ay up to her. Why shouldn't he have his
chance? Better--far better James than Ned Merrill. He had heard the
echoes of a disgraceful story about that young man in his college days,
the story of how he had trampled down a working girl for his pleasure.
James was clean and honorable... and she loved him. Jeff's mind fastened
on that last as a thing assured. Had he not seen her with starry eyes
fixed on her hero, held fast as a limed bird? She too was entitled to
her chance, and there was a way he could give it to her.

He turned back to James, who was sitting despondently at the managing
editor's desk, jabbing at the blotting sheet with a pencil.

Jeff touched the _Advocate_ he still held in his hand. "Did you read
this story carefully?"

"No. I just ran my eye down it. Why?"

"Whoever dug it up has made a mistake. He has jumped to the conclusion
that I'm Uncle Robert's son. Why not let it go at that?"

His cousin looked up with a flash of eager hope. "You mean--"

"I might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. Let it go the way they
have it."

The lawyer's heart leaped, but he could not let this go without a
protest. "No, I--I couldn't do that. It's awfully good of you, Jeff."

The managing editor smiled in his whimsical way. "My reputation has long
been in tatters. A little more can't hurt it."

James conceded a reflective assent with a manner of impartiality. "Of
course your friends wouldn't think any the less of you. They're not
so--so--"

"respectable as yours," Jeff finished for him.

"I was going to say so hidebound."

"All the same, isn't it?"

"But it would be a sacrifice for you. I recognize that. And I'm not
sure that I could accept it. I will have to think that over," the lawyer
concluded magnanimously.

"You'll find it is best. But I think I would tell Miss Frome, even if I
didn't tell anybody else. She has a right to know."

"You may depend upon me to do whatever is best about that."

James was hardly out of the office before Captain Chunn blew in like a
small tornado. He was boiling with rage.

"What's this infernal lie about you being the son of a convict, David?"
he demanded, waving a copy of the Herald.

"Sit down, Captain. I'll tell you the story because you're entitled to
it. But I shall have to speak in confidence."

"Confidence! Dad burn it, what are you talking about? Are you trying to
tell me that Phil Farnum was a thief and a convict?"

Jeff's steel-blue eyes looked stra