BRUCE JERMYN was as honorable a gentleman as could be found anywhere, but for two or three days and nights he wished he had read farther in that letter upon which he and the Admiral had made their of the surroundings of the placer mine. No one knew better than he the rights and sanctity of private correspondence, but could any man be blamed for wanting to know who it was who was planning to marry him to Kate Trewman?  
He could not say that he objected to the lady named in the letter, but who could it be who was charging herself with the conduct of the affair? "Dear old Papa," the letter had begun, and the Admiral being old, and also the possessor of the letter, was the person to whom it was addressed, but who could the writer be? Jermyn knew that the Admiral had at least one daughter, who was a clever woman with some reputation in the service as a match-maker, but she was married and living several hundreds of miles from Old Point.
 
Perhaps she had arrived, an , and remained in her room; but it was strange that no one mentioned her. Evidently the writer, whoever she might be—for the penmanship was that of a woman—was acquainted with Kate Trewman: in that case her identity might be discovered through Kate, but Jermyn, and honest though he was, half felt that he would not again be able to look Kate in the face, much less to her on so delicate a subject, in which there seemed so much at stake.
 
All his fears and doubts, however, disappeared like mists before the sun when next he met Kate herself. That estimable young woman was not in the least forward, but she knew how to put at their ease such men as she liked, and she quickly made herself so companionable that Jermyn began to wish that the writer of the letter would go on match-making, and in the greatest of earnest. Still, who on earth, or at Old Point, could she be? The Admiral himself seemed to enter into the spirit of the affair, for he made two or three occasions to speak to Kate and Jermyn together, and to bring out some of the young man's best points; he was as as if he and Jermyn had been boys together, and that sort of thing, from an officer of very high rank to a subaltern, has its effect upon women. Indeed, the old sea-dog was so very familiar that Jermyn almost to boldly ask him for another glance at the letter—at least, for a look at the sketches.
 
But the Admiral's affability and high spirits were partly assumed, for he had a great load of trouble upon his mind. When he reached his [Pg 88]room and prepared to burn the tell-tale letter, he could not find the letter itself. What could he have done with it? At times he was very absent-minded; he had been known to go out without his hat, and to search with his right hand for the eye-glasses that were in his left, but he certainly had carried that letter too close to his mind to mislay it. Had he taken any papers from his pocket anywhere? Ha! That of the placer mine.
 
He hurried back to the fort, but it was not there, nor could he find anyone who had seen it. Probably, the semi-public man, Blogsham, had pocketed the paper, which would have been entirely natural under the circumstances, but Blogsham had already started for Washington.
 
The Admiral . He remembered that the letter had no signature, so it could not be traced to its writer; but the writer was a woman, and the subject was a woman and an officer, and Blogsham was rather a coarse fellow, and very fond of a practical joke, and if he should chance to know Jermyn——
 
Know Jermyn? Why, to be sure he knew him! Had not the Admiral himself introduced the , and consulted him about the sketch? Possibly Jermyn himself had the letter; he would ask him. Hence, the Admiral's frequent excuses to speak to Jermyn in Kate's presence, and to finally ask bluntly:
 
"By the way, Jermyn, do you remember those sketches we made at the club yesterday?"
 
The young officer suddenly reddened, and the older officer lost heart, although he it when Jermyn replied:
 
 
"Yes, and I was going to ask you to let me see them once more. Have you them with you?"
 
The Admiral looked the Lieutenant full in the eye, at which the disappearing flush returned. The Admiral continued:
 
"I supposed you had it already."
 
"Not I, I assure you. I left it upon the club table, right at your elbow."
 
The Admiral suddenly looked so uncomfortable that Jermyn said:
 
"I sincerely hope you haven't lost it!"
 
"So do I. I could make the sketch again from memory, but there were some—er—some on the other side of the sheet which I had intended to preserve; that is, they were not my property, and——"
 
"Not your property?" Jermyn thought he saw the opportunity for which he was .
 
"No. The letter itself belonged to another person. Do you suppose that Blogsham himself may have kept the sketches for future reference."
 
"Quite possibly. But Blogsham has returned to Washington."
 
"So I have heard. I suppose there is nothing left but to write him."
 
"What a lot of trouble a bit of paper may cause," said Kate, becoming during a conversation in which she had no part.
 
"Yes—yes, indeed," replied the Admiral in a manner so unlike any which Kate had seen him display that the young woman began to wonder whether there could be some historic or romantic interest about the bit of paper in which the two men seemed so deeply interested. Everything she ............