Williams news., 1922-09-29
CHAPTER XVIII.
The Watch Upon the eeacF


 Constance was throbbing with deter imitation and action, as she found her purse and counted the money in it. She never in her life had gone alone upon an extended journey, much less been alone upon train overnight. If she spoke of such thing now, she would be prevented; no occasion for 1t would be recognized; she would not be allowed to go. even if properly ac- companied." She could not, there fore, risk taking a handbag from the house; so she thrust nightdress and toilet articles into her huff and the roomy pocket of her fur coat. She de scended to the side door of the house, gained the street and turned west ward at the first corner to a street car which would take her to the rail- way station.
 The manner of buying a railway ticket and of engaging a berth were unknown to her-there had been Serv- ants always to do these thfngs-but she watched others and did as they did She procured telegraph blank and wrote a message to her mother, telling her that she had gone north to join her father. When the train had started, she gave the message to the porter, directing him to send 1t from the first large town at which they stopped.
 Constance could not, as yet, place Henry's part in the strange cfrcum- stances which had begun to reveal themselves with Alan's coming to Chi cago; but Henry's hope that Uncle Benny and Alan were dead was begin ming to make that clearer. She lay without voluntary movement in her berth, but her bosom was shaking with the thoughts which came to her.
 Twenty years before, some dreadful event had altered Uncle Benny's life; his wife had known-or had learned enough of that event so that she had left him. It had seemed to Constance and her father, therefore, that 1t must have been some intimate and private event.
 Uncle Benny had withdrawn him. self from men; he had ceased to be active. in his business and delegated it 70 others. This change had been strangely advantageous to Henry. Henry had been hardly more than a common seaman then. He had been a mate-the mate on one of Uncle Ben ny's ships. Quite suddenly he had become Uncle Benny's partner. Henry had explained this to her by saying that Uncle Benny had not trusted Henry; he had been suspicious of him he had quarreled with him. How strange, then, that Uncle Benny should have advanced and given way to man whom he could not trustl
 Uncle Benny had come to her and warned her not to marry Henry; then he had sent for Alan. There had been purpose in these acts of Uncle Ben ny's; had they meant that Uncle Ben ny had been on the verge of making explanation-that explanation which Henry feared-and that he had been Her father had thought this; at least, he had thought that Uncle Benny must have left some ex- planation in his house. He had told Alan that, and had given Alan the key to the house so that he could find 1t. Alan had gone to the house
 In the house Alan had found some | one who had mistaken him for a | ghost, a man who had cried out at | sight of him something about ship | about the Miwaka, the ship of whose | loss no one had known anything ex- | cept by the soundings of the Drum | What had the man been doing in the | house? Had he too been looking for | the explanation-the explanation that