ching school there, and urged his father to see her before he made a
decision. Mr. Worthington read it through to the end, his lips closing
tighter and tighter until his mouth was but a line across his face. There
was pain in the face, too, the kind of pain which anger sends, and which
comes with the tottering of a pride that is false. Of what gratification
now was the overthrow of Jethro Bass?

He stared at the letter for a moment after he had finished it, and his
face grew a dark red. Then he seized the paper and tore it slowly,
deliberately, into bits.

Dudley Worthington was not thinking then--not he!--of the young man in
the white beaver who had called at the Social Library many years before
to see a young woman whose name, too, had been Cynthia.--He was thinking,
in fact, for he was a man to think in anger, whether it were not possible
to remove this Cynthia from the face of the earth--at least to a place
beyond his horizon and that of his son. Had he worn the chain mail
instead of the frock coat he would have had her hung outside the town
walls.

"Good God!" he exclaimed. And the words sounded profane indeed as he
fixed his eyes upon Mr. Flint. "You knew that Robert had been to
Brampton."

"Yes," said Flint, "the whole village knew it."

"Good God!" cried Mr. Worthington again, "why was I not informed of this?
Why was I not warned of this? Have I no friends? Do you pretend to look
after my interests and not take the trouble to write me on such a
subject."

"Do you think I could have prevented it?" asked Mr. Flint, very calmly.

"You allow this--this woman to come here to Brampton and teach school in
a place where she can further her designs? What were you about?"

"When the prudential committee appointed her, nothing of this was known,
Mr. Worthington."

"Yes, but now--now! What are you doing, what are they doing to allow her
to remain? Who are on that committee?"

Mr. Flint named the men. They had been reelected, as usual, at the recent
town-meeting. Mr. Errol, who had also been reelected, had returned but
had not yet issued the certificate or conducted the examination.

"Send for them, have them here at once," commanded Mr. Worthington,
without listening to this.

"If you take my advice, you will do nothing of the kind," said Mr. Flint,
who, as usual, had the whole situation at his fingers' ends. He had taken
the trouble to inform himself about the girl, and he had discovered,
shrewdly enough, th