equations or the dates of the battles of the Civil War.
Then with pencil, note-book, a window-ledge, and all the cleverness he could find at the moment, he wrote:—
"You know the room where the silver is. Burglars are burgling it, the thick door is picked. Send a man for police. I will follow the burglars if they get away ere police arrive on the spot."
He hesitated a moment, and ended—
"From a Friend—this is not a sell."
This letter, tied tightly round a stone by means of a shoe-lace, thundered through the window of the room where Mabel and her aunt, in the ardour of reunion, were enjoying a supper of unusual charm—stewed plums, cream, sponge-cakes, custard in cups, and cold bread-and-butter pudding.
Gerald, in hungry invisibility, looked wistfully at the supper before he threw the stone. He waited till the shrieks had died away, saw the stone picked up, the warning letter read.
"Nonsense!" said the aunt, growing calmer. "How wicked! Of course it's a hoax."
"Oh! do send for the police, like he says," wailed Mabel.
"Like who says?" snapped the aunt.
"Whoever it is," Mabel moaned.
"Send for the police at once," said Gerald, outside, in the manliest voice he could find.
