when hugh burton stepped from the train at high ridge, he wondered (in his ignorance of the events that were about to engage him) whether he would be able to catch a return train that evening. he had no desire to linger in this half-grown town on the western edge of civilization one minute longer than his fool errand demanded. he called it a "fool errand" every time he thought of his mission. that he, who had secretly prided himself on the "disengaged" attitude which he had always maintained toward life, should have consented to come halfway across the continent to hunt up a miss leslie underwood whom he had never met, and ask her if she would not be so kind as to reconsider her refusal to marry philip overman, because philip was really taking it very hard, don't you know, and particularly because philip's mother would be quite distracted if the boy should carry out his threat to enlist and go to the philippines,--oh, lord! he must have had some unsuspected idiot among his ancestors. did rachel overman know how heavily she was drawing on his friendship?

an indian woman sitting on the stone steps of the railway station made him realize how near the edge of civilization, in very truth, he had come. there was, he remembered, a reservation for indians on the northern border of the state. it could not be very far from high ridge.

with her bright shawl about her shoulders and her beadwork and baskets spread about her, the woman made a picturesque spot in the sunshine. at another time burton would have stopped to examine her wares, for among his other dilettante pursuits was an interest in indian basketry; but in his present impatient mood he would have pushed past with a mere glance but for one of those queer little incidents that we call accidental. a man who was coming down the steps that burton was about to ascend passed near the black-eyed squaw, and she looked up with smiling recognition and laid her hand arrestingly upon his coat. but he was not in a responsive mood. he gave her a black look and struck her hand away with such impatience and violence that a pile of her upset baskets rolled down the steps and over the platform at burton's feet. at once he stepped in front of the man, who was hurrying heedlessly on.

"pick them up. you knocked them over," he said quietly.

the man gathered up one or two with instinctive obedience to a positive order, before he realized what he was doing. then he straightened up and glared wrathfully at his self-appointed overseer.

"what the devil have you got to say about it?" he asked.

"what i did say."

"you mind your own infernal business," the man cried, and flinging the baskets in his hand at burton's feet he rushed on.

burton beckoned a porter, who gathered up and restored the woman's scattered merchandise. for himself, he walked on toward the booth marked "bureau of information," and wondered what had possessed him to make him act so out of character. why hadn't he called the porter in the first instance, if he felt it his affair? something in the man's brutality had aroused a corresponding passion in himself. it was a case of hate at first sight, and he rejoiced that at any rate he had declared himself, and had put the uncivilized pale face into a humiliating rage!

the particular information of which he stood in immediate need was leslie underwood's address. he opened the city directory and turned to the u's. there were a dozen underwoods,--a baker, a banker, a coal heaver, a doctor, a merchant,--where did miss leslie belong?

"have you a blue book?" he asked the lazy-looking attendant.

"naw."

"anything with ladies' addresses?--a society list, you know."

"naw."

"i want to get the address of miss leslie underwood," burton went on, with grim patience. "and i don't want to waste time. can you suggest how i can find it?"

the attendant had tipped down his uptilted chair so abruptly that it cracked. he was looking at burton with lively curiosity and amusement.

"you a friend of dr. underwood's?"

"miss underwood belongs to the doctor's family then, does she?"

"sure. you coming to visit, or are you going to write him up?"

"i didn't know this was a bureau to extract information," burton remarked, as he made a note of the doctor's home address from the directory. "what is there to write up about dr. underwood?"

"aw, you think i'm green."

"no, merely ill-mannered," said burton politely, as he turned away.

outside, a row of cabmen, toeing an imaginary line, waved their whips frantically over it to attract his attention. he selected the nearest.

"do you know where dr. underwood lives?"

the man held burton's suitcase suspended in mid-air while he honored its owner with the same look of amused curiosity.

"sure! the red house, they call it, on rowan street. take you there?"

"no. take me to the best hotel in town," burton said coolly, stepping into the cab.

why the mischief did everybody grin at the mention of dr. underwood's name? burton was conscious of being in an irritable state of mind, but still it could not be altogether his sensitiveness that made him hear innuendoes everywhere. what sort of people were the underwoods, anyhow? philip had met miss underwood in washington and fallen crazily in love,--after a fashion he had. (hadn't he been crazy about ellice avery a year before?) but this time he had emphasized the depths of his despair by falling ill of a low fever when his suit failed to prosper. beyond the fact that the girl was "an angel," "a dream," and other things of the same insubstantial order, burton had little knowledge to go upon. the family might be the laughing stock of high ridge, for all he knew. when a boy of twenty-two fell crazily in love, he didn't think about such matters; but rachel, who, in a panic over her boy, had hurried him off to intercede with the cold-hearted damsel, would, as he well knew, hold him personally responsible for the consequences of his unwelcome mission, if they should prove to be unpleasant. well, he would have to put in his time thinking up something to demand of rachel that would be hard enough to even up scores a little.

it was with deliberate intention that he said to the hotel clerk, after he had registered: "how far is it to dr. underwood's house?"

the clerk looked up with the sudden awakening of curiosity that burton had expected, then glanced at the registered name.

"you want his office?"

"no. his home."

"it's out on rowan street, not very far from here. know the doctor?"

"no. i'm a stranger here. is he a regular physician?"

"oh, yes."

"in practice?"

"when he gets any."

"is there anything peculiar about him?"

the clerk permitted himself a languid smile. "there is nothing about him that isn't peculiar. have you seen the morning paper?"

"not any of your local papers."

"i'll find one for you. did you want lunch?"

"yes." burton gave his order and went to the room assigned to him, where he made himself as presentable as possible for his proposed call on miss underwood.

when he returned to the dining-room he found a newspaper by his plate, folded so as to bring out the headline:

"dr. underwood denies."

under this appeared the following card:

"to whom it may concern: having been informed that there is a report abroad to the effect that, as a masked highwayman, i robbed mr. orton selby on crescent terrace last friday evening, i beg to state to my friends and the public that the report is without foundation in fact. i never robbed mr. selby or any one else, either as a masked highwayman or as an attending physician, and i defy anybody and everybody to prove anything to the contrary.

"roger underwood, m. d."

burton read the card several times while the waiter was placing his order before him. the hour was late and the dining-room was practically deserted, but burton saw the clerk through the doorway, and beckoned to him. he sauntered in with an amused smile and leaned against the window while burton questioned him.

"this is the most extraordinary announcement i ever saw in my life. are people in high ridge in the habit of publishing cards of this sort?"

"dr. underwood is rather original in his methods."

"i should judge so. what does he mean by this? surely there is nothing to connect him with a highway robbery?"

"well,--there has been some gossip."

"you really mean that? why, what sort of a man is dr. underwood? i wish you would tell me about him. i am entirely ignorant, but i have some business in hand involving some friends of mine and of his, and i'd like to know what i am up against."

"well, there's a good deal of talk about the doctor and henry underwood, both. people are ready to believe anything."

"how old a man is the doctor?"

"between fifty and sixty."

"and his family consists of--?"

"his wife, who is very pious, his son henry, who is rather less liked than the doctor, if any thing, and a daughter."

"anything queer about her?"

"oh, no! she's rather pretty."

burton recognized the point of view, but he did not feel that it solved his own problem. miss underwood would have to be very pretty indeed, if her personal charms were to cover the multitude of her family's sins.

"are there any specific charges against them?" he asked.

"not exactly. it's more a feeling in the air. there's a good deal of talk about his keeping a cripple shut up upstairs in his house. he's the son of the housekeeper,--ben bussey is his name. kept him there for years. mrs. bussey says he ain't treated right."

"that might be investigated, i should think. anything else?"

"a few months ago an old man died while the doctor was attending him. there was some talk about poison in his medicine."

"was anything done about investigating it?"

"no, it just dropped. nobody exactly likes to tackle the doctor. they're afraid. that old man had been complaining about his treatment, and then he died, and there are people who say that something is sure to happen to anybody that says anything against the doctor. this orton selby, now, had been making a lot of talk about old man means' death, saying it was malpractice, if nothing worse, and that something ought to be done about it; and then last friday he was held up. somehow it always seems to happen the same way. that's what makes people talk."

"what specific reason is there for connecting the doctor with the robbery?"

"well, it is known that the doctor was not far from crescent terrace at the time, for some one saw him driving very fast from that locality a few minutes later. it was in the dusk of evening. the man that held selby up was masked by having a handkerchief tied over his face, with slits cut in it to see through, but selby says he was the size and height of the doctor, and walked like him. but the closest point is that after he left selby, with his hands tied above his head to the railing that runs along the terrace, selby saw him pick up a gray cloak from the ground and throw it over his arm as he walked off."

"well?"

"the doctor commonly wears a gray cloak, something like a military cape. nobody ever saw any one else wear another just like it. everybody knows him at sight by his gray cloak."

"but he wasn't wearing it."

"that's the point. it looks as though he had thrown it down on the ground so as to conceal it. selby swears it was a gray cape or cloak, not a coat, because he saw a corner fall down over the man's arm as he hurried away."

"what sort of a man is selby?"

"why,--his word is considered good. he's a builder and contractor. worked himself up from a common workman, and is very successful. he's built some of our best houses. ben bussey, the young man i told you about who lives at the doctor's, does woodcarving for him."

"i thought you said he was a cripple."

"oh, his hands are all right."

"do the people consider that selby is justified in his charges?"

"well, they don't know just what to think. i guess most of them would rather like to have selby prove something against the doctor, for the sake of justifying all the talk that has gone before. but i think it's mostly henry that makes the family unpopular."

"how does he do it?"

the clerk shrugged his shoulders.

"i don't know all the stories, but they say there was something queer about the things he did when he was a boy. anyhow, he got the town down on him, and that's the way it has been ever since."

"the latest about dr. underwood," a boy called at the door. he tossed a crumpled sheet of paper to the clerk, who read it and then smilingly laid it before burton. the sheet was typewritten, not printed, and it bore the following legend:

"search dr. underwood's house. you will find evidence of his guilt."

burton frowned. "it strikes me that there is either too much or too little said about all this business. if there is any substantial evidence against the man, he ought to be arrested. if there isn't, his accusers ought to be. why don't the parties who send out a bill like this sign it?"

the clerk smiled his disinterested smile. "they're afraid to. i told you it wasn't considered healthy to oppose dr. underwood. something is bound to happen to them."

"nonsense," said burton impatiently.

"of course," agreed the smiling clerk, and sauntered away.

burton sat still and considered. his personal irritation was swallowed up in this more serious complication. how did this curious and unexpected situation affect the commission with which he was charged? he thought of rachel overman, fastidious, critical, ultra refined, and in spite of his preoccupation he smiled to himself. the idea of an alliance between her house and that of a man who was popularly supposed to indulge on occasion in highway robbery struck him as incongruous enough to be called humorous. at any rate, he now had a reasonable excuse for going no further with his "fool errand." the role of lancelot, wooing as a proxy for the absent prince, had by no means pleased him, and it was with a guilty sense of relief at the idea of dropping it right here that he called for a time-table.

he figured out his railway connections, and went to the office to give his orders. as he passed the open window his attention was caught by two men who had met on the sidewalk outside. one of them was talking excitedly and flourishing a paper which looked much like the typewritten sheet the clerk had shown him. it was the man with whom burton had clashed at the station.

"who is that man,--the smaller one?" he asked.

the clerk glanced out and smiled.

"that's the man i was telling you about,--orton selby."

"so that's the man who is bringing this charge against dr. underwood! who's the other?"

"mr. hadley. a banker and one of our prominent citizens."

burton crumpled up his time-table and tossed it into the waste-basket quite as though he had had no intention of taking the next train out of town.

"will you direct me to dr. underwood's house now?" he said.