The captain was a minute or two in deciding how far he would venture.

"Haines told me a number of strange things about that family I had never heard before," he admitted at last.

"You see he has known them for years, and attended to most of Beaucaire's legal business.

I don't know why he chanced to take me into his confidence, only he had been drinking some, and, I reckon, was a bit lonely for companionship; then those two girls interested me, and I asked quite a few questions about them.

At first Haines was close as a clam, but finally loosened up, and this is about how the story runs, as he told it.