"Yes. You are Mr. Matthew Broffin, of the Colburne Detective Agency, are you not?" she asked, sweetly. Broffin took the privilege of the accused and lied promptly. "Not that anybody ever heard of, I reckon," he denied, matching the smile in the inquiring eyes. "How curious!" she commented. Broffin's smile became a grin of triumph. "There's a heap o' curious things in this little old world," he volunteered. "What?" "But none quite so singular as this," she averred. Then she laughed softly. "You see, it resolves itself into a question of veracity--between you and Mr. Andrew Galbraith. You say you are not, and he says you are. Which am I to believe?" Broffin did some pretty swift thinking. There had been times when he had fancied that Miss Grierson, rather than Miss Farnham, might be the key to his problem. There was one chance in a thousand that she might inadvertently put the key into his hands if he should play his cards skilfully, and he took the chance. "You can call it a mistake of mine, if you like," he yielded; and she nodded brightly. "That is better; now we can go on comfortably. Are you too busy to take a little commission from me?" "Maybe not. What is it?" He was looking for a trap, and would not commit himself too broadly. "There are two things that I wish to know definitely. Of course, you have heard about the accident on the lake? Mr. Galbraith is at our house, and he is very ill--out of his head most of the time. He is continually trying to tell some one whom he calls 'MacFarland' to be careful. Do you know any one of that name?" Broffin put a foot on the phaeton step and a hand on the dash. There were loungers on the hotel porch and it was not necessary for them to hear. "Yes; MacFarland is his confidential man in the bank," he returned. "Oh; that explains it. But what is it that Mr. Galbraith wants him to be careful about?" Again Broffin thought quickly. If he should tell the plain truth.... "Tell me one thing, Miss Grierson," he said bluntly. "Am I doin' business with you, or with your father?" "Most emphatically, with me, Mr. Broffin." "All right; everything goes, then. Mr. Galbraith has been figurin' on buying some pine lands up north." "I know that much. Go on." "And he has sent MacFarland up to verify the boundary records on the county survey." "To Duluth?" Broffin nodded. "I thought so," she affirmed. And then: "The records are all right, Mr. Broffin; but the lands which Mr. MacFarland will be shown will not be the lands which Mr. Galbraith is talking of buying. I want evidence of this--in black and white. Can you telegraph to some one in Duluth?" Broffin permitted himself a small sigh of relief. He thought he had seen the trap; that she was going to try to get him away from Wahaska. "I can do better than that," he offered. "I can send a man from St. Paul; a good safe man who will do just what he is told to do--and keep his mouth shut." She nodded approvingly.