, alike unexpected by all. Fannie appeared at
the door.

"Mr. Edward Gilder wishes to see you, Miss Turner," she said, with no
appreciation of anything dynamic in the announcement. "Shall I show him
in?"

"Oh, certainly," Mary answered, with an admirable pretense of
indifference, while Burke glared at Demarest, and the District Attorney
appeared ill at ease.

"He shouldn't have come," Demarest muttered, getting to his feet, in
reply to the puzzled glance of the Inspector.

Then, while Mary sat quietly in her chair at the desk, and the two men
stood watching doubtfully the door, the maid appeared, stood aside, and
said simply, "Mr. Gilder."

There entered the erect, heavy figure of the man whom Mary had hated
through the years. He stopped abruptly just within the room, gave a
glance at the two men, then his eyes went to Mary, sitting at her desk,
with her face lifted inquiringly. He did not pause to take in the beauty
of that face, only its strength. He stared at her silently for a moment.
Then he spoke in his oritund voice, a little tremulous from anxiety.

"Are you the woman?" he said. There was something simple and primitive,
something of dignity beyond the usual conventions, in his direct
address.

And there was the same primitive simplicity in the answer. Between the
two strong natures there was no subterfuge, no suggestion of polite
evasions, of tergiversation, only the plea of truth to truth. Mary's
acknowledgment was as plain as his own question.

"I am the woman. What do you want?"... Thus two honest folk had met face
to face.

"My son." The man's answer was complete.

But Mary touched a tragic note in her question. It was asked in no
frivolous spirit, but, of a sudden, she guessed that his coming
was altogether of his own volition, and not the result of his son's
information, as at first she had supposed.

"Have you seen him recently?" she asked.

"No," Gilder answered.

"Then, why did you come?"

Thereat, the man was seized with a fatherly fury. His heavy face was
congested, and his sonorous voice was harsh with virtuous rebuke.

"Because I intend to save my boy from a great folly. I am informed that
he is infatuated with you, and Inspector Burke tells me why--he tells
me--why--he tells me----" He paused, unable for a moment to continue
from an excess of emotion. But his gray eyes burned fiercely in
accusation against her.

Inspector Burke himself filled the void in the halting sentence.