It was nearing noon when Burton left Dr. Underwood\'s. He took the street that ran by the Sprigg house, though it led him somewhat out of the most direct road to the hotel. He wanted to get the temper of the crowd and the gossip of the street. But the crowd had dispersed. He saw one man near the blackened wall of the house where the fire was supposed to have started. He was bending down, as though examining the ground. Then he rose and went away,--somewhat hurriedly and furtively, Burton thought. It was, indeed, this skulking quality in the man\'s hasty departure that made Burton look at him a second time. It was Selby. So! He was apparently hunting for the "proof" that he had promised. But why should he be so secretive about it?

As he came around by the other side of the burned house, he saw that two boys were still lingering on the scene of the morning\'s excitement. They were talking vigorously, and when Burton stopped by the fence and looked in, one of the boys, recognizing a kindred interest in the drama of life, called to him:

"Did yer see the bush where the kid was found?"

"What kid?" asked Burton.

"The Sprigg baby. He was right in here among the lilac bushes and the soft little shoots had been tied together around him, so\'s he couldn\'t get away, like Moses an\' the bulrushes. Right in here. Yer can see the place now."

Burton jumped the fence and went up to the place where the boys were.

"Was the baby lost?" he asked.

"Mrs. Sprigg thought it was all burned up, because she forgot it when she came down in a hurry, and she was carrying on just awful, and then the firemen found the baby in here among the bushes, and they most stepped on it before they saw it."

"Had it crawled in by itself?"

"Naw, it was tied in! See here. You can see the knots yet, only most of them have been pulled to pieces."

"Who tied it in?" pressed Burton, bending down to examine the knots. They certainly were peculiar. The lithe lilac twigs had been drawn together by a cord that ran in and out among them till they were twisted and woven together as though they were part of a basket. It was the knot of an experienced and skilful weaver.

"Mrs. Sprigg she says at Henry Underwood would be too durn mean to look out for the kid and she thinks it was sperrets. But if it was sperrets they could a took the baby clear over to some house, couldn\'t they? The branches was tied together so\'s they had to cut some of them to get the kid out. See, you can see here where they cut \'em."

Burton found that the theory advanced by the boys that the incendiary who had fired the house had also, in dramatic fashion, saved the life of the youngest of the Sprigg brood, by carrying the infant down from the second floor, and knotting the lilac shoots about it so that it could not crawl into danger, was the most popular byproduct of the fire. The story was in every one\'s mouth.

When he entered the dining-room at the hotel, he encountered Ralston.

"Hello!" said the newspaper man. "I saw that you were registered here. Allow me to welcome you to the only home a bachelor like myself owns. Won\'t you sit at my table, to give the fiction some verisimilitude?"

"Thank you. I shall be glad to."

"You will suspect that my whole-hearted hospitality has some professional sub-stratum if I ask you at once how our friends the Underwoods are, but I\'ll have to risk that. I assume that you have seen them today."

"Yes, I have seen the doctor and Miss Underwood. They have met the amazing charge against Henry with dignity and patience. I didn\'t see Henry, and don\'t know what he may have to say."

"He\'d better say nothing," said Ralston tersely. "It isn\'t a matter that is bettered by talk."

"Do you think there will be anything more than talk? I have as yet heard no suggestion of the slightest evidence against him."

"No, so far it is merely his bad reputation and the doctor\'s threat of yesterday. Have you happened to hear of the lively times Henry gave the town some six years ago? Property was burnt, things were stolen, people were terrorized in all sorts of ways for an entire summer. He must have had a glorious time."

"Was it proved against him?" asked Burton.

"The police never actually caught him, but they came so close upon his tracks several times that they warned the doctor that they had evidence against him. Then the disturbances stopped. That was significant."

"I heard something about it, but I understood that the attacks were mostly directed against the Underwoods themselves, and that the anonymous letters written by the miscreant were particularly directed against Henry. You don\'t suspect him of accusing himself!"

"But that\'s what he did. In fact, that was what first set the police to watching him. Perhaps you haven\'t happened to hear of such things, but there is a morbid form of egotism that makes people accuse themselves of crimes just for the sake of the notoriety. The handwriting of those letters was disguised, but the............