them, most likely. Women like her are not to be easily disconcerted even on the witness stand."