ed or spoken to us. I think that Jack
suspected and Una knew and feared to look at Jerry's face. By the time
we reached the house Jerry had managed to control himself. The
dangerous look upon his face was succeeded by a glacial calm, which
lasted through luncheon, of which he ate nothing. Jack did his best to
bring an atmosphere of unconcern but failed and we got up from the
table aware of impending trouble. Then Jerry disappeared.

CHAPTER XXIV

FEET OF CLAY

It is with some reluctance that I begin these chapters dealing with
the most terrible event in Jerry's life, and for that matter the most
terrible experience in my own, for as the reader of this history must
now be aware, Jerry's life was mine. I had made him, molded him for
good or ill according to my own definite plan, by the results of which
I had professed myself willing to stand whatever came. Had I known
what these results were to be, it would have been better if I had cast
myself into the sea than have come to Horsham Manor as Jerry's
preceptor, the sponsor for old Benham's theory. But human wisdom is
fallible, true virtue a dream. Dust we are and to dust return,
groveling meanwhile as best we may, amid the wreck of our illusions.
It costs me something to admit the failure of the Great Experiment,
its horrible and tragic failure! To lose a hand, an eye, a limb, to be
withered by disease, one can replace, repair, renew; but an ideal, a
system of philosophy, ingrained into one's very life! It is this that
scars and withers the soul.

I must go on, for, after all, it is not my soul that matters, but
Jerry's. It was quite an hour after Jerry disappeared before I began
to suspect that he had gone to Briar Hills. The last I had seen of him
was when he was on his way up the stair to his own room. But when I
sought him there a short while afterward, I could not find him, nor
was he anywhere in the house. I questioned the servants, telephoned
the garage. All the machines, including Jerry's own roadster, were in
the building. I went out to question the gardeners and found a man who
had seen Jerry awhile before, entering the path into the woods behind
the house. Mr. Benham was hatless, the fellow said, and walked
rapidly, his head bent. Even then I did not suspect where he was
going. I thought that he had merely gone to "walk it off," a phrase we
had for our own cure for the doldrums. But as the moments passed and
he did not return, I took Jack into confi