“Thursday,” said Hetty, as she watched the pressman that night, “there’s a New York detective here—­two of them, I think.”

“How do you know?”

“I recognized one of them, who used to prowl around the city looking for suspicious characters.  They say they’ve come to work on the new electric plant, but I don’t believe it.”

Thursday worked a while in silence.

“Mr. Merrick must have sent for them,” he suggested.

“Yes.  I think he suspects about the bomb.”

“He ought to discharge me,” said Thursday.

“No; he’s man enough to stand by his guns.  I like Mr. Merrick.  He didn’t become a millionaire without having cleverness to back him and I imagine he is clever enough to thwart Skeelty and all his gang.”

“Perhaps I ought to go of my own accord,” said Thursday.

“Don’t do that.  When you’ve found a friend like Mr. Merrick, stick to him.  I imagine those detectives are here to protect you, as well as the printing plant.  It won’t be so easy to set a bomb the next time.”

Smith looked at her with a smile.  There was a glint of admiration in his eyes.

“You’re not a bad sleuth yourself, Hetty,” he remarked.  “No detective could have acted more wisely and promptly than you did that night.”

“It was an accidental discovery, Thursday.  Sometimes I sleep.”

That was a good deal of conversation for these two to indulge in.  Hetty was talkative enough, at times, and so was Thursday Smith, when the humor seized him; but when they were together they said very little.  The artist would stroll into the pressroom after the compositors had finished their tasks and watch the man make up the forms, lock them, place them on the press and run off the edition.  Then he would glance over the paper while Thursday washed up and put on his coat, after which he accompanied her to the door of her hotel and with a simple “good night” proceeded up the street to his own lodging.

There are surprises in the newspaper business, as our girl journalists were fast discovering.  It was a real calamity when Miss Briggs, who had been primarily responsible for getting the Millville Daily Tribune into proper working order, suddenly resigned her position.  They had depended a great deal on Miss Briggs, so when the telegraph editor informed them she was going back to New York, they were positively bewildered by her loss.  Questions elicited the fact that the woman was nervous over the recent explosion and looked for further trouble from the mill hands.  She also suspected the two recent arrivals to be detectives, and the town was so small and so absolutely without police protection that she would not risk her personal safety by remaining longer in it.

“Perhaps I’m homesick,” she added.  “It’s dreadfully lonely here when I’m not at work, and for that reason I’ve tried to keep busy most of the time.  Really, I’m astonished to think I’ve stood this isolation so long; but now that my mind is made up, I’m going, and it is useless to ask me to remain.”