While I was puzzling myself with the question, Estelle suggested an expedient. The answer to the advertisement undoubtedly came from Ratcliff, and we had a right to regard it as valid. Why not address a letter, with fifty dollars, to Ratcliff, and have it legally registered at the post-office? “Admirable!” exclaimed I, delighted at her quickness. “No, it is not admirable,” she replied. “An objection suggests itself. Some one will have to go to the post-office to register the letter, and he may be known or tracked.” I reflected a moment, and then said: “I think I can guard against such a danger. Having been an actor, I am expert at disguises. I will go as an old man.” The plan was approved and put into effect. The two watches were disposed of at a jeweller’s for a hundred and ten dollars. In an altered hand I wrote Ratcliff a letter, enclosed in it a fifty-dollar bill, and bade him direct his answer simply to Estelle Grandeau, Cincinnati, Ohio. I added one dollar for the purpose of covering any expense he might be at for postage. Then, at the shop of a theatrical costumer, I disguised myself as a man of seventy, and went to the post-office. There I had the letter and its contents of money duly registered. As I was returning home in my disguise, I saw the old negro I had left in charge at Mrs. Dufour’s. He did not recognize me, and was not surprised at my questions. From him I learned, that before he left the house a gentleman (undoubtedly Ratcliff) had called, and had seemed to be in a terrible fury on finding that Estelle had gone away some hours before; but his rage had redoubled when he further ascertained that a young man was her attendant. The interesting question now was, Had Ratcliff any clew to my identity? My true name, William Carteret, under which I had been known at Mrs. Dufour’s, was not the name I had gone by on the stage. Here was one security. Still it was obvious the utmost precaution must be used. My plans were speedily laid. Not having money enough to pay the passage of both Estelle and myself up the Mississippi, I decided that Estelle should go alone, disguised as an old woman. I engaged a state-room, and paid for it in advance. I had much difficulty in persuading her to accede to the arrangement, so painful was the prospect of a separation; but she finally consented. At my friend the costumer’s I fitted her out in a plain, Quaker-like dress. She was to be Mrs. Carver, a schoolmistress, going North. The next morning I covered her beautiful hair with a grayish wig; and then, by the aid of a hare’s foot and some pigments, added wrinkles and a complexion suitable to a maiden lady of fifty. With a veil over her face, she would not be suspected.