oor, and threading the crowd, made toward
the curb, where the bulldog, with a bark of delight, leaped upon the
seat of a burnished car, rumbling and vibrating with pent-up power.
There were those in the sullen anxious crowd who knew whose was that
throbbing metal miracle, the chauffeur spick and span from shining
cap-visor to polished brown puttees, and recognizing the white face that
went past, pelted it with muttered sneers. But he scarcely saw or heard
them, as he stepped into the seat, took the wheel from the chauffeur's
hand and threw on the gear.

He had afterward little memory of that ride. Once the leaping anger
within him jerked the throttle wide and the car responded with a
breakneck dart through the startled traffic, till the sight of an
infuriated mounted policeman, baton up, brought him to himself with a
thud. He had small mind to be stopped at the moment. His mouth set in a
sudden hard sharp line, and under it his hands gripped the slewing wheel
to a tearing serpentine rush that sent the skidding monster rearing on
side wheels, to swoop between two drays in a hooting plunge down a side
street. His tight lips parted then in a ragged laugh, bit off by the
jolt of the lurching motor and the slap of the bulging air.

As the sleek rubber shoes spun noiselessly and swiftly along the avenue
the myriad lights that were beginning to gleam wove into a twinkling
mist. He drove mechanically past a hundred familiar things and places:
the particular chop-house of which he was an habitue--the ivied wall of
his favorite club, with the cluster of faces at the double window--the
florist's where daily he stopped for his knot of Parma violets--but he
saw nothing, till the massive marble fronts of the upper park side
ceased their mad dance as the car halted before a tall iron-grilled
doorway with wide glistening steps, between windows strangely shuttered
and dark.

He sprang out and touched the bell. The heavy oak parted slowly; the
confidential secretary of the man he had come to face stood in the
gloomy doorway.

"I want to see Mr. Sedgwick."

"You can't see him, Mr. Valiant."

"But I _will_!" Sharp passion leaped into the young voice. "He must
speak to me."

The man in the doorway shook his head. "He won't speak to anybody any
more," he said. "Mr. Sedgwick shot himself two hours ago."

CHAPTER II

VANITY VALIANT

"The witness is excused."

In the ripple that stirred across the court room at the examin