He clapped on his cap and folded his arms, clearly satisfied with the expressions of surprise to which my feelings betrayed me. Could it be possible that he had guessed the truth, perhaps by deductive processes of which I was ignorant? Whether he had reasoned from some remark thrown out by Miss Octavia as to the influence of seven in the affairs of life and her application of that fateful principle to the choice of a husband for Cecilia, I could not guess, but assuming that he had caught that clue, he might readily enough have managed the rest. Having crossed on the steamer with the suitor host, a man of his intelligence might readily enough have kept track of the vanquished. In any case he had hit upon me as a likely victim, and on the plea of generously waiting till I had tried my luck he hoped to thrust me forward as the sixth suitor, and immediately thereafter project himself as the inevitable seventh man. The whole situation was rendered perilously complex by the knowledge that, unaided, he had possessed himself of so much dangerous information. I must not, however, allow him to see what I suspected. "My dear professor, there's an ancient warning against the Greeks bearing gifts. You must give me time to inspect the horse." "Are you questioning my good faith?" "Be it far from me! I'm a good deal tickled though by your genial assumption that if I offered myself to this lady I should be declined with thanks. You have fretted yourself into a state of mind that bodes ill for American philosophy." He was again belligerent. It may have occurred to him that I might know as much as he, but at any rate he grinned; it was a saturnine grin I did not like. "I'm starving to death at the door of an inn, and you must excuse me. Have you seen Hartley Wiggins lately?" "I have, indeed! He's taken to lonely horseback rides; he's off somewhere now. He has n't the stamina for a contest like this. One by one the autumn leaves are falling," he added, with special intention, "and I have given you your chance." "Thanks, light-bringing Socrates from the lands of the Ogalallas! For so much courtesy I shall take pleasure in reading all your posthumous works. Let us cease being absurd." He laid his hand on my arm and lowered his tone. "Don't be an ass. If you and I both know what's underneath all this mystery we might come to an understanding." "I don't follow you. Please make a light, like a man about to have an idea." "You mean that you don't understand?" He eyed me doubtfully, uncertain whether I knew or not. "You have implied that I am incapable of understanding; suppose we let it go at that."