He picked up the letter which Osborne had so fortunately come upon.  He was often amused at the fascination it held for him.  He would never meet the writer, and yet not a day passed that he did not strive to conjure up an imaginative likeness.  And he had nearly lost it.  The creases were beginning to show.  He studied it thoroughly.  He held it toward the light.  Ah, here was something that had hitherto escaped his notice.  It was a peculiar water-mark.  He examined the folds.  The sheet had not been folded originally, letter-wise, but had been fiat, as if torn from a tablet.  He scrutinized the edges and found signs of mucilage.  Here was something, but it led him to no solution.  The post-office mark had been made in New York.  To trace a letter in New York would be as impracticable as subtracting gold from sea-water.  It was a tantalizing mystery, and it bothered him more than he liked to confess.  He put the letter in his wallet, and went into the sewing-room, where his aunt was knitting.  The dear old lady smiled at him.

“Aunty, I’ve got a secret to tell you.”

“What is it, Richard?”

“I’m going to run for mayor.”

The old lady dropped her work and held up her hands in horror.

“You are fooling, Richard!”

“I am very serious, Aunty.”

“But politicians are such scamps, Richard.”

“Somebody’s got to reform them.”

“But they’ll reform you into one of their kind.  You don’t mean it!”

“Yes, I do.  I’ve promised, and I can’t back down now.”

“No good will come of it,” said the old lady prophetically, reaching down for her work.  “But if you are determined, I suppose it’s no use for me to talk.  What will the Benningtons say?”

“They rather approve of the idea.  I’m going up there early to-morrow.  I’ll be up before you’re down.  Good night.”  He lightly kissed the wrinkled face.

“Have a good time, Richard; and God bless my boy.”

He paused on the threshold and came back.  Why, he did not know.  But having come back, he kissed her once again, his hands on her cheeks.  There were tears in her eyes.

“You’re so kind and good to an old woman, Richard.”

“Pshaw! there’s nobody your equal in all the world.  Good night;” and he stepped out into the hall.

The next morning he left town for the Benningtons’ bungalow in the Adirondacks.  He carried his fishing-rods, for Patty had told him that their lake was alive with black bass.  Warrington was an ardent angler.  Rain might deluge him, the sun scorch, but he would sit in a boat all day for a possible strike.  He arrived at two in the afternoon, and found John, Kate and Patty at the village station.  A buckboard took them into the heart of the forest, and the penetrating, resinous perfumes tingled Warrington’s nostrils.  He had been in the woods in years gone by; not a tree or a shrub that he did not know.  It was nearly a two hours’ drive to the lake, which was circled by lordly mountains.