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“Heard what?”

“I see you have not heard,” she replied. “Sit down, Willie, and prepare yourself for painful news. But first tell me what you meant by saying what you did just now,–who was it that ran away from you?”

“Well, perhaps I should hardly call it running away, but he certainly disappeared most mysteriously, down here near the corner of Yonge and Crookshank Streets.”

“Of whom are you speaking?”

“Of Uncle Richard, of course.”

“Uncle Richard! The corner of Yonge and Crookshank Streets! When did you see him there?”

“When? A quarter of an hour ago. He met me at the station and we walked up together till I met Johnny Gray. I turned to speak to Johnny for a moment, when–“

“Willie, what on earth are you talking about? You are labouring under some strange delusion. Uncle Richard died of apoplexy more than six weeks ago, and lies buried in St. James’s Cemetery.”

II.

I don’t know how long I sat there, trying to think, with my face buried in my hands. My mind had been kept on a strain during the last thirty hours, and the succession of surprises to which I had been subjected had temporarily paralyzed my faculties. For a few moments after Alice’s announcement I must have been in a sort of stupor. My imagination, I remember, ran riot about everything in general, and nothing in particular. My cousin’s momentary impression was that I had met with an accident of some kind, which had unhinged my brain. The first distinct remembrance I have after this is, that I suddenly awoke from my stupor to find Alice kneeling at my feet, and holding me by the hand. Then my mental powers came back to me, and I recalled all the incidents of the evening.

“When did uncle’s death take place?” I asked.

“On the 3rd of November, about four o’clock in the afternoon. It was quite unexpected, though he had not enjoyed his usual health for some weeks before. He fell down in the hall, just as he was returning from a walk, and died within two hours. He never spoke or recognised any one after his seizure.”

“What has become of his old overcoat?” I asked.

“His old overcoat, Willie–what a question?” replied Alice, evidently thinking that I was again drifting back into insensibility.

“Did he continue to wear it up to the day of his death?” I asked.

“No. Cold weather set in very early this last fall, and he was compelled to don his winter clothing earlier than usual. He had a new overcoat made within a fortnight before he died. He had it on at the time of his seizure. But why do you ask?”

“Was the new coat cut by a fashionable tailor, and had it a fur collar and cuffs?”

“It was cut at Stovel’s, I think. It had a fur collar and cuffs.”

“When did he begin to wear a wig?”

“About the same time that he began to wear his new overcoat. I wrote you a letter at the time, making merry over his youthful appearance and hinting–of course only in jest–that he was looking out for a young wife. But you surely did not receive my letter. You must have been on your way home before it was written.”

“I left Melbourne on the 11th of October. The wig, I suppose, was buried with him?”

“Yes.”

“And where is the overcoat?”

“In the wardrobe upstairs, in uncle’s room.”

“Come and show it to me.”

I led the way upstairs, my cousin following. In the hall on the first floor we encountered my old friend Mrs. Daly, the housekeeper. She threw up her hands in surprise at seeing me. Our greeting was very brief; I was too intent on solving the problem which had exercised my mind ever since receiving the letter at Boston, to pay much attention to anything else. Two words, however, explained to her where we were going, and at our request she accompanied us. We passed into my uncle’s room. My cousin drew the key of the wardrobe from a drawer where it was kept, and unlocked the door. There hung the overcoat. A single glance was sufficient. It was the same.