y, "that there is any subject which can be
of mutual interest----"

"Oh, yes, there is," she replied eagerly. She was quick to take
advantage of this entering wedge into the man's mantle of cold reserve.

"Flesh and blood," she went on earnestly, "is of mutual interest. Your
son is yours whether you cast him off or not. You've got to hear me. I
am not asking anything for myself. It's for him, your son. He's in
trouble. Don't desert him at a moment like this. Whatever he may have
done to deserve your anger--don't--don't deal him such a blow. You
cannot realize what it means in such a critical situation. Even if you
only pretend to be friendly with him--you don't need to really be
friends with him. But don't you see what the effect will be if you, his
father, publicly withdraw from his support? Everybody will say he's no
good, that he can't be any good or his father wouldn't go back on him.
You know what the world is. People will condemn him because you condemn
him. They won't even give him a hearing. For God's sake, don't go back
on him now!"

Mr. Jeffries turned and walked toward the window, and stood there gazing
on the trees on the lawn. She did not see his face, but by the nervous
twitching of his hands behind his back, she saw that her words had not
been without effect. She waited in silence for him to say something.
Presently he turned around, and she saw that his face had changed. The
look of haughty pride had gone. She had touched the chords of the
father's heart. Gravely he said:

"Of course you realize that you, above all others, are responsible for
his present position."

She was about to demur, but she checked herself. What did she care what
they thought of her? She was fighting to save her husband, not to make
the Jeffries family think better of her. Quickly she answered:

"Well, all right--I'm responsible--but don't punish him because of me."

Mr. Jeffries looked at her.

Who was this young woman who championed so warmly his own son? She was
his wife, of course. But wives of a certain kind are quick to desert
their husbands when they are in trouble. There must be some good in the
girl, after all, he thought. Hesitatingly, he said:

"I could have forgiven him everything, everything but----"

"But me," she said promptly. "I know it. Don't you suppose I feel it
too, and don't you suppose it hurts?"

Mr. Jeffries stiffened up. This woman was evidently trying to excite his
sympathies. The hard, prou