your remark and your actions on the porch earlier in the evening."

"I only said that they were curious about you. The man named Roon
asked me a good many questions about you while you were in at supper.
Who knows but what he was justified in thinkin' you didn't mean any
good to him and his friend?"

"Did you know any more about these two men, Mr. Jones, than you know
about me?"

"I don't know anything about 'em. They came here like any one else,
paid their bills regular, 'tended to their own business, and that's
all."

"What was their business?"

"Mr. Roon was lookin' for a place to bring his daughter who has
consumption. He didn't want to take her to a reg'lar consumptive
community, he said, an' so he was lookin' for a quiet place where she
wouldn't be associatin' with lungers all the time. Some big doctor in
New York told him to come up here an' look around. That was his
business, Mr. Barnes, an' I guess you'd call it respectable, wouldn't
you?"

"Perfectly. But why should he be troubled by my presence here if--"
Miss Thackeray put an end to the discussion in a most effectual
manner.

"Oh, for the Lord's sake, cut it out! Wait till he's dead, can't you?"
she whispered fiercely. "You've got all the time in the world to talk,