me."

And Mr. Briggs kept snapping the elastic band nervously while he
dictated, carefully looking away from the young woman.

In such manner Kate Kilgour learned of the existence of Zelie Dionne and
of the child whom Walker Farr had protected; Mr. Briggs's zeal in the
interest of his employer had made him a partisan in that affair, with
easy conscience regarding the matter of the details. The bald record
showed that Farr and the girl had cared for the child between them, had
nursed it with grief and solicitude, had borne it to the plot of land
where the little graves were crowded so closely. Mr. Briggs complacently
avoided dates and age and the minuter details. He even pleaded the case,
having caught a cue from Colonel Dodd; his record left the impression
that Walker Farr, who had come from nowhere--nobody knew when--had lived
in Marion unknown and unnoticed at the time when he had compassed the
ruin of a confiding girl.

"A scalawag, and a bad one!" commented Mr. Briggs, closing his
note-book. "And of course there's worse to come! Posing as a
reformer--that's the way such renegades work the thing. A new game for
every new place!"

And Kate Kilgour, remembering the vagrant on the broad highway, wrote
down the arraignment of this person, trying to understand her emotions.

Her own eyes had seen him garbed as a tramp, plainly a homeless nomad.

Her ears had just listened to the story of his shame.

But after a time, in spite of what she had seen and heard, that strange
instinct which dominates the feminine mind in spite of what the mere
senses affirm took possession of her.

She had known from the first that Richard Dodd's garments, his attitude,
his professions, his position did not make him what her woman's heart
desired.

But, somehow, this other man, no matter what he seemed to be from
outward appearance, stood forth for her from all the world. At times, in
her ponderings, she had disgustedly termed her mood regarding him pure
lunacy. Then she gave rein to the domination of her intuition; the man
was not what he seemed to be!

She determined to put him out of her thoughts for ever.

Just then, however, writing out the story of his turpitude, she must
needs have him in her mind.

She wondered whether he were honest in his attempts to help the poor
people.

She had believed that he was when he had faced Colonel Dodd.

She determined that she would make some investigation of her own in
regard to the my