"I thank you, Mr. Ames; thank you! thank you! You have rendered me the greatest service. And I hope you were able to do so without serious inconvenience to yourself." "On the other hand it was the smallest matter, and instead of being a trouble I found the greatest pleasure in recovering it." I stood with my hands thrust carelessly into my trousers pockets, rocking slightly upon my heels to convey a sense of the unimportance of my service. It was a manner I had cultivated to meet the surprise and gratitude of my clients when I had brought a seemingly incurable flue into a state of subjection. I think I may have appeared a little bored, as though I had accomplished a feat that was rather unworthy of my powers. A doctor who prescribes the wrong pill and finds to his amazement that it cures the patient, might improve upon that manner, but not greatly. "You naturally wonder, Miss Hollister, how I found this trinket so readily. And in order that you may not suspect perfectly innocent persons, I will tell you exactly how I came by it. It was your belief that you had left it on your dressing-table. But as a memorandum-book of any character pertains to a writing-desk rather than to a dressing-table, my interest centred at once upon such writing-table as you doubtless have in your room." "There is a writing-desk, in the corner by the window, but"-- "Ah, you are about to repeat your belief that you left the book on the dressing-table and that it could not have moved to the desk. May I ask whether you did not, just before you came down to dinner, scribble me a line asking for an interview?" "Why, yes; I remember that perfectly." "You wrote in some haste, as indicated by the handwriting in your message. It is possible that you wrote and destroyed one note, or perhaps two, before you had expressed yourself exactly to your liking. We are all of us, with any sort of feeling for style, prone to just such rejections." "It is possible that I did," she replied, coloring slightly. "I was extremely anxious to see you." "Very well, then; is it not possible that in throwing the rejected correspondence cards into the waste-paper basket that stands beside your desk,--there is such a basket, is there not?" "Yes," she replied breathlessly. "Is it not possible, then, that that little booklet, hardly heavier than paper itself, may have been brushed off without your seeing it?" "It is possible; I must admit that it is possible; but"--