"Crazy, am I?" Mrs. Marier cried, snatching up a freshly baked pumpkin pie from the seat beside her, and holding it ready to hurl at the offenders. "I'll show you if I'm crazy. Jest ye open yer mouths, ary one of ye, an' I'll show ye how crazy I am! Oh! I'll learn ye to insult a respectable woman, who minds her own business!" And the woman came off victor, for Fritz ventriloquized no further, and the passengers had nothing to say, having no desire to get plastered up with freshly prepared pumpkin pie. In the course of three hours the train arrived at Atlantic City, and before the ocean's blue expanse, as it billowed away to meet the horizon. The grand stretch of level beach was thronged with people, despite the pouring heat of the midday sun, and many queerly costumed pleasure-seekers were buffeting about in the water for recreation and health. Fritz was among the first to leave the cars, and he stationed himself where he could watch the movements of the girl, Madge. Some subtle instinct prompted him to do this, with the impression that she was--what? That was an enigma. He could not, for the life of him, have told why, but he was impressed with an idea that there was some strange romance connected with her visit to the sea-shore--that she did not come alone for pleasure, but for an object that might be worth investigating. She left the cars, and at once took a carriage for the principal hotel. Not to be balked, Fritz jumped into another carriage, and directed the driver to take him to the same hotel. His conveyance arrived first, and he was standing on the veranda, when the carriage drove up with Madge, and she got out. She scarcely noticed him as she came up the steps and passed into the hotel; but, after she had registered, she came out, and touched him on the arm. "You are watching me--what for?" she asked, when he turned around facing her. "Am I an object of suspicion to you, sir?" Fritz flushed uncomfortably, and hardly knew how to answer. "Vel, I--I--" "There! don't make any apologies or excuses; I know you are, and shall look out for you. Please understand I am no criminal!" Then she turned around again, and swept haughtily into the hotel, while Fritz walked away toward the beach in meditation. "She vas sharper ash lightning," he mused, "und dot makes me t'ink some more dot for some reason or odder she vil bear watching." He took a bath in the ocean, and then went back to the hotel. He was not quite satisfied to drop the matter where it was. Something urged him to pry further into the affairs of this young lady, whose case had struck him as being singular. On examining the register, he found that she was registered as Miss Madge Thurston, and assigned room 43. As nothing more offered, he sat down on the veranda, and watched the stream of people that surged in and out of the hotel, and to and from the beach--men, women, and children by the hundred, and yet there were scarcely two faces alike.