to their conversation.
"Who is it, Norma?"

"A gentleman to see you, Tom."

"Who is it?" more sharply.

"It is I, Mr. Pelton. I came to have a talk with you." Yesler pushed
forward into the dingy sitting-room with the pertinacity of a
bookagent. "I heard you were not well, and I came to find out if I can
do anything for you."

The stout man lying on the lounge grew pale before the blood reacted in
a purple flush. His very bulk emphasized the shabbiness of the stained
and almost buttonless Prince Albert coat he wore, the dinginess of the
little room he seemed to dwarf.

"Leave my house, seh. You have ruined this family, and you come to
gloat on your handiwork. Take a good look, and then go, Mr. Yesler. You
see my wife in cotton rags doing her own work. Is it enough, seh?"

The slim little woman stepped across the room and took her place beside
her husband. Her eyes flashed fire at the man she held responsible for
the fall of her husband. Yesler's generous heart applauded the loyalty
which was proof against both disgrace and poverty. For in the past
month both of these had fallen heavily upon her. Tom Pelton had always
lived well, and during the past few years he had speculated in ventures
far beyond his means. Losses had pursued him, and he had looked to the
senatorship to recoup himself and to stand off the creditors pressing
hard for payment. Instead he had been exposed, disgraced, and finally
disbarred for attempted bribery. Like a horde of hungry rats his
creditors had pounced upon the discredited man and wrested from him the
remnants of his mortgaged property. He had been forced to move into a
mere cottage and was a man without a future. For the only profession at
which he had skill enough to make a living was the one from which he
had been cast as unfit to practise it. The ready sympathy of the
cattleman had gone out to the politician who was down and out. He had
heard the situation discussed enough to guess pretty close to the
facts, and he could not let himself rest until he had made some effort
to help the man whom his exposure had ruined, or, rather, had hastened
to ruin, for that result had been for years approaching.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Pelton. If I've injured you I want to make it right."

"Make it right!" The former congressman got up with an oath. "Make it
right! Can you give me back my reputation, my future? Can you take away
the shame that has come upon my wife, and that my children will have to
b