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The opportunity presented itself at dusk, as Mr. Gunn, somewhat abstracted, stood apart at the drawing-room window. Marie hoped he had enjoyed himself while skating; her stupid cold had kept her indoors. She had amused herself rambling about the old homestead; it was such a queer place, so full of old nooks and corners and unaccountable spaces. Just the place, she would think, where old treasures might have been stored. Eh?

Mr. Gunn had not spoken–he had only coughed. But in the darkness his eyes were fixed angrily on her face. Without observing it, she went on. She knew he was interested in the old house; she had heard him talk to Kitty about it: had Kitty ever said anything about some old secret hoarding place?

No, certainly not! And she was mistaken, he never was interested in the house! He could not understand what had put that idea in her head! Unless it was this ridiculous, shady stranger in the guise of an uncle whom they had got there. It was like his affectation!

“Oh, dear, no,” said Marie, with unmistakable truthfulness, “HE did not say anything. But,” with sudden inconsistent aggression, “is THAT the way you speak to Kitty of her uncle?”

Really he didn’t know–he was joking only, and he was afraid he must just now ask her to excuse him. He had received letters that made it possible that he might be called suddenly to New York at any moment. Marie stared. It was evident that he had proposed to Kitty and been rejected! But she was no nearer her discovery.

Nor was there the least revelation in the calm, half-bored, yet good-humored presence of the wicked uncle at dinner. So indifferent did he seem, not only to his own villainy but even to the loss it had entailed, that she had a wild impulse to take the ring from her pocket and display it on her own finger before him then and there. But the conviction that he would in some way be equal to the occasion prevented her. The dinner passed off with some constraint, no doubt emanating from the conscious Kitty and Gunn. Nevertheless, when they had returned to the drawing-room, Gabriel rubbed his hands expectantly.

“I prevailed on Sylvester this morning to promise to tell us some of his experiences–something COMPLETE and satisfactory this time. Eh?”

Uncle Sylvester, warming his cold blood before the fire, looked momentarily forgetful and–disappointing. Cousins Jane and Emma shrugged their shoulders.

“Eh,” said Uncle Sylvester absently, “er–er–oh yes! Well” (more cheerfully), “about what, eh?”

“Let it be,” said Marie pointedly, fixing her black magnetic eyes on the wicked stranger, “let it be something about the DISCOVERY of gold, or a buried TREASURE HOARD, or a robbery.”

To her intense disgust Uncle Sylvester, far from being discomfited or confused, actually looked pleased, and his gray eyes thawed slightly.

“Certainly,” he said. “Well, then! Down on the San Joaquin River there was an old chap–one of the earliest settlers–in fact, he’d come on from Oregon before the gold discovery. His name, dear me!”–continued Uncle Sylvester, with an effort of memory and apparently beginning already to lose his interest in the story–“was–er–Flint.”

As Uncle Sylvester paused here, Cousin Jane broke in impatiently. “Well, that’s not an uncommon name. There was an old carpenter here in your father’s time who was called Flint.”

“Yes,” said Uncle Sylvester languidly. “But there is, or was, something uncommon about it–and that’s the point of the story, for in the old time Flint and Gunn were of the same stock.”

“Is this a Californian joke?” said Gunn, with a forced smile on his flushed face. “If so, spare me, for it’s an old one.”

“It’s much older HISTORY, Mr. Gunn,” said Uncle Sylvester blandly, “which I remember from a boy. When the first Flint traded near Sault Sainte Marie, the Canadian voyageurs literally translated his name into Pierre a Fusil, and he went by that name always. But when the English superseded the French in numbers and language the name was literally translated back again into ‘Peter Gunn,’ which his descendants bear.”