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ASIL SANTOINE'S bedroom, like the study below it, was so nearly sound-proof that anything going on in the room could not be heard in the hall outside it, even close to the double doors. Eaton, as they approached these doors, listened vainly, trying to determine whether any one was in the room with Santoine; then he quickened his step to bring him beside Harriet.

"One moment, please, Miss Santoine," he urged.

She stopped. "What is it you want?"

"Your father has received some answer to the inquiries he has been having made about me?"

"I don't know, Mr. Eaton."

"Is he alone?"

"Yes."

Eaton thought a minute. "That is all I wanted to know, then," he said.

Harriet opened the outer door and knocked on the inner one. Eaton heard Santoine's voice at once calling them to come in, and as Harriet opened the second door, he followed her into the room. The blind man turned his sightless eyes toward them, and, plainly aware—somehow—that it was Eaton and Harriet who had come in, and that no one else was with them, he motioned Harriet to close the door and set a chair