ld have its way and their secret stood revealed.

This was the story told me by Mrs. Ocumpaugh; not in the continuous and
detailed manner I have here set down, but in disjointed sentences and
wild bursts of disordered speech. When it was finished she turned upon
me eyes full of haggard inquiry.

"Our fate is in your hands," she falteringly declared. "What will you do
with it?"

It was the hardest question which had ever been put me. For minutes I
contemplated her in a silence which must have been one prolonged agony
to her. I did not see my way; I did not see my duty. Then the fifty
thousand dollars!

At last, I replied as follows:

"Mrs. Ocumpaugh, if you will let me advise you, as a man intensely
interested in the happiness of yourself and husband, I would suggest
your meeting him at quarantine and telling him the whole truth."

"I would rather die," said she.

"Yet only by doing what I suggest can you find any peace in life. The
consciousness that others know your secret will come between you and any
satisfaction you can ever get out of your husband's continued
confidence. A wrong has been done; you are the only one to right it."

"I can not. I can die, but I can not do that."

And for a minute I thought she would die then and there.

"Doctor Pool is a fanatic; he will pursue you until he is assured that
the child is in good hands."

"You can assure him of that now."

"Next month his exactions may take another direction. You can never
trust a man who thinks he has a mission. Pardon my presumption. No
mercenary motive prompts what I am saying now."

"So you intend to publish my story, if I do not?"

I hesitated again. Such questions can not be decided in a moment. Then,
with a certain consciousness of doing right, I answered earnestly:

"To no one but to Mr. Ocumpaugh do I feel called upon to disclose what
really concerns no one but yourself and him."

Her hands rose toward me in a gesture which may have been an expression
of gratitude or only one of simple appeal.

"He is not due until Saturday," I added gently.

No answer from the cold lips. I do not think she could have spoken if
she had tried.

XXII

ON THE SECOND TERRACE

My first step on leaving Homewood was to seek a public telephone.
Calling up Doctor Pool in Yonkers, I assured him that he might rest easy
as to the young patient to whose doubtful condition he had called my
attention. That she was in good hands and was doing w