SYNOPSIS CHAPTER I.—Gabriel Warden, Seattle capitalist, tells his butler he is expecting a caller, to be admitted without question. He informs his wife of danger that threatens him if he pursues a course he considers the only honorable one. War- den leaves the house in his car and meets man whom he takes into the machine, en the car returns home, Warden is found dead, murdered, and alone. The caller, a young man, has been at War- den’s house, but leaves unobserved. CHAPTER I1.—Bob Connery, conductor, receives orders to hold train for a party. ive men and & girl board the train The father of the girl, Mr. Dorne, is the rson for whom the train was held ip D. Eaton, a young man, also boarded the train. Dorne tells his daugh- ter and his secretary, Don Avery, to find out what they can concerning him. CHAPTER III.—The two make Eaton's acquaintance. The train is stopped by snowdrifts, CHAPTER IV.—Eaton receives a tele- gram addressed to Lawrence Hillwara, which he claims. It warns him he is being followed. CHAPTER V.—Passing through the car, Connery notices Dorne's hand hanging outside the berth. He ascertains Dorne’s has recently rung. Perturbed, he investigates and finds Dorne with his skull crushed. He calls a surgeon, Dr. Binclair, on the train. CHAPTER VI.—Sinclair recognizes the injured man as Basil Santolne, who, al- though blind, is a peculiar power in the ncial world as adviser to ‘“‘big inter- ests.” His recovery is a matter of doubt CHAPTER VIII.—Eaton {is practically placed under arrest. He refuses to make explanations as to his previous move- ments before boarding the train, bui admits he was the man who called on aren the night the financier was mur CHAPTER IX —Eaton pleads with Har- t Santoine to withhold judgment, tell- g her he is in serious danger, though precent of the crime against her father. feels the girl believes him. CHAPTER X.—Santoine recovers suffi- elently to question Eaton, who refuses fo reveal his identity. The financier re- uires Eaton to accompany him to the ntoine home, where he is in the posi- tion of a semi-prisoner. CHAPTER XI1.—Eaton meets a resident of the house, Wallace Blatchford, and a young girl, Mildred Davis, with whom apparently he is acquainted, though they conceal the fact. Eaton's mission is to secure certain documents which are vital w his interests, and his being admitted to the house is a remarkable stroke of luck. The girl agrees to aid him. He becomes deeply interested in Harriet San- toine, and she in him. CHAPTER XII.—Harrlet tells Eaton she and Donald Avery act as ‘eyes’ to San- toine, reading to him the documents on which he bases his judgments. While » walking with her, two men in an auto- mobile deliberately attempt to run Eaton down. He escapes with slight injuries. The girl recognizes one of the men as having been on the train on which they came from Seattle. (Continued from last week), “Just ten days ago,” he said evenly and dispassionately, “I was feund un- conscious in my berth—Section Three of the rearmost sleeper—on the trans- continental train, which I had taken with my daughter and Avery at Se- attle. I had been attacked—assailed during my sleep some time in thea. first night that I spent on the train— and my condition was serious enough so that for three days afterward 1 was not allowed to receive any of the particulars of what had happered to me. When I did finally learn them. I naturally attempted to make certain deductions as to who it was that had attempted to murder me, and why; and ever since, I have continued to occupy myself with those questions. I am going to tell you a few of my deductions. If you fancy I am at fault in my conclusions, wait until you discover your error.” Santoine waited an instant; Eaton thought it was to allow him to speak if he wanted to, but Eaton merely waited. “The first thing I learned,” the blind man went on, “was the similarity of the attack on me to the more saceess- ful attack on Warden, twelve days previous, which had caused his death. The method of the two attacks was the same; the conditions surrounding them were very similar. The des- perate nature of the two attacks, and their almost identical method, made it practically certain that they origi- nated at the same source and were carried out—probably—by the same hand and for the same purpose. “Mrs. Warden's statement to me of her interview with her husband a half-hour before his murder, made it certain that the’ object of the attack on him was to ‘remove’ him. It seemed almost inevitable, therefore, that the attack on me must have been for the same purpose. “I found that a young man—your- self—had acted so suspiciously both before and after the attack on me that both Avery and the conductor in charge of the train had become eonvinced that he was my assailant, and had segregated him from the rest of the passengers. Not only this, but —and this seemed quite conclusive to them—you admitted that yeu were the one who had called upon Warden the evening of his murder. It seemed likely, too, that you were the only person on the train aside from my daughter and Avery who knew who 1 was; for I had had reason to believe from the time when I first heard you speak when you boarded the train, that you were someone with whom 1 had previously, very briefly come in contact; and I had asked my daugh ® BLIND EYES BY WILLIAM MACHARGEDWIN BALMER. [llustrations by R.H.Livingstone COPYRIGHT BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. MANS ter to find out who you were, and she had tried to do so, but without suc- cess.” Eaton “Also,” wet the his lips. blind man ly showed that there was some con- nection, unknown to me, hetween you and me, as well rather a previous—suspicious tele- gram In cipher, which we were able to translate.” Eaton leaned forward, impelled to speak; but as Santoine clearly detect- ed this Impulse and waited to hear fr Mt lh Gu Asserted. it he was going to say, Katon re- | axidered and kept silent. “You were going to say something ut that telegram in cipher?” San- ae asked, ‘No,"” Eaton denied. +f A fewtminutes ago when I said you vere not surprised by the attempt made today to run you down, you were also going to speak of it; for that attempt makes clear the meaning of the telegram. ‘Its meaning was not | understs nd. | Tt said only that you were known and | why you | clear to me before, you followed. were followed. of that; there were several poseilse reasons wily you might be followed— even that the ‘one’ who ‘was follow it did not say Ing’ might be someone secretly inter- ! ested In preventing you from am »t- | tack on me. Now. however, T know that the reason you feared the man who was following was because you expected him to attack you. Know- ing that, Eaton—knowing that, I want to c&ll your attention te the pecullur- ity of our mutual positions on the train. You had asked for and were occupying Section Three in the third | sleeper, in order—I assume and, I be- lieve, correctly—to avoid being put in the same car with me. In the night. the second sleeper—the car next in iront of yours—was cut off from the train and left behind, That made me occupy in relation to the forward part of the train exactly the same position as you had occupied before the car ahead of you had been cut out. I was in Section Three in: the third sleeper from the front.” Eaton stared at Santoine, fasci- nated; what had been only vague, half felt, half formed with himself, was becoming definite, tangible, under the blind man’s reasening. His hands closed instinctively. in his emotion. “What do you mean?’ ; “You understand already,” Santoine asserted. “The attack made on me was meant for you. Someone stealing through the cars from the front to the rear of the train and carrying in his mind the location of Section Thiee in the third car, struck through the curtains by mistake at me instead of you. Who was that, Eaton?” “I den’t know,” Eaton answered. “You mean you prefer to shield tm?” : “Shield him?” “That is wha! you are doing, is it aot? For, even if you don’t know the man directly, you know in whose «uuse and under whose direction he murdered Warden—and why and tor ‘whom he is attempting to murder you.” Laton remained silent. In his intensity, Santoine had lift- ed himself from his pillows. “Who is that man?” he challenged. “And what is that connection between you aad me which, when the attack found and disabled me instead of you, told him that—in spite of his mistake—his re- sult had been accomplished? told him that, if I was dying, a repetition of tie attack against you was unneces- sary?” Eaton knew that he had grown very | bale; Harriet must be aware of the effect Santoine’s words had on him continued, | “there was a telezram which definite- | Eaton stooped, and the blind man’s | as a second—or Understand Already,” Santoine ! were; and I think that | I could not be certain i but he did not dare look at her now to see how much she was comprehend- ing. . “I don’t understard.” He fought to compose himself, : “It is perfectly plain,” Santoine said patiently. “It was believed at first that I had been fatally hurt; it was even reported at one time—I under- stand—that I was dead; only intimate friends have been informed of my ac- tual condition. Yesterday, for ‘the first time, the newspapers announced the certainty of my recovery: and to- day an attack is made on you. They | did not hesitate to attack you in sight i of my daughter.” “But—"! > “You are merely challenging my de- ductions! Will you reply to my ques- tions?—tell me the connection he- tween us?—who you are?” “No.” “Come here!” “What?” said Eaton. “Come here—close to me, beside the bed.” daton hesitated, and then obeyed. , “Bend over!” ! hands seized him. Instantly Eaton withdrew, “Wait!” Santoine warned. “If you do not stay, I shall call help.” gaze warningly and nodded to him to comply. He bent again over the hed He felt the blind man's sensitive fin. | gers searching his features, his head. his throat. Eaton gazed at Santoine's face while the fingers were examining him; he could see that Santoine was merely finding confirmation of an im pression already gained from what he had been told him about Eaton. San toine showed nothing more than this confirmation ; certainly he did not rer ognize Eaton. More than this, Eaton could not tell. “Now your dered. Eaton extended one hand and then the other; the blind man felt over them from wrists to the tips of the fingers; then he let himself sink beck against the pillows, absorbed in thought. “You may go,” Santoine said at last. “Go?” Eaton asked, “You may leave the room. Blatch- ford will meet you downstairs.” : Santoine reached for the house ¥el- ephone beside his bed—receiver ana i transmitter on one light bar—and gave directions to have Blatchford await Eaton in the hall below. Eaton was distinctly frightened by the revelation he just had had of San- | toine’s clear, implacable reasoning re i garding him; for none of the hlino man’s deductions about him had been wrong—all had been the exact though incomplete truth. It was . “lear to him tMat Santoine was close —much closer “even than Santoine himself yet appreciated—to knowing iiaton’s Identity; ir was even prob- nhle that one single additional fack— I the discovery, for imstance. that Miss Davis was the source of the second hands,” Santoine or- telegram received by Eaton on the train—would reveal everything to And Eaton was not certain that Santolne, even without any new information, would not reach the So Eaton knew that he himself must act i 1 | | | Santoine. truth unaided at any moment. { before this happened. But so long as , “he safe In Santoine’s study was kep: | locked or was left open omly while | someone was in’ the room with it, he | could net act until he had received , help from omside; and he had not | yet received that help; be could aot hurry it or even tell how soon it wus likely to come. As his mind reviewed, almest in- stantaneously, these considerations, he glanced again at Harriet; her eves, this time. met his, but she looked away immediately. As he went toward the door, she made no move to accompany him. He went out with- out speaking and closed the inner and the outer doors behind him; then he ; went down to Blatchford. For several minutes after Eaton had left the room, Santoine thought in silence. “Where are you, asked at last. She knew it was not necessary to answer him, but merely to move so that he could tell her position; she moved slightly, and his sightless eyes shifted at once to where she stood. “How did he act?’ Santoine asked. She reviewed swiftly the conversa- tion, supplementing his blind apper- ceptions of Eaton's manner with what she herself had seen. “What have been your impressions of Eaton’s previous social condition, Daughter?’ he asked. “You have talked with him, been with him -both on the train and here: have yoy been able to determine what sort. of people he has been accustomed to mix with? Have his friends been business men? Professional men? Society people?” The deep and unconcealed note of trouble in her father’s voice startlea her, in her familiarity with every tone and every expression. She answerea his question: “I don’t know, Father.” “I want you to find out.” “In what way?” “You must find a way. I shall tell Avery to help.” He thought for sev- eral moments, while she stood walt- ing. “We must have that motor and the men in it traced, of course. Har- riet, there are certain matters—corre- spondence — which Avery has been looking after for me; do you know what correspondence I mean?’ “Yes, Father.” “I would rather not have Avery bothered with it just now; I want him to give his whole attention to this present inquiry. You yourself will assume charge of the correspondence of which I speak, Daughter.” “Yes, Father. Do you want any- | thing else now?” “Not of you; send Avery to me.” Harriet?” he One: | hand went to the bell beside his bed. | Harriet had risen: she met Eaton's | CHAPTER XIV Donald Avery Is Moody. Harriet went down the stairs into the study; she pissed through the | study into the main part of the house and found Donald and sent him to her father; then she returned to the study. She closed and fastened the doors, and She Romoved the Books in Front of a Wall S-fe to the Right of the Door. pfter glancing about the room, she re- moved the hooks in front of a wall- safe to the right of the door, slid back the movable panel, opened the safe and took out a bundle of corre- spondence. She closed safe and panel and put back the boozs; and carrying the correspondence to her father’s lesk, she began to look over it. This correspondence—a consider- nble bundle of letters held together with wire clips and the two envelopes hound with tape which she had put into the safe the day before—made up the papers of which her father had spoken to her. These letters repre- sented the contentions of willful, pow- TL and replaced the books. Then she went to her father's desk, took from a drawer a long typewritten report of which he had asked her to prepare a | digest, and read it through; conscious- ! ly concentrating, she began her work. At three she heard Avery's motor, and went to the study door and looked oi | as he entered the hall. | “What have you found, Don?” she , inquired. | “Nothing yet, Harry.” “You got no trace of them?” “No; too many motors pass on that ; road for the car to be recalled par- ! ticularly. I've started what inquiries are possible and arranged to have the road watched in case they come back this way.” He went past her and up to her fa- ther. She returned to the study and . put away her work. Dinner was served in the great Jacobean dining room, with walls pan- eled to the high ceiling, logs blaz- ing in the big stone fireplace. As they seated themselves, she noted that { Avery seemed moody and uncommu- . niecative; something, clearly, had irri- erful and sometimes 1uthless and vio- : lent men. Ruin of one man by an- other—ruin financial, social or moral, or all three together—was the inten. tion of the principals concerned in this correspondence; too often, she knew, one man or one group had car- ried out a fierce intent upon another; and sometimes, she was aware, these bitter feuds had carried certain of her father's clients further even than personal or family ruin; fraud, vio- fence and—twice now-—even murder were represented by this correspond- ence; for the papers relating to the arden and the Latron murders were fiere. She had felt always the horror of this violent and ruthless side of the men with whom her father dealt; hut new she knew that actual appre- cittion of the crimes that passed as business had been far from her, And. strangely, she now realized that it was not the attacks on Mr. Warden and her father—overwhelming with horror as these had been—which were bring: ing that appreciation home to her. It was her understanding now that the attack was not meant for her father tut for Haton. Though Harriet had never believed that Eaton had been concerned in the attack upon her father, her denial of it bad been checked and stifled be- epuse he wounla nor even defend him- self, Ste had not known what to! think ; she had seemed ro herself to | be waiting with her tnoughts i» ahey- ance; until be should be cleared. sne had tried not to let herself think more about Eaton than was necessary. Though he was involved with her fa- ther in some way. she refused te be- lieve he was against her father, put clearly he was not with him. How could he be involved, then, unless the injury he had suffered was some such act of man against man as these let- ters and statements represented? She looked carefully through all the cou- tents of the envelopes, but she conid not find anything which helped her. She pushed site letters away, then, and sat thinking. Mr. Warden, who appeared to have known more abont Eaton than anyone else, had taken Ea- ton’s side; it was because he had been going to help Eaton that Mr. Warden had been killed. Would not her father be ready to help Eaton, then, if he wnew as much about him as Mr. War- den had known? But Mr. Warden, spparently, had kept what ho knew even from his own wife; and Eaton was now keeping it from everyone-- her father included. She felt that her tather had understood and appreci- ated all this long before herself—that it was the reason for his attitude toward Eaton on the train and, in part, the cause of his considerate treatment of him all through. So, instead of being estranged by aton’s manner to her father, she felt un impulse of feeling toward him flooding her, a feeling which she tried to explain to herself as sympathy. But it was not just sympathy; she would not say even to herself what it was. She got up suddenly and went to the door and looked into the hall; a servant came to her. “Is Mr. Avery still with Mr. San- toine?’ she asked. “No, Miss Santoine; he has gone out.” “Thank you.” She went back, and bundling the correspondence together as it had been pefore, she removed the books from a shelf to the left of the door, slid back another panel and revealed a second wall-safe corresponding to the one to the right of the door from which she had taken the papers. The combina- tion of this second safe was known only to her father and herself. She put the envelopes into it, closed it, i bolding them, and fhat this link most tated and disturbed him; and ax the meal progressed, he vented his irrita- tion upon Eaton by affronting him more openly by word and look than he had ever done before in her pres- ence. She was the more surprised at his domg this now, because she knew that Donald must have received trom her father the same instructions as had been given herself to learn what- ever was possible of Eaton's former position in life. Before Eaton’s entrance into her life she had supposed that some time. as a matter of course, she was going to marry Donald. In spite of this, she had never thought of herself as aparr from her father; when she thought or marrying, it had been always with the idea that her duty to her husband must be secondary to that to her father; she knew now that she had accepted Donald Avery not because he had become necessary to her but because he had seemed essential to her father and her marrying Donald would permit her life to go on much as it was. Donald had social position and a certain amount of wealth and power; now suddenly she was feeling that he nad nothing but these things, that his own unconscious admission was thar ! to be worth while he must have them, that to retain and increase them was his only object in life. She had the feeling that these were the only things he would fight for; but that for these he would fight—fairly, perhaps, if he could—but, if he must, unfairly, des- picably. She had finished dinner, but she hes- itated to rise and leave the men alone; after-dinner cigars and the fic- | tion of the masculine conversation about the table were insisted on hy Blatchford. As she delayed, looking across the table at Baton, his eyes met hers; reassured. she rose at once: the three rose with her and stood while she went out. She went up- stairs and looked in upon her father: he wanted nothing, and after a con- versation with him as short as she could make it, she came down again. No further disagreement between the two men, apparently, had happened after she left the table. Avery now was not visible. Eaton and Blatchford were in the music-room. With a re- pugnance against ber father’s orders which she had never felt hefarz,