But the Stranges had tired of public life.  For a long time the wife had confessed to a lack of interest in her vocation which amounted almost to a repugnance.  Snake-charming, she had discovered, was far from an ideal profession for a woman of refinement.  It possessed unpleasant features, and even such euphemistic titles as “Serpent Enchantress” and “Reptilian Mesmerist” failed to rob the calling of a certain odium, a suggestion of vulgarity in the minds of the more discriminating.  This had become so distressing to Mrs. Strange’s finer sensibilities that she had voiced a yearning to forsake the platform and pit for something more congenial, and finally she had prevailed upon Phil to make a change.

The step had not been taken without misgivings, but a benign Providence had watched over the pair.  Mrs. Strange was a natural seamstress, and luck had directed her and Phil to a community which was not only in need of a good dressmaker, but peculiarly ripe for the talents of a soothsayer.  Phil, too, had intended to embrace a new profession; but he had soon discovered that Jonesville offered better financial returns to a man of his accepted gifts than did the choicest of seaside concessions, and therefore he had resumed his old calling under a slightly different guise.  Before long he acknowledged himself well pleased with the new environment, for his wife was far happier in draping dress goods upon the figures of her customers than in hanging python folds about her own, and he found his own fame growing with every day.  His mediumistic gifts came into general demand.  The country people journeyed miles to consult him, and Blaze Jones’s statement that they confided in the fortune-teller as they would have confided in a priest was scarcely an exaggeration.  Phil did indeed become the repository for confessions of many sorts.

Contrary to Blaze’s belief, however, Strange was no Prince of Darkness, and took little joy in some of the secrets forced upon him.  Phil was a good man in his way—­so conscientious that certain information he acquired weighed him down with a sense of unpleasant responsibility.  Chancing to meet Dave Law one day, he determined to relieve himself of at least one troublesome burden.

But Dave was not easily approachable.  He met the medium’s allusions to the occult with contemptuous amusement, nor would he consent to a private “reading,” Strange grew almost desperate enough to speak the ungarnisned truth.

“You’d better pay a little attention to me,” he grieved; “I’ve got a message to you from the ‘Unseen World.’”

“Charges ‘collect,’ I reckon,” the Ranger grinned.

Strange waved aside the suggestion.  “It came unbidden and I pass it on for what it’s worth.”  As Dave turned away he added, hastily, “It’s about a skeleton in the chaparral, and a red-haired woman.”

Dave stopped; he eyed the speaker curiously.  “Go on,” said he.