Mrs. Freeman is a rather small woman, singularly unaffected, cordial, frank. A friend once described her thus: “A little, frail-looking creature, with a splendid quantity of pale-brown hair, and dark-blue eyes with a direct look and a clear, frank expression—eyes that readily grow bright with fun.” Mrs. Freeman has plenty of humor, is quiet and whimsical, is fond of country ways, but confesses to fear of cows, caterpillars and all creeping things.

Her popularity has been sufficient to bring about the translation of a number of her books into various European languages.

Books by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

The Debtor.
The Fair Lavini.
A Humble Romance, 1887.
A New England Nun, 1891.
Young Lucretia, 1892.
Jane Field, 1892.
Giles Corey, 1893.
Pembroke, 1894.
Madelon, 1896.
Jerome—A Poor Man, 1897.
Silence, 1898.
Evelina’s Garden, 1899.
The Love of Parson Lord, 1900.
The Hearts of Highway, 1900.
The Portion of Labor, 1901.
Understudies, 1901.
Six Trees, 1903.
The Wind in the Rose Bush, 1903.
The Givers, 1904.
Doc Gordon, 1906.
By the Light of the Soul, 1907.
Shoulders of Atlas, 1908.
The Winning Lady, 1909.
The Green Door, 1910.
The Butterfly House, 1912.
Yates Pride, 1912.
The Copy-Cat and Other Stories, 1914.
The Jamesons.
People of Our Neighborhood.
Edgewater People, 1918.

Published by Harper & Brothers, New York; but The Butterfly House is published by Dodd, Mead & Company, New York.

CHAPTER XVI
ANNA KATHARINE GREEN

THE real Anna Katharine Green is a terrible mystery. We do not mean Mrs. Charles Rohlfs of 156 Park Street, Buffalo, whose husband is an expert maker of fine furniture and who wrote Initials Only and The Leavenworth Case. We mean the Anna Katharine Green Mind, a Mind no longer young counted by years, a Mind as subtle and powerful and clever as ever, counted by achievement. Read The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow, published at the close of 1917, if you doubt that Mind’s unabated mastery. Anna Katharine Green—but hush! What awe-inspiring quality invests the mere whisper of that name? Why do cold shivers run up and down our backs? Why in our commonplace surroundings—porch, porch chairs, typewriter, manuscript—why, why do we chill all over? Why do the thrills in dots and dashes like a hurrying Morse code torture our nerves?

We will tell you.

It is because last night we opened a book and read:

I
WHERE IS BELA?