Percival Coolidge is a good business man, but something strange is going on behind the scenes.

I cannot talk with the lawyer about it; I can scarcely be sure myself.

I--I am simply up against a mystery I am unable to solve.

Everywhere I turn I run into a blank wall." "But I do not understand." "How could you expect to, when it is so utterly obscure to me?
I seem to be fighting against a ghost." "A ghost!" "Yes; now don't laugh at me! Do you suppose I would ever have done anything as reckless as advertising for help if I had not been actually desperate?
Can you imagine a respectable girl performing so ridiculous an act, as putting her whole trust in a stranger, inviting him to her home, introducing him as her promised husband to her relatives and friends?
Why, it almost proves me crazed, and, in a measure, I think I must be.
But it is because I have exhausted all ordinary methods.

I do not seem to be opposing anything of flesh and blood; I am fighting against shadows.