"A month ago. You know, from England they had gone to India. He
wrote me from there that he had just missed Mr. Arnold Musgrove
and his widowed sister, Mrs. John Langworthy, who had sailed for
China."

"Yes, I remember all that. The lady has always been a very great
traveler, and something of an explorer. You told me she was
intending to do something that few strong men had ever attempted,"
remarked Frank, wonderfully interested in all that pertained to
the strange history of this boy friend.

Ralph had been brought up as the son of the Wests, living in the
village of Paulding. Then there had come a letter by mail,
accompanying bank notes to the extent of fifty dollars, and
telling him that a friend, knowing of his great ambition to get an
education above what the little country school could afford,
wished him to accept this gift, which would be duplicated every
month.

Ralph, with the assistance of his good friend, Frank, had learned
that the money came through a lawyer in New York, really an uncle
of young Allen. Then, later on, it was found that Ralph was only
an adopted son of the Wests, who had taken him from a poorhouse.

By degrees, it came out that the man who had left this sum with
the lawyer, Mr. Arnold Musgrove, must be an uncle of the boy, who
was, in all probability, a son of the rich widow.

Judge Jim had immediately set out for Europe, to confront