y, what I know."

"Then ask them for an Inspectorship."

Benham drew a step nearer.

"Ay, and I can hit you nearer home."

"You might have, once. What can you do now? She's safe from you,"
answered Medland, with a frown.

"Yes, she's safe, but there's the daughter."

"Daisy!"

"Yes, Daisy." And he added, in slow, emphatic tones--"Yes, my daughter
Daisy."

Medland was about to answer violently, but he curbed his temper and said
quietly,

"Your daughter? Come, don't talk nonsense."

"A daughter born to my wife in wedlock is my daughter. If I claim her,
what answer is there?"

"I can prove that she's not your daughter."

"Perhaps; and what an edifying sight! The Premier proving----" Mr.
Benham broke off with a laugh that sounded loud and harsh in the silent
night air.

Medland ground his heel into the gravel.

"How it will please your Methodist friends, and the swells at Government
House! You can tell 'em all about that trip to Meadow Beach under the
name of--what was it?--Christie, wasn't it? And about your
night-flitting, and----"

"Hold your tongue."

"Oh, there's no one to hear now. You won't like proving all that, will
you? No, no, the girl will come to her loving father! Take a minute to
think it over, Medland--take just a minute. An Inspectorship's no great
matter to a politician, you know. You're not so mighty pure as all that!
Take a minute. I can wait," and he flung himself on to a bench and lit a
cheroot.

Then, in Digby Square, at two o'clock in the morning, the devil tempted
"Jimmy" Medland. The man had indeed hit him close--very close. He had
hit him in the love he bore his daughter, and in the love he bore her
mother and her mother's fame. He had hit him in his love of place and
power, and his nobler joy in using them for what seemed to him good
purposes. Love and tenderness--pride and ambition--the man shot his
arrow at all. And as Medland stood motionless in thought, across these
abiding reflections came now and again a new one--the image of a face
that had been that night upturned to his almost in worship, and would,
if this thing were done, be turned away in sorrow, shame, and scorn.

What, after all, was an Inspectorship? It was only doing what the world
said all politicians did. What, compared with losing love and power and
fair fame, was it to--job an Inspectorship? Besides, from one point of
view, the man had a kind of claim upon him: he had done him wrong.

"I dare say," i