then--eager,
trembling a little with excitement, expecting only to find his father
and happiness--came to her; and as it contrasted with the way she saw
him now, she choked queerly as she tried to speak. He was very white,
but quite controlled; lines not upon his face before had come there.

"Won't you come over home with me," she said, "and wait for father
there till we can think this thing out together?"

Her sweetness almost broke him down. "This ... together! Think this
out! Oh, it's plain enough, isn't it? For years--for as long as
Wassaquam has been here, my father has been seeing that man and paying
blackmail to him twice a year, at least! He lived in that man's power.
He kept money in the house for him always! It wasn't anything
imaginary that hung over my father--or anything created in his own
mind. It was something real--real; it was disgrace--disgrace and
worse--something he deserved; and that he fought with blackmail money,
like a coward! Dishonor--cowardice--blackmail!"

She drew a little nearer to him. "You didn't want me to know," she
said. "You tried to put me off when I called you on the telephone;
and--when I came here, you wanted me to go away before I heard. Why
didn't you want me to know? If he was your father, wasn't he
our--friend? Mine and my father's? You must let us help you."

As she approached, he had drawn back from her. "No; this is mine!" he
denied her. "Not yours or your father's. You have nothing to do with
this. Didn't he try in little cowardly ways to keep you out of it?
But he couldn't do that; your friendship meant too much to him; he
couldn't keep away from you. But I can--I can do that! You must go
out of this house; you must never come in here again!"

Her eyes filled, as she watched him; never had she liked him so much as
now, as he moved to open the door for her.

"I thought," he said almost wistfully, "it seemed to me that, whatever
he had done, it must have been mostly against me. His leaving
everything to me seemed to mean that I was the one that he had wronged,
and that he was trying to make it up to me. But it isn't that; it
can't be that! It is something much worse than that! ... Oh, I'm glad
I haven't used much of his money! Hardly any--not more than I can give
back! It wasn't the money and the house he left me that mattered; what
he really left me was just this ... dishonor, shame..."

The doorbell rang, and Alan turned to the door and t