I want to say is this," said Twelve. "We want you to get
out of this trouble and strike your old gait again. You are simply
killing your practice through your infernal pigheadedness. Now this
thing is out of the ordinary, but there must be ways to--to beat the
game somehow, you see. So we've talked it over--about a dozen of
us--and, as I say, if you want to tell us to mind our own business,
why, go ahead; but we've talked it over, and we've come to the
conclusion that the only way to do is to get Johnson a place somewhere
off up the valley, and--"

Trescott wearily gestured. "You don't know, my friend. Everybody is so
afraid of him, they can't even give him good care. Nobody can attend
to him as I do myself."

"But I have a little no-good farm up beyond Clarence Mountain that I
was going to give to Henry," cried Twelve, aggrieved. "And if you--and
if you--if you--through your house burning down, or anything--why, all
the boys were prepared to take him right off your hands, and--and--"

Trescott arose and went to the window. He turned his back upon them.
They sat waiting in silence. When he returned he kept his face in the
shadow. "No, John Twelve," he said, "it can't be done."

There was another stillness. Suddenly a man stirred on his chair.

"Well, then, a public institution--" he began.

"No," said Trescott; "public institutions are all very good, but he is
not going to one."

In the background of the group old Judge Hagenthorpe was thoughtfully
smoothing the polished ivory head of his cane.

XXIV

Trescott loudly stamped the snow from his feet and shook the flakes
from his shoulders. When he entered the house he went at once to the
dining-room, and then to the sitting-room. Jimmie was there, reading
painfully in a large book concerning giraffes and tigers and
crocodiles.

"Where is your mother, Jimmie?" asked Trescott.

"I don't know, pa," answered the boy. "I think she is up-stairs."

Trescott went to the foot of the stairs and called, but there came no
answer. Seeing that the door of the little drawing-room was open, he
entered. The room was bathed in the half-light that came from the four
dull panes of mica in the front of the great stove. As his eyes grew
used to the shadows he saw his wife curled in an arm-chair. He went to
her. "Why, Grace." he said, "didn't you hear me calling you?"

She made no answer, and as he bent over the chair he heard her trying
to smother a sob in the cushion.