"DR. UNDERWOOD DENIES."

Under this appeared the following card:

"To Whom it may Concern: Having been informed that there is a report abroad to the effect that, as a masked highwayman, I robbed Mr. Orton Selby on Crescent Terrace last Friday evening, I beg to state to my friends and the public that the report is without foundation in fact. I never robbed Mr. Selby or any one else, either as a masked highwayman or as an attending physician, and I defy anybody and everybody to prove anything to the contrary.

"Roger Underwood, M. D."

Burton read the card several times while the waiter was placing his order before him. The hour was late and the dining-room was practically deserted, but Burton saw the clerk through the doorway, and beckoned to him. He sauntered in with an amused smile and leaned against the window while Burton questioned him.

"This is the most extraordinary announcement I ever saw in my life. Are people in High Ridge in the habit of publishing cards of this sort?"

"Dr. Underwood is rather original in his methods."

"I should judge so. What does he mean by this? Surely there is nothing to connect him with a highway robbery?"

"Well,--there has been some gossip."

"You really mean that? Why, what sort of a man is Dr. Underwood? I wish you would tell me about him. I am entirely ignorant, but I have some business in hand involving some friends of mine and of his, and I'd like to know what I am up against."

"Well, there's a good deal of talk about the Doctor and Henry Underwood, both. People are ready to believe anything."

"How old a man is the doctor?"

"Between fifty and sixty."

"And his family consists of--?"

"His wife, who is very pious, his son Henry, who is rather less liked than the doctor, if any thing, and a daughter."

"Anything queer about her?"

"Oh, no! She's rather pretty."

Burton recognized the point of view, but he did not feel that it solved his own problem. Miss Underwood would have to be very pretty indeed, if her personal charms were to cover the multitude of her family's sins.

"Are there any specific charges against them?" he asked.

"Not exactly. It's more a feeling in the air. There's a good deal of talk about his keeping a cripple shut up upstairs in his house. He's the son of the housekeeper,--Ben Bussey is his name. Kept him there for years. Mrs. Bussey says he ain't treated right."

"That might be investigated, I should think. Anything else?"

"A few months ago an old man died while the doctor was attending him. There was some talk about poison in his medicine."

"Was anything done about investigating it?"

"No, it just dropped. Nobody exactly likes to tackle the doctor. They're afraid. That old man had been complaining about his treatment, and then he died, and there are people who say that something is sure to happen to anybody that says anything against the doctor. This Orton Selby, now, had been making a lot of talk about old man Means' death, saying it was malpractice, if nothing worse, and that something ought to be done about it; and then last Friday he was held up. Somehow it always seems to happen the same way. That's what makes people talk."

"What specific reason is there for connecting the doctor with the robbery?"

"Well, it is known that the doctor was not far from Crescent Terrace at the time, for some one saw him driving very fast from that locality a few minutes later. It was in the dusk of evening. The man that held Selby up was masked by having a handkerchief tied over his face, with slits cut in it to see through, but Selby says he was the size and height of the doctor, and walked like him. But the closest point is that after he left Selby, with his hands tied above his head to the railing that runs along the Terrace, Selby saw him pick up a gray cloak from the ground and throw it over his arm as he walked off."

"Well?"

"The doctor commonly wears a gray cloak, something like a military cape. Nobody ever saw any one else wear another just like it. Everybody knows him at sight by his gray cloak."

"But he wasn't wearing it."

"That's the point. It looks as though he had thrown it down on the ground so as to conceal it. Selby swears it was a gray cape or cloak, not a coat, because he saw a corner fall down over the man's arm as he hurried away."

"What sort of a man is Selby?"

"Why,--his word is considered good. He's a builder and contractor. Worked himself up from a common workman, and is very successful. He's built some of our best houses. Ben Bussey, the young man I told you about who lives at the doctor's, does woodcarving for him."

"I thought you said he was a cripple."

"Oh, his hands are all right."

"Do the people consider that Selby is justified in his charges?"

"Well, they don't know just what to think. I guess most of them would rather like to have Selby prove something against the doctor, for the sake of justifying all the talk that has gone before. But I think it's mostly Henry that makes the family unpopular."

"How does he do it?"

The clerk shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't know all the stories, but they say there was something queer about the things he did when he was a boy. Anyhow, he got the town down on him, and that's the way it has been ever since."

"The latest about Dr. Underwood," a boy called at the door. He tossed a crumpled sheet of paper to the clerk, who read it and then smilingly laid it before Burton. The sheet was typewritten, not printed, and it bore the following legend:

"Search Dr. Underwood's house. You will find evidence of his guilt."

Burton frowned. "It strikes me that there is either too much or too little said about all this business. If there is any substantial evidence against the man, he ought to be arrested. If there isn't, his accusers ought to be. Why don't the parties who send out a bill like this sign it?"

The clerk smiled his disinterested smile. "They're afraid to. I told you it wasn't considered healthy to oppose Dr. Underwood. Something is bound to happen to them."

"Nonsense," said Burton impatiently.

"Of course," agreed the smiling clerk, and sauntered away.

Burton sat still and considered. His personal irritation was swallowed up in this more serious complication. How did this curious and unexpected situation affect the commission with which he was charged? He thought of Rachel Overman, fastidious, critical, ultra refined, and in spite of his preoccupation he smiled to himself. The idea of an alliance between her house and that of a man who was popularly supposed to indulge on occasion in highway robbery struck him as incongruous enough to be called humorous. At any rate, he now had a reasonable excuse for going no further with his "fool errand." The role of Lancelot, wooing as a proxy for the absent prince, had by no means pleased him, and it was with a guilty sense of relief at the idea of dropping it right here that he called for a time-table.

He figured out his railway connections, and went to the office to give his orders. As he passed the open window his attention was caught by two men who had met on the sidewalk outside. One of them was talking excitedly and flourishing a paper which looked much like the typewritten sheet the clerk had shown him. It was the man with whom Burton had clashed at the station.

"Who is that man,--the smaller one?" he asked.

The clerk glanced out and smiled.

"That's the man I was telling you about,--Orton Selby."

"So that's the man who is bringing this charge against Dr. Underwood! Who's the other?"

"Mr. Hadley. A banker and one of our prominent citizens."

Burton crumpled up his time-table and tossed it into the waste-basket quite as though he had had no intention of taking the next train out of town.

"Will you direct me to Dr. Underwood's house now?" he said.