o gamble in stocks."

"That was your great mistake," said the dry voice of the motionless
figure against the tree. "A minister has no business to fool with the
stock market."

"But what was I to do?" Doctor Sherman cried desperately. "No money
behind me--the salary of a dry goods clerk--my wife up there, whom I
love better than my own life, needing delicacies, attention, a long
stay in Colorado--what other chance, I ask you, did I have of getting
the money?"

"Well, at any rate, you should have kept your fingers off that church
building fund."

"God, don't I realize that! But with the market falling, and all the
little I had about to be swept away, what else was a half frantic man
to do but to try to save himself with any money he could put his hands
upon?"

Blake shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, if luck was against you when that church money was also swept
away, luck was certainly with you when it happened that I was the one
to discover what you had done."

"So I thought, when you offered to replace the money and cover the
whole thing up. But, God, I never dreamed you'd exact such a price in
return!"

He gripped Blake's arm and shook it. His voice was a half-muffled
shriek.

"If you wanted the water-works, if you wanted to do this to Doctor
West, why did you pick on me to bring the accusation? There are men
who would never have minded it--men without conscience and without
character!"

Blake steadfastly kept his steely gaze upon the river.

"I believe I have answered that a number of times," he replied
in his hard, even tone. "I picked you because I needed a man of
character to give the charges weight. A minister, the president of
our reform body--no one else would serve so well. And I picked you
because--pardon me, if in my directness I seem brutal--I picked you
because you were all ready to my hand; you were in a situation where
you dared not refuse me. Also I picked you, instead of a man with no
character to lose, because I knew that you, having a character to lose
and not wanting to lose it, would be less likely than any one else
ever to break down and confess. I hope my answer is sufficiently
explicit."

Doctor Sherman stared at the erect, immobile figure.

"And you still intend," he asked in a dry, husky voice, "you still
intend to force me to go upon the stand to-morrow and commit----"

"I would not use so unpleasant a word if I were you."

"But you are going to force me to do it?"

"I am