eyes; and a thought, hot and
anger-edged, strove for utterance, but an appealing gesture, a look
from that gentle woman, turned his resentment into these consoling
words, "Don't worry. I think I know my duty when it's put before me.
The Colossus shall not suffer."

How tenderly she looked at him. She made a magnanimity of the cooling
of his resentment and she gave him that sacred reward--a mother's
gratefulness.

"All right," said the merchant, "Do the best you can."

His quick discernment had caught the play between Henry and Mrs.
Witherspoon. "Of course I don't expect you to take my place. I want
you merely to show that the Witherspoon family hasn't run away."

The doctor called and found his patient much improved. "A little rest
is all you need to bring you about again," the physician said. "Your
unsettled nerves have made you morbid. Don't worry. Everything will be
all right."

The newspaper reports of the arrest of Brooks, although they proceeded
to arraign and condemn him, had on Witherspoon's nervous system more
of a retoning effect than could have been brought about by a doctor's
skill. That Brooks might be guilty, had not been the merchant's fear;
but that he himself might in some way be implicated, had been his
morbid dread. Now he could begin to recognize the truth that with a
black beast of his own creation he had frightened himself; and he
laughed with a nervous shudder. But when the doctor was gone he again
became anxious.

"Caroline, didn't he ask if there had ever been any insanity in my
family?"

"Why, no; he didn't hint at such a thing."

"I must have dreamed it, then. But what makes me dream such strange
things? I thought you told him that my father had been a little off at
times. Didn't you?"

"Why, of course not. You never told me that there was ever anything
wrong with your father, and even if there was how should I know it?"

"But there wasn't anything wrong with him, Caroline, and why should
you say 'if there was.'"

"Now, father, I never thought of such a thing as suspecting that there
was, and please don't let that worry you."

"I won't, but didn't Henry bring a paper and keep it hidden until
after I went to sleep?"

"No, he read them all to you."

"I thought he brought in a weekly paper and read something about a
widow from Washington."

"No, he didn't."

After a time he dozed and then he began to mutter: "It is easier to
pay than to explain."

"What is it, dear?" she