The delay on the pier, where we were obliged to proceed at a snail's pace, was a dreadful strain. Suppose that Pedro's cries were to be heard, and, rescued, he bore down upon us? I shuddered at the thought. But at length we were past officialdom and speeding up the hill and into the city's silent and deserted ways. Dicky turned his head to question me, almost colliding with a lamp-post by so doing, but his usual nonchalant skill saving us by a hair--or so it appeared to me. "Now what the devil did you say you did?" he wanted to know. "Pedro--the detective," I said--"I locked him up on the boat!" I repeated. "Good heavens, Freedom! How?" cried Peaches. I told them briefly. Richard, the chauffeur, gave a long whistle. "Then it's more than likely we are headed right!" said he. "Gosh Almighty, Aunt Mary, I hope I never get in wrong with you!" "Why?" I demanded. "I simply do the obvious thing as occasion arises." "Well, give us a little advance notice when you are going to pull something out of the usual," he replied cryptically, and turned his attention back to the car--for which I felt profoundly grateful--and to scanning the corner lamps for the name of the avenue for which we were seeking. Fortunately the streets were literally deserted and so we escaped notice. If any one had followed us from the ferry he would have been visible many blocks away. The only living creature we passed in fifty squares was a maraudering cat which shot across our path like a black arrow. "Good luck!" commented Peaches. But the remark failed to reassure me, for by now we had discovered and turned into our avenue, and its aspect was most decidedly not residential. In point of fact it could hardly be said to contain houses, much less anything worthy of being dignified by the name of residence. It was quite unlike any part of Boston with which I was acquainted, and I did not fancy its atmosphere, which was redolent of gas, to say the least. Moreover, it was not at all a suitable place for a duke to live, even when in retirement from the police. I should have felt something on upper Fifth Avenue much more fitting--say, in a secret chamber in the neighborhood of the Plaza. Or in the half-ruinous mansion of some aristocrat out at, let us say at Hempstead, which I understand contains many fine old estates. The quarter through which we were proceeding was impossible--simply impossible! I trust that there is very little of the snob in me, at least of that species of snob which cannot distinguish between genteel poverty and common poverty. Mere shabbiness is no cause for losing caste, as I myself know full well. And so I would have said nothing to a shabby neighborhood. But this was not even, properly speaking, a neighborhood, being as it was, chiefly composed of gas tanks which towered heavenward in shadowy menace, of warehouses with blank faces, and unpleasant odors.