an trouble."

"That was good of you! I appreciate it."

"No. It was a debt. I owed it to the 'Clarion.' You've been--splendid
about the typhus."

"Worthington doesn't look at it that way," returned Hal, with a rather
grim smile.

"When they understand, they will."

"Perhaps. But, see here, you can't stay. There may be danger. It's
awfully good of you to come. But you must get away."

She looked at him sidelong. In her coming she had been the new Esme, the
Esme who was Norman Hale's most unselfish and unsparing worker, the Esme
who thought for others, all womanly. But, now that the strain had
relaxed, she reverted, just a little, to her other self. It was, for the
moment, the Great American Pumess who spoke:--

"Won't you even say you're glad to see me?"

"Glad!" The echo leaped to his lips and the fire to his eyes as the old
unconquered longing and passion surged over him. "I don't think I've
known what gladness is since that night at your house."

Her eyes faltered away from his. "I don't think I quite understand," she
said weakly; then, with a change to quick resolution:--

"There is something I must tell you. You have a right to know it. It's
about the paper. Will you come to see me to-morrow?"

"Yes. But go now. No! Wait!"

From without sounded a dull murmur pierced through with an occasional
whoop, jubilant rather than threatening.

"Too late," said Hal quietly. "They're coming."

"I'm not afraid."

"But I am--for you. Stay in this room. If they should break into the
building, go up those stairs and get to the roof. They won't come
there."

He went into the outer room, closing the door behind him.

From both directions and down a side street as well the dwellers in the
slums straggled into the open space in front of the "Clarion" office. To
Hal they seemed casual, purposeless; rather prankish, too, like a lot of
urchins out on a lark. Several bore improvised signs, uncomplimentary to
the "Clarion." They seemed surprised when they encountered the rope
barrier with its warning placards. There were mutterings and queries.

"No serious harm in them," opined Dr. Elliot, to whom Hal had gone to
see whether he wanted anything. "Just mischief. A few rocks maybe, and
then they'll go home. Look at old Mac."

Opposite them, at his brilliantly lighted window desk, sat McGuire
Ellis, in full view of the crowd below, conscientiously blue-penciling
telegraph copy.

"Hey, Mac!" yelled an acquaintance in t