"That," I said, "relieves my conscience of a great burden."

As I went out of the door I heard her saying: "Why Mary Starkweather
should _care_ to live in her barn...."

It was a sparkling cold day, sun on the snow and the track crunching
under one's feet, and I walked swiftly and with a warm sense of coming
adventure.

To my surprise there was no smoke in the cottage chimney, and when I
reached the door I found a card pinned upon it:

PLEASE CALL AT THE HOUSE

Mary Starkweather herself opened the door--she had seen me coming--and
took me into the big comfortable old living-room, the big, cluttered,
overfurnished living-room, with the two worn upholstered chairs at the
fireplace, in which a bright log fire was now burning. There was a
pleasant litter of books and magazines, and a work basket on the table,
and in the bay window an ugly but cheerful green rubber plant in a tub.

"Well!" I exclaimed.

"Don't smile--not yet."

As I looked at her I felt not at all like smiling.

"I know," she was saying, "it does have a humorous side. I can see that.
Dick has seen it all along. Do you know, although Dick pretends to