rd that was sure to
follow.

It came with all the emphasis he expected.

"Roberts! Director Roberts!"

"The same, sir"; and the eyes of the two detectives met in what was
certainly one of the most solemn moments of their lives.

They had paused for this short conference at a point where the road
running for a few yards on a level gave them a view of slope on slope of
varying verdure, with glimpses of the Hudson between. Glancing up, with a
gesture of manifest shrinking from the portrait which Sweetwater still
held, Mr. Gryce allowed his glance to run over the wonderful landscape
laid out to his view, and said with breaks and halts bespeaking his deep
emotion:

"If my death here and now, following fast upon that of this unhappy
Frenchwoman, would avail to wipe out the evidence I have so laboriously
collected against this man, I should welcome it with gratitude. I shrink
from ending my career with the shattering of so fine an image, in the
public eye. What lies back of this crime--what past memories or present
miseries have led to an act which would be called dastardly in the most
uninstructed and basest of our sex, I lack the imagination to conceive.
Would to God I had never tried to find out! But no man standing where
Roberts does to-day among the leaders of a great party can fall into such
a pit of shame without weakening the faith of the young and making a
travesty of virtue and honor."

"Yet, if he is guilty----"

"It is our business to pursue him to the end. Only, I like the man,
Sweetwater. I had a long talk with him yesterday on indifferent matters
and I came away liking him."

This was certainly something Sweetwater had not expected to hear, and
it threw him again into silence as he started up the machine and they
pursued their course home.

Hard as the day had been for Mr. Gryce, its trials were not yet over. He
had left it to Sweetwater to report the case to the New York authorities
and had gone home to rest from the shock of the occurrence and to prepare
for that interview with the Chief Inspector which he was satisfied would
now lead to an even more exacting one with the District Attorney.

He was met by a messenger from downtown who handed him a letter. He
opened it abstractedly and read the following:

"Mrs. Taylor is talking."

He had forgotten Mrs. Taylor. To have her thus brought forcibly back to
mind was a shock heightened, rather than diminished, by a perusal of the
few connected words