But John, it appeared, was not interested in pursuing that line. He
turned back to Paula. "I wish you'd begin at the beginning, my dear, at
the time you let him into the house, and try to remember as nearly as you
can everything that you said to him and that he said to you. He may have
said something casually that you didn't remark at the time which would be
of the greatest help to us now."

Paula wasn't very hopeful of obtaining any result in this way, but she
dutifully went to work trying to think. She was perfectly amiable about
it all. Presently her husband prompted her. "How did he happen to tell
you what his name was? Can you remember that?"

After a minute, she did. "Why," she cried, lighting up, "he said he knew
you but you wouldn't remember him. He said you did an operation on his
sister once--that saved her life."

"An unmarried sister?" he asked.

"What difference ... Oh, I see, because if she was married her name
wouldn't be March. No, he didn't say anything about that. He did say
something, though, about a factory. You went out to the factory to see
his father and he was there."

John Wollaston's face went blank for a minute and his eyelids drooped
shut. Then a quick jerk of the head and a sharp expulsion of breath
announced success. "That's all right," he said. "Thank the Lord, I've
got it now."

It would have seemed absurd to Paula, had she been capable of regarding