er on the left-hand side of his desk, muttering to himself
rather than speaking to Shirley:

"How on earth did they get among my other papers?"

"From Judge Rossmore, were they not?" said Shirley boldly.

"How did you know it was Judge Rossmore?" demanded Ryder
suspiciously. "I didn't know that his name had been mentioned."

"I saw his signature," she said simply. Then she added: "He's the
father of the girl you don't like, isn't he?"

"Yes, he's the--"

A cloud came over the financier's face; his eyes darkened, his
jaws snapped and he clenched his fist.

"How you must hate him!" said Shirley, who observed the change.

"Not at all," replied Ryder recovering his self-possession and
suavity of manner. "I disagree with his politics and his methods,
but--I know very little about him except that he is about to be
removed from office."

"About to be?" echoed Shirley. "So his fate is decided even before
he is tried?" The girl laughed bitterly. "Yes," she went on, "some
of the newspapers are beginning to think he is innocent of the
things of which he is accused."

"Do they?" said Ryder indifferently.

"Yes," she persisted, "most people are on his side."

She planted her elbows on the desk in front of her, and looking
him squarely in the face, she asked him point blank:

"Whose side are you on--really and truly?"

Ryder winced. What right had this woman, a stranger both to Judge
Rossmore and himself, to come here and catechise him? He
restrained his impatience with difficulty as he replied:

"Whose side am I on? Oh, I don't know that I am on any side. I
don't know that I give it much thought. I--"

"Do you think this man deserves to be punished?" she demanded.

She had resumed her seat at the desk and partly regained her
self-possession.

"Why do you ask? What is your interest in this matter?"

"I don't know," she replied evasively; "his case interests me,
that's all. Its rather romantic. Your son loves this man's
daughter. He is in disgrace--many seem to think unjustly." Her
voice trembled with emotion as she continued: "I have heard from
one source or another--you know I am acquainted with a number of
newspaper men--I have heard that life no longer has any interest
for him, that he is not only disgraced but beggared, that he is
pining away slowly, dying of a broken heart, that his wife and
daughter are in despair. Tell me, do you think he deserves such a
fate?"

Ryder remained thoughtful a moment, an