Produced by Robert Fite, Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. This file was produced from images generously made available by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions.

THE MILL MYSTERY

ANNA KATHARINE GREEN

AUTHOR OF "THE LEAVENWORTH CASE," "A STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE," "HAND AND RING," ETC. ETC.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I-------THE ALARM

II------A FEARFUL QUESTION

III-----ADA

IV------THE POLLARDS

V-------DOUBTS AND QUERIES

VI------MRS. POLLARD

VII-----ADVANCES

VIII----A FLOWER FROM THE POLLARD CONSERVATORY

IX------AN UNEXPECTED DISCOVERY

X-------RHODA COLWELL

XI------UNDER THE MILL FLOOR

XII-----DWIGHT POLLARD

XIII----GUY POLLARD

XIV-----CORRESPONDENCE

XV------A GOSSIP

XVI-----THE GREEN ENVELOPE

XVII----DAVID BARROWS

XVIII---A LAST REQUEST

XIX-----A FATAL DELAY

XX------THE OLD MILL

XXI-----THE VAT

XXII----THE CYPHER

XXIII---TOO LATE

XXIV----CONFRONTED

XXV-----THE FINAL BLOW

XXVI----A FELINE TOUCH

XXVII---REPARATION

XXVIII--TWO OR ONE

THE MILL MYSTERY

* * * * *

THE ALARM.

Life, struck sharp on death,
Makes awful lightning.
--MRS. BROWNING.

I had just come in from the street. I had a letter in my hand. It was for my fellow-lodger, a young girl who taught in the High School, and whom I had persuaded to share my room because of her pretty face and quiet ways. She was not at home, and I flung the letter down on the table, where it fell, address downwards. I thought no more of it; my mind was too full, my heart too heavy with my own trouble.

Going to the window, I leaned my cheek against the pane. Oh, the deep sadness of a solitary woman's life! The sense of helplessness that comes upon her when every effort made, every possibility sounded, she realizes that the world has no place for her, and that she must either stoop to ask the assistance of friends or starve! I have no words for the misery I felt, for I am a proud woman, and----But no lifting of the curtain that shrouds my past. It has fallen for ever, and for you and me and the world I am simply Constance Sterling, a young woman of twenty-five, without home, relatives, or means of support, having in her pocket seventy-five cents of change, and in her breast a heart like lead, so utterly had every hope vanished in the day's rush of disappointments.

How long I stood with my face to the window I cannot say. With eyes dully fixed upon the blank walls of the cottages opposite, I stood oblivious to all about me till the fading sunlight--or was it some stir in the room behind me?--recalled me to myself, and I turned to find my pretty room-mate staring at me with a troubled look that for a moment made me forget my own sorrows and anxieties.

"What is it?" I asked, going towards her with an irresistible impulse of sympathy.

"I don't know," she murmured; "a sudden pain here," laying her hand on her heart.

I advanced still nearer, but her face, which had been quite pale, turned suddenly rosy; and, with a more natural expression, she took me by the hand, and said:

"But you look more than ill, you look unhappy. Would you mind telling me what worries you?"

The gentle tone, the earnest glance of modest yet sincere interest, went to my heart. Clutching her hand convulsively, I burst into tears.