on Burton meant to use them for another, and a grimmer
purpose--in fact a final one. The portfolio which he carried contained
a dilapidated old blank book, such as one buys in a crossroads store, a
volume of verse, and an automatic pistol, carefully loaded. When the now
inevitable moment came which should leave his family roofless--he would
not be there to see.

There is no saying what small matter may, at a given crisis, bring
solace to a man who requires it. Now Hamilton Burton appeared to find
the necessary comfort in the boast which he nursed to his heart, that
his exit from the world, with which he had played ducks and drakes, was
to be entirely voluntary and in no wise forced: that though he was
closing life's door upon himself he was still crossing the Stygian
threshold the captain of his soul.

His face was calm enough as he turned on the light and drew down the
blinds of his private office. He had no knowledge of another tall
figure, bearing abundant outward signs of adversity that, from the
opposite side of the street, halted to glance up just as he showed
himself there in the window.

Hamilton Burton deliberately unlocked the morocco brief-case with its
gold clasp. First he took out the pistol and carefully examined it,
nodding his head in satisfaction. Since there was no table left, he laid
it on the window-sill near at hand. Next he withdrew the book of verses
and after that the country-store note-book with its dog-eared and
age-yellowed pages. These proceedings left the case empty save for a
note directed, "Coroner's Agent, City."

In the days of his magnificence Hamilton Burton had regarded
life-insurance as a poor man's buffer between his heirs and want.

For himself it had meant nothing and he had passed it by. Only since he
had secretly half-admitted his vulnerability, had he thrown such an
anchor to windward, and all his policies were new--too new to hold
validity against self-destruction.

And yet the brain that had been so cool always, so logical, had of late
assumed a dozen unaccountable eccentricities. Through his thoughts with
the obstinacy of an obsession ran one refrain: "'Twas no foe-man's hand
that slew him: 'twas his own that struck the blow."

Men must not think of him as one beaten and murdered. They must remember
him as his own executioner. Surely the lawyers would find a way. Surely
their cleverness would circumvent the restrictions framed by these
gamblers on the chances of life