his mother has recently come here to live in the village, and he, naturally, visits her. He is staying with her now.”
“Is he a friend of Van Wyck’s?”
“No, he has never been here before. He came with Mr. and Mrs. Davidson, Crescent Falls Village people, and I think he came principally to see the house. This room, you know, is famous.”
“Not as famous as he is,” I said, gazing at the man I so much admired, but had never before seen.
Fleming Stone was a man who would have compelled notice anywhere, and yet his appearance was entirely quiet and unostentatious. He was slightly above average height, of a strong, well set up figure and a forceful expression of face. His hair was slightly gray at the temples, and his dark, deep-set eyes gave a strangely blended effect of unerring vision and kindly judgment. His manner was marked by a gentle courtesy, and his personal magnetism was apparent in every tone and gesture.
I longed to get away from the uninteresting widow and talk or at least listen to Mr. Stone. As this was not possible, I suggested that we both stroll across the room and join the group that surrounded him.
Though apparently not over-anxious, Mrs. Stelton agreed to this, and we became a part of the small circle that had formed around the great detective.
Great detective I knew him to be, for his fame was world-wide, and yet as he stood there drinking his tea with a careless grace, he gave only the impression of a cultured society man, ready to lend himself to the polite idle chatter of the moment
He was looking at Anne Van Wyck, and, though not staring, not even gazing intently, I could see that his interest centred in her.
But this was not at all astonishing. I think few men were ever in Anne Van Wyck’s presence without centring their interest upon her.
Her slender figure was exquisitely proportioned, and her small head, with its masses of soft dark hair, was set upon her shoulders with a marvellous grace. Her deep gray eyes, with long, curling, dark lashes, were full of fascination, and her small, pale face was capable of expressing such receptiveness and such responsiveness that one’s eyes were drawn to it irresistibly. Anne’s face was mysterious—purposely so, maybe, for she was intensely clever; but mysterious with the weird fascination of the Sphinx.
And as Fleming Stone’s own deep eyes met those of Anne Van Wyck, in a glance that caught and held, it seemed as if two similar natures experienced a mutual recognition.
I may have been over-fanciful, but I looked upon Fleming Stone as almost superhuman; and though, before my arrival at Buttonwood Terrace, I had felt no special personal interest in Mrs. David Van Wyck, I was now conscious of a dawning realization that the Anne Mansfield I used to know had grown to a wonderful woman.
It was part of Anne’s beautiful tact, that she made no reference to Fleming Stone’s profession or to his celebrity.
She smiled graciously and opened the conversation with a bit of banter.
“It is a great pleasure to welcome you under our roof-tree, Mr. Stone,” she was saying, “but it is also a surprise. For, I am told, you are a confirmed woman-hater.”
“Aren’t ‘woman-haters’ always confirmed, Mrs. Van Wyck?” he parried; “I never heard of one that wasn’t.”
“Nor I,” said Anne, laughing at the quip; “but you evade my question. Do you hate all women?”
“No,” said Stone; “I do not. But if I did, I should say I did not,—out of common politeness.”
“How baffling!” cried Anne. “Now I can form no idea of your attitude toward our sex.”
“Oh, I’ve no reason to conceal that,” said Stone, lightly. “It is merely the attitude of civilized man toward civilized woman. Taken collectively, women are delightful. But any one of them alone, nearly scares me out of my wits.”
“I’d like to try it!” said Anne, with a daring sweep of her long lashes, as she half closed her eyes, and looked at him.
“You wouldn’t have to try. I admit I’m afraid of you already. I’m afraid of any woman. One never knows what they mean by what they say.”
“They rarely know that, themselves,” Anne flung back at him; and Condon Archer, who stood near, added, “Or if they do, they know wrong.”
“These are cryptic utterances,” I put in, laughingly. “Are you good people sure you know what you’re talking about?”
“We’re sure we don’t!” said Anne, gaily, “and that’s just as good. But if we’re really achieving cryptic remarks, we’ll refer them to Beth. She knows all about crypticism,—or whatever you call it,—and mysticism, and occultism ”
“Oh, good gracious, Anne, don’t!” cried Miss Fordyce. “I don’t mind people who understand, talking about those things; but you are not only ignorant but intolerant of them.”
“Nonsense, girlie,” said Anne, smiling at Miss Fordyce, “I love you, and so I love all those crazy notions of yours.”
“I’m sure Mr. Stone understands,” Beth Fordyce went on, looking at him with earnest eyes.
It may have been my imagination, but it seemed to me that Fleming Stone had to wrench his attention away from Anne by force, and compel himself to reply to Miss Fordyce’s remark.
Chapter III.
All About a Fan
“You are sure I understand what, Miss Fordyce?” he asked; “I assure you my understanding is not limitless.”
“Oh, understand clairvoyance, and all that sort of thing. You must, you know, with all your wonderful detective ability. Please tell us all about yourself, won’t you? I never saw a real detective before, and they’re awfully different from what I imagined! I thought they were more—more—”
“Unwashed,” put in Archer bluntly. “I am not myself acquainted with many of them, but those I have met are not in Mr. Stone’s class socially, by any means.”
“They’re not in his class professionally, either,” I declared, anxious to have Fleming Stone aware of my appreciation of his genius. “Mr. Stone is in a class by himself. His work is art, that’s what it is.”
“Thank you,” said Fleming Stone, but in the smile he gave me there was a slight tinge of that boredness that masters always feel at compliments from tyros. “My art, as you call it, is my life,” he went on, simply. “I do not study it, I simply practise it as it comes along. And, after all, any success I may have had is merely the rational outcome of logical observation.”
“Oh, don’t depreciate yourself, Mr. Stone,” said Mrs. Stelton, shaking a silly finger at him. “You know you are the greatest detective ever—Mr. Sturgis told me so. And now you must, you simply must, tell us just how you do it, and give us an example. Here, take my fan, and deduce my whole mental calibre from it!”
Although Fleming Stone looked at the speaker pleasantly, I was convinced that he felt, as I did, that it would be perfectly easy to deduce the lady’s mental calibre without the assistance of her lace fan.
“Yes, do! What fun!” exclaimed Morland Van Wyck, who was standing at the elbow of the fair widow who had enslaved him.
Before Fleming Stone could reply, Anne spoke. “That wouldn’t be a fair test,” she said, flashing a smile at Stone; and then her eyes curiously deepened with earnestness as she went on: “But I do wish, Mr. Stone, that you would do something like that for us. I have heard that you can tell all about any one, just from seeing some article that they have used.”
“That is not a difficult thing to do, Mrs. Van Wyck,” said Stone. “You