d not have given it in any other house. On the
fly leaf was written in pencil, in Ware's rough, uneven hand, an
inscription which covered the page, with the last words cramped in the
lower corner. These were almost illegible, but Sylvia felt her way
through them slowly, and then turned to the middle of the book quickly
with an uncomfortable sense of having read a private memorandum of the
minister's. The margins of his books she knew were frequently scribbled
over with notes that meant nothing whatever to any one but Ware himself.
After a moment her eyes sought again irresistibly the inscription. She
re-read it slowly:--

"The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their
goings; they have made them crooked paths; whosoever goeth therein
shall not know peace. Tramping in Adirondacks. Baptized Elizabeth
at Harris's."

It was almost like eavesdropping to come in this way upon that curiously
abrupt Ware-like statement of the minister's: "Tramping in Adirondacks.
Baptized Elizabeth at Harris's."

The discussion in the parlor had become heated, and occasionally words
in a voice not Ware's reached Sylvia distinctly. Some one was
alternately beseeching and threatening the minister. It was clear from
the pauses in which she recognized Ware's deep tones that he was
yielding neither to the importunities nor the threats of his blustering
caller. Sylvia had imagined that the storms of life had passed over the
retired clergyman, and she was surprised that such an interview should
be taking place in his house. She was about to retreat to the
dining-room to be out of reach of the voices when the parlor door opened
abruptly and Thatcher appeared, with anger unmistakably showing in his
face, and apparently disposed to resume in the hall the discussion which
the minister had terminated in the library. Thatcher seemed balder and
more repellent than when she had first seen him on the floor of the
convention hall on the day Harwood uttered Bassett's defiance. Sylvia
rose with the book still in her hand and walked to the end of the room;
but any one in the house might have heard what Thatcher was saying.

"That's the way with you preachers; you talk about clean politics, and
when we get all ready to clean out a bad man, you duck; you're a lot of
cowardly dodgers. I tell you, I don't want you to say a word or figure
in this thing at all; but you give me that book and I'll scare Mort
Bassett out of town.