The Mystery of the Well
a monstrously interesting trade, even in a little place like this. As for that girl, of course I've known her all her life, and—But—but that is just the question. Have I known her all her life? Have I known her at all? Was she even there to be known? You admire her for telling the truth; and so she did, by God, when she said that some people wake up late, who have never lived before. Do we know what they might do—we, who have only seen them asleep?"
"Great heavens!" cried Paynter. "You don't dare suggest that she"
"No, I don't," said the lawyer, with composure, "but there are other reasons. . . . I don't suggest anything fully, till we've had our interview with this poet of yours. I think I know where to find him."
They found him, in fact, before they expected him, sitting on the bench outside the Vane Arms, drinking a mug of cider and waiting for the return of his American friend; so it was not difficult to open conversation with him. Nor did he in any way avoid the subject of the tragedy; and the lawyer, seating himself also on the long bench that fronted the little market place, was soon putting the last developments as lucidly as he had put them to Barbara.
"Well," said Treherne at last, leaning back and frowning at the signboard, with the colored birds and dolphins, just about his head; "sup-
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