“That is really not so incredible. For you, Mademoiselle, are the niece of her whom Monsieur the Marquis loved twenty years ago; so that that resemblance is not at all a subject of wonder, even if extraordinary. This, however, he did not know, nor I either, until I investigated! Nor did you know. As for the mummy, well, coincidence … and a stretch of fancy.”

“But your duel, Pierre, at St. Leon?”

“Who knows? Illusion … a stranger from Kurdistan … I attempt no explanation. Santiago is dead, even as may be the Marquis and some of his followers; but the Stranger still lives, and the Peacock’s shadow still hangs over us.”

The White Lady of the Orphanage

Seabury Quinn

Dr. Trowbridge? Dr. de Grandin?” Our visitor looked questioningly from one of us to the other.

“I’m Trowbridge,” I answered, “and this is Dr. de Grandin. What can we do for you?”

The gentle-faced, white-haired little man bowed rather nervously to each of us in turn, acknowledging the introduction. “My name is Gervaise, Howard Gervaise,” he replied. “I’m superintendent of the Springville Orphans’ Home.”

I indicated a chair at the end of the study table and awaited further information.

“I was advised to consult you gentlemen by Mr. Willis Richards, of your city,” he continued. “Mr. Richards told me you accomplished some really remarkable results for him at the time his jewelry was stolen and suggested that you could do more to clear up our present trouble than anyone else. He is president of our board of trustees, you know,” he added in explanation.

“U’m?” Jules de Grandin murmured noncommittally as he set fire to a fresh cigarette with the glowing butt of another. “I recall that Monsieur Richards. He figured in the affair of the disembodied hand, Friend Trowbridge, you remember. Parbleu, I also recall that he paid the reward for his jewels’ return with very bad grace. You come poorly introduced, my friend”—he fixed his uncompromising cat-stare on our caller—“however, say on. We listen.”

Mr. Gervaise seemed to shrink in upon himself more than ever. It took small imaginative powers to vision him utterly cowed before the domineering manner of Willis Richards, our local nabob. “The fact is, gentlemen,” he began with a soft, deprecating cough, “we are greatly troubled at the orphanage. Something mysterious—most mysterious—is taking place there. Unless we can arrive at some solution, we shall be obliged to call in the police, and that would be most unfortunate. Publicity is to be dreaded in this case, yet we are at a total loss to explain the mystery.”

“U’m,” de Grandin inspected the tip of his cigarette carefully, as though it were something entirely novel, “most mysteries cease to be mysterious, once they are explained, Monsieur. You will be good enough to proceed?”