slippery
streets. The windshield was so covered with rain-drops that I lowered
it to see the better, and the autumn rain, beating into my face, soon
swept away my gloomy forebodings. After all, no man was going to stick
his neck into the hangman's noose, no matter how eager he was for
revenge. This was the twentieth century, in which no man could
deliberately flout the law. Frank Woods would never have invited Jim
to a "rendezvous" so public as the country-club, if he planned
mischief. When he found out how much Jim knew, realizing the game was
up, he would leave town quietly. Helen certainly would shake Woods
when she learned of his dishonesty and trickery. Surely, no woman with
Helen's pride could learn how she had been duped without hating the man
who duped her.

I stopped at the University Union and found the card room well filled
with bridge players. The rainy afternoon had driven the golfers to
cards, and as one of the men, Terry O'Connel, was on the point of
leaving, I took his place. I played till seven and then started home
to dinner. The rain had stopped and a fresh chilly wind was rippling
the pools in the streets and rapidly drying the sidewalks. The
prospect of a cold blustery evening made me look forward with pleasure
to the warm comfort of my study, and a good book.

I had just finished a solitary dinner--mother being confined to her
room--and had settled down in dressing gown and slippers before my
cheerful fire, when the telephone rang. I put down my book and tried
to think of some excuse for staying home, in case it was my
bridge-playing friends of the afternoon wanting me to come back to the
club. A strange voice called from the other end of the wire.

"Mr. Thompson?"

"Yes."

"There has been an accident to your brother-in-law's car."

"What?--Where?--Who is this talking?" I shouted breathlessly.

"This is Captain Wadsworth of the North District Police Station
speaking. Your brother-in-law had a very bad accident with his car at
the second bridge on the Blandesville Road. Both Mr. and Mrs.
Felderson were pretty badly injured."

"Where are they now?" I gasped, fear clutching at my throat.

"They have been taken to St. Mary's Hospital."

I slammed down the receiver and tore into my clothes. I ran out to the
car and drove through the dark wet streets regardless of speed laws.
From out the gray gloom, the heavy bulk and lighted windows of St.
Mary's loomed just ahead. I ran