Mr. B's taunting letter was a bitter dose for Jack's pride to swallow. Jack was young and very human, and it was only natural he should have been a little puffed up by his preliminary successes in a task that might well have daunted an experienced detective. And then to discover after all that his crafty adversary had only been playing with him, that he was aware of all his movements--well, Jack ground his teeth a bit. But the effect on the whole was salutary. The letter rebuked Jack's vanity, and steeled his resolution. "I was a fool!" he told himself. "I didn't give the old boy credit for ordinary horse sense. Well, I won't make the same mistake again. I can't do anything more in my own character, that's certain. He has a perfect line on me as Bobo's secretary. But he doesn't know anything about Pitman yet--or young Henry Cassels, the student at Barbarossa's school. I'll get him yet." The affair of the letter resulted in the swift break-up of Mrs. Cleaver's establishment. Jack did not see her again. He instructed the bank to pay her two hundred dollars weekly. She rented her house and departed--for an extensive trip through the South, it was given out. Miriam disappeared too. Jack hoped that his mind would now be relieved of any further anxiety concerning her designs on Bobo. She would naturally suppose Jack thought, that in the general expose her connection with Mr. B. would be made known to Bobo, and she would scarcely have the effrontery to pursue him further. But Jack underrated that young lady's hardihood, as will be seen. As a matter of fact Jack did not feel that it was necessary to explain to Bobo the whys and wherefors of what had happened. He had no confidence in Bobo's discretion. He ascribed Mrs. Cleaver's sudden departure to her well-known capriciousness. Bobo was a bit dazed by the change in the situation, and broken-hearted at the seeming loss of Miriam. "Why don't I hear from her!" he cried a hundred times a day. "There wasn't any trouble the last time I saw her. You know, we went to the theater together, and you and Clara had dinner at home. When we got home Clara had gone to bed with a headache, but you were there waiting for us, and the three of us had a rabbit together, all as jolly as possible." "The next day when I went back to lunch the whole house was upset. Miriam had gone out they said, and Clara wouldn't see me. The butler said she was packing. I hung around a couple of hours, and nobody so much as offered me a bite. At last I had to go away to get something to eat. When I got back Miriam had come in and gone again, gone for good the man said. He had had his wages, and was openly impudent. And she hadn't left me a line! The next day the whole house was closed up. I can't understand it! Did Clara write to you?" "Just a line to say that she couldn't face the fag of a New York season, and was going South for a rest." "Let me see the letter, will you?" "Oh, I didn't keep it."