you going to do?"

"Fight!"

"Fight?" He looked admiringly at her glowing figure. "But if there is
a strong company behind all this, for you to fight it alone--it will
be an awful big fight!"

"I don't care how big the fight is!" she cried exultantly. "What has
almost broken my heart till now is that there has been no one to
fight!"

A shadow fell on the old man's face.

"But after all, Katherine, it is all only a guess."

"Of course it is only a guess!" she cried. "But I have tested every
other possible solution. This is the only one left, and it fits every
known circumstance of the case. It is only a guess--but I'll stake my
life on its being the right guess!" Her voice rose. "Oh, father, we're
on the right track at last! We're going to clear you! Don't you ever
doubt that. We're going to clear you!"

There was no resisting the ringing confidence in her voice, the fire
of her enthusiasm.

"Katherine!" he cried, and opened his arms.

She rushed into them. "We're going to clear you, father! And, oh,
won't it be fine! Won't it be fine!"

For a space they held each other close, then they parted.

"What are you going to do first?" he asked.

"Try to find the person, or corporation, behind the scheme."

"And how will you do that?"

"First, I shall talk it over with Mr. Blake. You know he told me to
come to him if I ever wished his advice. He knows the situation
here--he has the interests of Westville at heart--and I know he will
help us. I'm not going to lose a second, so I'm off to see him now."

She rushed downstairs. But she did have to lose a second, and many of
them, for when she called up Mr. Blake's office on the telephone, the
answer came back that Mr. Blake was in the capital and would not
return till the following day on the one forty-five. It occurred to
Katherine to advise with old Hosie Hollingsworth, for during the long
summer her blind, childish shrinking had changed to warm liking of the
dry old lawyer; and she had discovered, too, that the heresies it had
been his delight to utter a generation before--and on which he still
prided himself--were now a part of the belief of many an orthodox
divine.

But she decided against conferring with Old Hosie. Her adviser and
leader must be a man more actively in the current of modern affairs.
No, Blake was her great hope, and precious and few as were the hours
before the trial, there was nothing for it but to wait for his return.

She went up to