Amesville was a city of some twenty-five thousand population, and on a certain Monday in late September of the year 1911 it increased its population, to our certain knowledge, by one. That one was Mr. Thomas Pollock, who stepped off the milk train at a quarter-past six and staggered across the dust-strewn road to Mrs. Cleary’s lodging-house, burdened with a valise whose bulging sides would certainly have strained the lock to the breaking point without the straps that encircled them. He spent the better part of an hour in unpacking and distributing his possessions. He was not over-supplied with clothes, which, in view of the scanty accommodations provided for such things, was fortunate; but it nevertheless took him quite a while to arrange the contents of the big valise to his satisfaction. There was a small table in one corner of the room and a bureau near the window. A washstand, a single iron bed, and a straight-backed chair completed the furnishings, if we except a very thin and gaudy carpet which tried but failed to quite cover the uneven floor. Tom stowed his clothes neatly in the bureau drawers--there was no closet, but a board holding four hooks was nailed to the inner side of the door--put his extra pair of shoes under the table, and arranged a few treasures on table and bureau. These included a faded photograph of his father--he had never had one of his mother,--one of Aunt Patty taken at the State Fair some ten years ago, and one of Star. Star’s likeness had been made by a travelling photographer to whom Tom had paid the sum of fifty cents. But it was a good picture and worth the money. If only Star had kept his tail still no possible fault could have been found with it. The treasures also included a pair of skates, an old-fashioned travelling portfolio which had belonged to his father and which held an ink-well and compartments for paper, envelopes, pens, holders, stamps, and a blotter. Tom was very fond of that portfolio and dreamed of some day making a real journey and pictured himself sitting in a Pullman car or on the deck of a steamer with it on his knee writing long letters to Uncle Israel and Aunt Patty. Not to Star, of course, for Star would be right there with him! There were other things, too; a much battered baseball which showed the imprints of a dog’s teeth, a coloured picture showing the landing of Columbus, a sweet-grass basket, the Christmas gift of Aunt Patty, holding several disfigured pennies, a postage stamp lacking mucilage, some buttons, a stone arrow-head which Tom had himself unearthed on the farm, and a soiled piece of slippery-elm. There was also a little shiny red-lacquered box with a spray of bamboo in gilt on the cover which held Tom’s jewelry. This box, however, had been safely stowed under a pile of underwear in the second bureau drawer and contained a tiny plain gold ring which was supposed to have been his mother’s wedding ring, although Tom had absolutely no proof