Frank told him at seven the next morning, and he continued: 

’Please send the carriage to meet it.  Gretchen will probably be there.  She was in the train with me, and should have gotten out when I did, but she must have been asleep and carried by.’

‘Gr-gr-gretchen!  Who is she?’ Frank stammered, while the cold sweat began to run down his back.

The ‘us’ in the telegram did mean something, and mischief, too, to his interests, he felt intuitively.

Instantly into Arthur’s eyes there stole a look of cunning, and a peculiar smile played round his mouth as he replied: 

‘She is Gretchen.  See that the carriage goes for her, will you?’

His voice and manner indicated that he wished the conference ended, and with a great sinking at his heart Frank left the room and returned to his guests and his wife, who had not seen the stranger when he entered the hall, and thus did not know of Arthur’s arrival until her husband rejoined her.

‘He has come,’ he whispered to her, while she whispered back: 

‘Is he alone?’

’Yes, but somebody is coming to-morrow; I do not know who; Gretchen, he calls her,’ was Frank’s reply.

‘Gretchen!’ Mrs. Tracy repeated, in a trembling voice.  ‘Who is she?’

‘I don’t know.  He merely said she was Gretchen; his daughter, perhaps,’ was Frank’s answer, which sent the color from his wife’s cheeks, and made her so faint and sick that she would have given much to be alone and think over this evil coming upon her the next day in the shape of the mysterious Gretchen.

Meantime when left to himself, Arthur changed his mind with regard to going down into the parlors to see his brother’s guests, and, unlocking the trunk which held his own wardrobe he took out an evening suit fresh from the hands of a London tailor, and, arraying himself in it, stood for a moment before the glass to see the effect.  Everything was faultless, from his neck-tie to his boots; and, opening the door, he went out into the hall, which was empty, except for Harold, who was sitting near the stairs, half asleep again.  Most of the guests were in the supper-room, but a few of the younger portion were dancing, and the strains of music were heard with great distinctness in the upper hall.

‘Ugh!’ Arthur said, with a shiver, as he stopped a moment to listen, while his quick eye took in every detail of the furniture and its arrangement in the hall.  ’That violinist ought to be hung—­the pianist, too!  Don’t they know what horrid discord they are making?  It brings that heat back.  I believe, upon my soul, I shall have to bathe my face again.’

Suiting the action to the word, he went back and washed his face for the third time; then returning to the hall, he advanced toward Harold, who was now wide awake and stood up to meet him.  As Arthur met the clear-brown eyes fixed so curiously upon him, he stopped suddenly, and put his hand to his head as if trying to recall something; then going a step or two nearer to Harold, he said: