Grail raised a restraining hand. “I don’t think he cares to get away,” he said quietly. The look in the adjutant’s face held them all spellbound. Mrs. Schilder clung to her husband, her face as white as chalk. Pepernik, the conspirator, stood silent and nonplussed, making no effort to leave the room. Every eye was upon him when suddenly, from below, in one of the larger apartments, came the muffled report of a revolver. Mrs. Schilder swooned, without a cry. Meredith Vedant gazed with fascination, silently, at the imperturbable countenance of the adjutant. The colonel and the adjutant, grim fighting men, turned cold, inquiring looks upon the white and trembling Pepernik. The man seemed to feel their question, and he raised his hands in a weak gesture of helplessness. “I--I have not the courage of Captain Rezonoff,” he muttered. “I surrender. Send for your police.” Grail took the revolver which the man held out weakly, then turned and went downstairs to the telephone. THE END. AN ODD GHOST STORY. “It is strange,” said my grandfather one winter’s evening, as we sat by the log fire, roasting chestnuts and watching the flames leaping and dancing in harmony with the music of the crackling of the fuel and the bursting of the nuts. “I was saying, Tom, that it was strange that the trivial incidents and events of one’s early life stand out so clearly through all the years that have slipped by, and seem as vivid and real as the things of yesterday.” Then grandfather stopped and looked at the fire, evidently in deep thought, from which we children knew from past experience he would evolve some story which would call for all our interest and attention. And so it proved, for, rousing himself suddenly, he hurried into a narrative at once strange and interesting. “Yes,” he said, “ghost stories are, as a rule, capable of explanation. I know it for a fact. If only those who see the apparition were to exert a little presence of mind, it would be possible for them to solve what they precipitately put down as supernatural and mysterious. “I remember when I was a young man that I received an urgent invitation from a very valued friend to spend a couple of weeks at his father’s house at Mobberley. Of course, I responded most willingly, the more so that I had never been to his place before, although I had heard much of it. We traveled by coaches in those days, and a journey from London to the north of Lincolnshire was no unconsidered trifle, I can assure you. However, in a few days I found myself speeding up the drive which led to the ancestral home of the Arden Howard family, and was, in truth, highly gratified at the hearty reception my friend and his people extended to me. “There was no event of unusual interest for some days. Hunting, shooting, and skating parties were organized, and in a downright old-fashioned way we young people did justice to the entertainment so lavishly provided.