Now and then she would go to the rear window, to see if there was any sign of the automobile returning, and then hurry back to the front, to see if the men were still there. Once she returned to the chair, and, lying back, shut her eyes, and let the memory of yesterday sweep over her in all its sweet details, up to the time when they had got into the way train and she had seemed to feel her disloyalty to her father. But now her heart was all on the other side, and she began to feel that there had been some dreadful mistake, somewhere, and he was surely all right. He could not, could not have written those terrible letters. Then again the details of their wild carriage ride in Pittsburgh and miraculous escape haunted her. There was something strange and unexplained about that which she must understand. CHAPTER XV Meantime, Gordon was speeding away to another part of the city by the fastest time an experienced chauffeur dared to make. About the time they turned the first corner into the avenue, two burly policemen sauntered casually into the pretty square in front of the house where lived the chief of the Secret Service. There was nothing about their demeanor to show that they had been detailed there by special urgency, and three men who hurried to the little park just across the street from the house could not possibly know that their leisurely and careless stroll was the result of a hurried telephone message from the chief to police headquarters immediately after his message from Gordon. The policemen strolled by the house, greeted each other, and walked on around the square across the little park. They eyed the three men sitting idly on a bench, and passed leisurely on. They disappeared around a corner, and to the three men were out of the way. The latter did not know the hidden places where the officers took up their watch, and when an automobile appeared, and the three stealthily got up from their park bench and distributed themselves among the shrubbery near the walk, they knew not that their every movement was observed with keen attention. But they did wonder how it happened that those two policemen seemed to spring out of the ground suddenly, just as the auto came to a halt in front of the chief’s house. Gordon sprang out and up the steps with a bound, the door opening before him as if he were expected. The two grim and apparently indifferent policemen stood outside like two stone images on guard, while up the street with rhythmic sound rode two mounted police, also coming to a halt before the house as if for a purpose. The three men in the bushes hid their instruments of death, and would have slunk away had there been a chance; but, turning to make a hasty flight, they were met by three more policemen. There was the crack of a revolver as one of the three desperadoes tried a last reckless dash for freedom--and failed. The wretch went to justice with his right arm hanging limp by his side.