"Let me explain, please," said Smith, and related his curious experience in practically the same words he had employed when confiding it to Mr. Merrick. "I had hoped," he concluded, "that if ever I met one who knew me formerly, or heard my right name mentioned, my memory would come back to me; but in this I am sorely disappointed. Did you know me well, sir?"
"Pretty well," answered the detective, after a slight hesitation.
"Then tell me something about myself. Tell me who I was."
"Here—in public?" asked Fogerty, with a suggestive glance at the spectators, who had involuntarily crowded nearer.
Smith flushed, but gazed firmly into the faces surrounding him.
"Why not?" he returned. "These young ladies and Mr. Merrick accepted me without knowledge of my antecedents. They are entitled to as full an explanation as—as I am."
"You place me, Melville, in a rather embarrassing position," declared
Fogerty. "This is a queer case—the queerest in all my experience.
Better let me post you in a private interview."
Smith trembled a bit, from nervousness; but he persisted in his demand.
"These people are entitled to the truth," said he. "Tell us frankly all you know about me, and do not mince words—whatever the truth may be."
"Oh, it's not so bad," announced the detective, with a shrug; "or at least it wouldn't be in New York, among your old aristocratic haunts. But here, in a quiet country town, among these generous and simple-hearted folks who have befriended you, the thing is rather difficult to say."