And when Silo got home that day, Mrs. Silo was waiting for him. Mrs. Silo and the copy of the _Echo_, with the letter concerning Mr. Silo and the pink pants. Mrs. Silo wanted to know about it. If Mr. Silo was in any doubt about Thursday night, the eleventh, Mrs. Silo was not. On that night Mr. Silo had been expected out on the train leaving New York at eight o’clock. He had arrived on the train leaving New York at ten o’clock. There was no trouble at all in identifying the night. Mrs. Silo reminded him that it was the night of the day when he took in a certain hank of red Berlin wool to be delivered to Mrs. Silo’s mother, who lived in 14th Street; which, as Mrs. Silo remarked, is not a quiet street. She also reminded Mr. Silo that on his appearance that evening she had asked him if he had delivered that hank of red Berlin wool at the house of his mother-in-law, and he had answered that he had; that his lateness was due to that cause; and, furthermore, that his dear mother-in law was very well. [Illustration] To this Mr. Silo responded that his statements on Thursday evening were perfectly correct. Then Mrs. Silo told him that since the arrival of the paper she had made a trip to New York to inform herself as to the true condition of affairs. And, furthermore, on Thursday the eleventh, Mrs. Silo’s mother had been confined to her bed all day with a severe neuralgic headache, all the other members of the family being absent at the bedside of a sick relative; the cook had had a day off, and the aged waitress, who had been in the family twenty-five years, was certain that no one had entered the house up to the return of the absent members at eight, sharp, when, the sick relative being by that time a dead relative, the house was closed. So much for furthermore. Now, moreover, the hank of red Berlin wool had arrived at the house in Fourteenth Street four days after the date in question. It came through the United States mail, wrapped up in a sheet of tinted notepaper, scented with musk, and addressed in a sprawling but unmistakably feminine hand. [Illustration] Mr. Silo made an explanation. It was unsatisfactory. * * * * * It had long been known in the town that suspicion was rife in the Silo household. It was now known that suspicion had ripened into certainty. Events of that kind belong to what may be classed as the masculine or strictly necessary and self-protective scandal. News of the event goes in hushed whispers through the masculine community--the brotherhood of man, as you might say. One man says to his neighbor, “Let’s get Johnston and go down to Coney Island this afternoon.” “Johnston isn’t going down to Coney Island this week,” says the neighbor. “Johnston miscalculated his wine last night, and Mrs. Johnston is good people to leave alone this morning.”