and for once could not answer offhand.

"So," continued the captain, "I'll ease your and their minds by sayin'
that, the way I feel now, I probably sha'n't accept the trust. I
PROBABLY sha'n't. But I won't say sure I won't, because--well, because
'Bije was my brother; he was that, no matter what our diff'rences may
have been. And I know--I KNOW that there must be some reason bigger than
'implicit trust' and the other May-baskets for his appointin' me in his
will. What that reason is I DON'T know--yet."

"Then you intend--?"

"I don't know what I intend--in the end. But for a beginnin', I cal'late
to run down to New York some time durin' the next week, take a cruise
'round, and sort of look things over."



CHAPTER III


"It's a box of a place, though, isn't it," declared Mr. Stephen Warren,
contemptuously glancing about the library of the apartment. "A box, by
George! I think it's a blooming shame that we have to put up with it,
Sis."

Mr. Warren sprawled in the most comfortable chair in the room, was
looking out through the window, across the wind-swept width of Central
Park West, over the knolls and valleys of the Park itself, now bare of
foliage and sprinkled with patches of snow. There was a discontented