walked down Main Street to the bank, the shadow anchor of the
cloud had ceased to flit across his consciousness. Life had grown all
gray and dull, and he was apart from the world. He saw the handbills
announcing the meeting that night as one who sees a curious passing
show; the men he met on the street he greeted as creatures from
another world. Yet he knew he smiled and spoke with them casually. But
it was not he who spoke; the real Robert Hendricks he knew was
separated from the pantomime about him. When he went into the bank at
five o'clock, the janitor was finishing his work. Hendricks called up
the depot on the telephone and found that No. 6 was an hour late. With
the realization that a full hour of his fighting time had been taken
from him and that the train would arrive only a scant hour before the
meeting, the Adrian face of his puzzle turned insistently toward
Hendricks. It was not fear but despair that seized him. The cloud was
over him. And for want of something to do he wrote. First he wrote
abstractedly and mechanically to John Barclay, then to Neal Ward--a
note for the _Banner_--and as the twilight deepened in the room, he
squared his chair to the table and wrote to Molly Brownwell; that
letter was the voice of his soul. That was real. Six o'clock struck.
Half-past six clanged on the town clock, and as Jake Dolan opened the
bank door, Hendricks heard the roar of the train crossing at the end
of Main Street.

"There goes Johnnie's private car, switching on the tail of her," said
Dolan, standing in the doorway.

Hendricks sent Dolan to a back room of the bank, and at seven-twenty
went to the telephone. "Give me 876, central," he called.
"Hello--hello--hello," he cried nervously, "hello--who is this?"
The answer came and he said, "Oh, I didn't recognize your voice." Then
he asked in a low tone, as one who had fear in his heart: "Do you
recognize me? If you do, don't speak my name. Where is Adrian?" Then
Mr. Dolan, listening in the next room, heard this: "You say Judge
Bemis phoned to him? Oh, he was to meet him at eight o'clock. How long
ago did he leave?" After a moment Hendricks' answer was: "Then he has
just gone; and will not be back?" Hendricks cut impatiently into
whatever answer came with: "Molly, I must see you within the next
fifteen minutes. I can't talk any more over the telephone, but I must
come up." "Yes," in a moment, "I must have your decision in a matter
of great importance to you--to you,