What did she know about his wife and the mystery that had entangled him in its snare? Why, if he loved Ruth, must he return to the Pine wood Inn? He looked up and caught Miss Solomons eying him with so soft a gaze that he was actually startled. "Oh!" gasped John Ryder, "is she _there_?" The detective "came to attention" swiftly. Her face hardened to its usual bored expression. She said: "I don't know anything about the note. It was given to me by the old lady. I'm here to take you back for stealing coal." "Oh! All right," said John Ryder. "I'll go." But the detective seemed suddenly more moderate in her demands. "Tell you what," she said. "I'll bunk here." "Here in the parlor?" "Yep. 'Twon't hurt _me_." "In one of these chairs?" "Good's I us'ally get at night," she declared. "But, my dear young woman," protested Ryder, "the management of the hotel won't permit anyone to lie around in their parlors all night." "They'll let me, I guess! I'm a State officer. I've got rights that don't pertain to any old person that just happens to drop into a hotel. Now, you can beat it to your room. I won't let you oversleep. We'll make that six-fifteen train." But John Ryder needed nobody to awaken him at the proper hour. He was up in good season, and had heard nothing of Miss Solomons when he came out of his bedchamber at half after five in the morning. He went to the parlor to look for her. There was but a single light burning, and that dimly. The house detective of the Pine wood Inn was sound asleep in her chair. She had evidently succumbed to nature while keeping what she considered proper vigil. The long-barreled pistol she carried had slipped to the rug at her feet. When Ryder stooped to pick it up before awakening Miss Solomons, he saw that she had dropped her "five-cent thriller" as well. He picked this up and unfolded the pamphlet curiously. He expected to find a detective story with quite as sensational a title as Jim Howe had suggested. Instead, the title of the story the house detective had been last perusing was: "Little Laurel's Lovers; Or, Sweethearts' Paths Made Smooth." CHAPTER XXV JOHN RYDER FORGIVES FATE They might have arrived at the Pinewood Inn earlier had not the officer and her captive been met before they crossed the inlet to the hotel by a man with a bandage swathing his jaw. Ryder had considerable trouble in identifying the deputy sheriff, whom he had last seen struggling in the tide. "Got him," said Miss Solomons briefly to the deputy. "He came back without making any trouble." She seemed, Ryder thought, a little sorry that she was forced to hand him over to the mercy of the other officer. For that deputy did seem vindictive. "Got a warrant, have you?" asked Miss Solomons, as an afterthought. "Oh, I know my business. I'll get the warrant, all right," growled the man with the bruised jaw.