“It is a bargain, then. I will hold you to every word, and I will never let you go. How I secreted myself so as to hear them, is my own business. But I did. In their fear of Doctor Alberg, whom Endicott heartily despises, they fell easily into my hands. There was much talk of the child—a girl—a missing girl—her child—but no time or age was given—no whisper of the father’s name.” Justine paused, while Vreeland hoarsely whispered, “Go on! Go on! Quick! She may send any moment for me, now!” “It appears she had placed her child, to get rid of it, in a ‘private Orphan Asylum’ here, in the city. Just why—I can not tell. But, they have lost all traces of the girl. “The old man said, ‘I have followed up every “private inquiry” possible, since your orders of last summer. These detective fellows all come to me for their money on the New Year. Now you must be brave, Elaine,’ he said, and I could hear her choking sobs. “‘I have very bad news.’ “‘She is dead?’ almost screamed Madame. “From my little peep-hole, I could see the old lawyer take her hands. “‘We have been led away on a blind trail. And I have only just now found the right one—but to lose it forever, I fear. For one of my best agents has discovered that Doctor McLloyd’s private Orphan Asylum was chased out of New York City by some angry rivals, and a bevy of too inquisitive reporters. “‘The Doctor was making money too fast, and there was a very suspicious mortality among the little girls. It reappeared as the “House of the Good Samaritan,” at a little village in Westchester County. The old Doctor has gone either to his reward, or punishment. Probably, the latter. “‘But the sly hypocrite who sported a D. D., as well as a medical title, left the Westchester property to a buxom grass widow, who long officiated as his matron. “‘This woman is now forty years old—well-to-do—and is married to a thrifty young farmer—a man who is not particular as to how she earned the handsome property which they enjoy.’ “Mrs. Willoughby was softly sobbing when he finished. “‘By the lavish use of money and a compact of immunity, she agreed to privately examine the books and records. Of course _she has not got them_. “It is a friend—and so on.” We did not dare to force her. For, she is a very sly bird. “‘She was only twenty-two when she eased the good Doctor’s lonely hours, and she is a remarkably cool hand at the game of life.’ “The old man sighed, as he said, ‘It appears that the enthusiastic childless woman, who first adopted the child, died in two years after your babe was taken away from the “private Orphan Asylum,” and, as her young husband remarried in a year, he brought the pretty child back and left her again on McLloyd’s hands—with a handsome present. “‘The girl was a beautiful three-year-old fairy, and the “matron” remembers her especially. But, McLloyd, always anxious for profit, gave her to the first decent applicants, a respectable childless couple, from Western New York.