were in the way. So on
his head, the white blossom of the almond tree trembled; and one noon
in March the stage bore to this broken, shaking old man a letter from
Kansas City that ran the sword of fear into his heart and almost
stopped it forever. It ran:--

"Dear General: I have just learned from talking with a banker here
that an inspector is headed our way. He probably will arrive the day
after this reaches you. Something must be done about that tax check of
yours. The inspector should not find it in the drawer again. Once was
all right, but you must get it out now. Put it in the form of a note.
Make it Carnine's note. He is good for twice that. Don't bother him
with it, but make it out for ninety days, and by that time we can make
another turn. But that note must be in there. Your check won't do any
longer. The inspector has been gossiping about us up here--and about
that check of yours. For God's sake, don't hesitate, but do this thing
quick."

The letter was not signed, but it came in Barclay's envelope, and was
addressed by Barclay's hand.

The general fumbled with the pad of blank notes before him for a long
time. He read and reread Barclay's letter. Then he put away the pad
and tore the letter into bits and started for the front door. But a
terror seized him, and he walked behind the counter and put his
palsied hand into the box where he kept cancelled checks, and picked
out one of Gabriel Carnine's checks. He folded it up, and started for
the door again, but turned weakly at the threshold, and walked to the
back room of the bank.

When it was done, and had been worked through the books, General
Hendricks, quaking with shame and fear, sat shivering before his desk
with jaws agape and the forged name gashed into his soul. And "the
strong men" bowed themselves as he shuffled home in the twilight. The
next day when the inspector came, "all the daughters of music were
brought low" and the feeble, bent, stricken man piped and wheezed and
stammered his confused answers to the young man's questions, and stood
paralyzed with unspeakable horror while the inspector glanced at the
Carnine note and asked some casual question about it. When the bank
closed that night, General Hendricks tried to write to his son and
tell him the truth, but he sat weeping before his desk and could not
put down the words he longed to write. Bob Hendricks found that
tear-stained letter half finished in the desk when he came home, and
he k