ing brain, and
said something must be done. Fred must come back, and face the terrible
truth. As well send for him now.

He wrote out a message, and rang the bell. A tall, slim youth answered
it.

"I want this telegram sent immediately," he said in his quiet tone of
command. "Is Farrell anywhere about?"

"I can take it, sir, if you please: I often do."

"Very well."

Back to the books again with their long lines of figures. Did he think
he would find the shame and ruin here in bold black and white? He
studied them until they all ran together, and his brain seemed to become
a mass of luminous light with black motes floating about in it. The
tense agony abated. Strange visions haunted him, frivolous fancies, and
wonders that had puzzled him in boyhood; heroic fragments of bygone
declamation; the incidents of a week ago; a picture of some bold
scenery, and he in the cars, whirling by.

"Am I going crazy?" he asked with a ghastly expression. Then he took
several turns about the room, listened to the noise of the great engine,
and assured himself that he was sane.

Had he better go home? He was so tired! In all his life he had never
been so utterly exhausted. Then in a sudden, fretful mood of
contradiction he wondered he should think of fatigue when his limbs felt
strong, and his body knew no physical pain.

"I must shake it off!" he declared resolutely. Of what avail would be
going home to a wife's peevish complaints, and sit by himself to study
out this tangle? As well stay here, and master it. And that palace
yonder was home, and these were the comforts for which he had spent his
years and his energies! This was what he had laid up. An inheritance
incorruptible--why would these things come back to him?

The mill-bell began its clang. He listened to the tramp through the
passage-ways, the confusion of voices. He went to the window. The great
gates for the work-hands were around on the other side; but he could see
the motley procession filing down the street. Not gay and cheerful as in
bygone days: they seemed to drag along, these girls and women in shabby
clothes, their shawls drawn around their shoulders. Old men and
boys--why, where had vigorous middle life disappeared? So many faces had
a hard, discontented look, that pierced him like the sharp point of
ingratitude. Had he not brought himself to ruin to give the people
employment? If he had shut down the mill three years ago, he would have
been a rich man.