The young man obeyed desperately: "I am an ambassador for the--"

Still Miss Dounay did not speak; she did not move nor change an

expression even; and yet Rollie felt himself interrupted. He could not

tell how this was done, but he was sure that this woman had detected him

in the first note of insincerity and by a thought-wave had emphatically

said, "Don't lie to me!"

All at once, too, he realized that this motionless, marble-lipped

creature sitting there before him was more implacable, more potential

for evil than the raging tigress he had expected to confront. He felt

somehow that she was not a woman, but a super-devil into whose clutches

he was being drawn. He even had a sense that he was not going to be

allowed any increased issue of moral stock on the ground of telling this

woman the truth. He was going to tell her the truth because he had to,

because she hypnotized it out of him.

"I say," he began, and stopped to wet his lips, but found his tongue so

furred that it could not function in that behalf. "I say," he went on

again, croaking hoarsely, "that I am the thief."

"You? The banker?"

Rollie fell to wondering how blue vitriol bites. Certainly it could not

be more biting than the sarcasm in look and tone with which the woman

had asked this question.

"Yes, I--"

The young man was going to prepare the soil for throwing himself upon

her mercy--this woman whom he was now positive knew no such thing as

mercy--by telling her about his defalcation; but in the wooden state of

his mind, one quivering gleam of intelligence suggested that it was

quite unnecessary to tell her anything about his defalcation; that it

might give her an added set of pincers for the torture she might choose

to inflict.

"Yes, I stole them," he affirmed doggedly. "And I am going to bring

them back."

"Going to?" she asked, again making the fine shade of her meaning clear

with the slightest expenditure of sound.

"Yes, a little accident happened."

"An accident!" The woman's eyes blazed, her cheeks were aflame, and her

whole attitude expressive of menace. "You didn't lose them?"

"I only lost control of them for a few hours through a bit of

stupidity," he confessed, and hurried on to explain: "For safe keeping

this morning I locked them in John Hampstead's safe deposit box, and he

went off with the key. He's wandering around the tenderloin of San

Francisco now on an errand for a man in the county jail, and they don't

even expect him home before to-morrow morning. We can get them--"

Again Rollie felt himself mentally interrupted, although Miss Dounay had

not spoken.

This time, however, her features did change unmistakably. She had been

listening with a cynical expression that somehow suggested the manner of

a cat about to pounce; and suddenly this manner had departed. It was

succeeded by a look of surprise and then of thoughtful interest,

followed by that indefinable something which bade him cease to speak.

He paused abruptly with his tongue in air, as it were; yet she neither

spoke nor looked at him. Her features were a sort of moving picture of

complex and swift-flying mental processes which succeeded one another

with astonishing rapidity and ended in a queer expression of glory and

triumph, while she stiffened her body and drew a full breath so quickly

that the air whistled in her narrowing nostrils.

Then, as if becoming suddenly aware of the visitor's presence, Miss

Dounay turned her eyes directly upon him and exclaimed, with a manner

quite the most pleasant she had yet displayed:

"Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr. Burbeck. Something you said started such an

interesting train of thought."

Her cordiality extended to the point of reaching out a hand and laying

it reassuringly upon Rollie's arm, while she asked, and this time with a

tone of real consideration:

"Will you be kind enough to tell me again, very carefully, and a little

more in detail, just why you couldn't bring the diamonds to-day?"

Rollie, greatly relieved at this softening in Marien's mood at the very

point where he had feared she might actually leap on him and throttle

him, retold the story, only being careful to omit all reference as to

why he chanced to be visiting Doctor Hampstead's box, and why Doctor

Hampstead happened to come into his office so that he might pick up the

key, as he did.

"What an odd coincidence!" commented Marien, when the recital was

finished. Actually, she was laughing. Rollie's heart went out to her

completely. He felt a sting of self-reproach at the harshness of his

judgment of her, and was sensible of a new charity growing in his life

for all mankind. It was really going to be made easy for him to take

"the way up." He felt like singing a little psalm of thanksgiving.

"And the minister has no idea that the diamonds are in his vault?" that

mercurial lady inquired, with a chuckle.

"Not the least in the world," assured Rollie, anxious to relieve his

benefactor of any slightest odium of indiscretion.

"And when did you say Doctor Hampstead was expected home from San

Francisco?"

Miss Dounay had stopped laughing and had an intent look, as if desiring

to understand something very clearly.

"Perhaps the last boat to-night--possibly not till to-morrow morning."

"Then there is no way of getting the jewels until to-morrow morning?"

"None at all," confessed Rollie. "But as a matter of fact, they are

perfectly safe there--safer than they are in your own apartment."

"So I should say," Miss Dounay observed dryly, "unless I revise my guest

list."

Rollie flushed.

"That was coming to me," he confessed, frowning at himself. "That and

much more."

His tone was serious and full of bitter self-reproach. Miss Dounay's

surprisingly indulgent attitude emboldened him to pursue the

disagreeable subject farther.

"I have not told you," he went on, "that I came to ask you for mercy."

"Do you not perceive that you are getting it without asking?" the

actress replied, with a liquid glance that was really full of gentleness

and sympathy.

"Of course," Rollie averred. "But I am so grateful that I did not want

you to think I could take it for granted. I was in a terrible position,

Miss Dounay. The crime was not accidental, but deliberate; that it

miscarried was the accident. But that your diamonds are to be restored

to you, and that I myself am on my way to a sort of character

restoration, if I ever had any, which I begin to doubt, is all due to

one good friend whom I saw to-day, and who is also a good friend of

yours."

Again Rollie was interrupted; but this time there was nothing intangible

about it.

Miss Dounay's face grew suddenly hard; cruel lines that were tense and

threatening appeared about her mouth, while her eyes bored straight into

his, as she exclaimed: "Never mind about that now. As for the theft:

you need never hear from me one word about what you have done. The only

injunction that I lay upon you is to keep absolute silence about it

yourself. Remember, no matter what comes to pass, you know nothing and

have nothing to say. So long as you are silent, I will protect you

absolutely. Break the silence, and you will go where you belong!"

Of all the hard glances Miss Dounay had given young Burbeck, the look

which accompanied this last menacing sentence was positively the

hardest. A spasm of mortal terror wrung the young man's heart, as he

saw how deliberately implacable this woman could be, and how completely

he was in her power.

But presently, Miss Dounay, as if suddenly ashamed of her outburst of

feeling over so slight an occasion, broke into radiant smiles, took

Rollie by the arm, and led him a few steps in the direction of the door.

Her manner was gracious and almost affectionate, proclaiming that at

least as long as all went well with her moods, the whole wretched

incident was past and forgotten absolutely.

As if to make this emphatically clear, she inquired:

"And when is it that you go out with Mrs. Ellsworth Harrington upon her

launch party?"

"With Mrs. Harrington's launch party?" Rollie asked, in a dazed voice,

his mind groping as at some elusive memory.

"Yes," the actress replied crisply. "You told me yesterday you were

going out to-day with her party for a cruise on the Bay."

"Yesterday!" confessed Rollie dreamily. "By Jove, so I did. But," and

as though it made all the difference in the world, "that was yesterday!"

"And isn't to-day to-day?" Miss Dounay asked significantly. "Going to

buck up, aren't you?" she continued with intimate friendliness of tone.

"You are still to continue as the Amalgamated's social ambassador?"

"Why, of course," the young man replied, although weakly, for after what

he had passed through of hope and fear in the past few hours and even

the past few minutes, he felt quite unequal to any such prospect as the

immediate resumption of his social duties.

But it was a part of the swiftly forming plans of the strong willed

woman that he should take them up immediately, and she cleverly recalled

his mind to the necessity of special attention to Mrs. Harrington's

projects by inquiring tentatively: "I suppose Mrs. Harrington was very

much put out because I did not attend her dinner last night?"

"I should say!" confessed Rollie, turning a wry face at the memory.

"Suppose," suggested Miss Dounay in calculating tones, "that I went with

you upon her launch party this afternoon."

"You? Oh! Miss Dounay!" Rollo exclaimed, with another of his looks of

dog-like gratefulness. "Could you be as good as that? Why, say!" and

the young man's enthusiasm actually began to kindle. "You'd undo the

damage of last night and fix me with her for life. Positively for life;

because," and he hesitated while an expression half ludicrous and half

painful crossed his face; "because you are ten times as big a social

asset now that--that--" he could not bring himself to finish the

sentence.

But Miss Dounay relieved him of his embarrassment by appearing not to

notice and broke in with a practical question:

"What time does the launch leave the pier?"

"At four. It is now one-thirty."

For a moment Miss Dounay's brow was threaded with lines of thought, as

if she were making calculations and tying the loose ends of some project

together in her mind.

"Yes," she said, her face clearing and a look of impish happiness coming

into her eyes, "I can go. It will be a delightful relief. I have been

bored beyond measure by my own company to-day. Come here at

three-thirty and Francois will take us to the pier."

*CHAPTER XXVII*

*THE FIRST ALARM*

Doctor Hampstead was more successful than he had dared to hope in his

quest for the woman of the underworld to whom the Red Lizard, from his

position in the county jail, acknowledged a tardy obligation. By five

o'clock the sufferer was located, her condition inquired into, and the

services of a nurse from the Social Settlement near by arranged for,

with instructions that the minister be notified of any serious change in

the patient's condition.

His breast warmed comfortably with the sense of duty done, the clergyman

made his way toward the water front, congratulating himself that he

would get the six o'clock boat and be at home in time for dinner; but as

he walked through the ferry building, his eye was caught by a headline

in one of the evening papers. "MINISTER TO BE ARRESTED" it proclaimed

in tall characters of glaring black; and he reflected cynically at the

eagerness with which the headline makers seize upon that word "minister"

or any of its synonyms. It made the black letters blacker when they

spelled minister, priest, or clergyman.

Wondering what preacher could have got himself in trouble, and feeling a

slight sense of resentment at the creature, whoever he might be, to have

thus brought notoriety and possible dishonor upon the calling, Doctor

Hampstead bought a copy of the paper from fat Hermann of the crutch and

red face, who has stood so many years at the ferry gate; but reading no

farther than the headline, he doubled the paper in his hand and elbowed

his way through the crowd to a seat on the exposed upper deck of the

ferryboat. Wearied from the exertions of his day, the minister found

temporary diversion in watching the fountains of humanity gushing up the

stairways. Many of the people he knew, and those who saw him nodded as

they passed. Once or twice it struck him that there was something

peculiar in these glances of recognition, a startled look of surprise or

wonder that he could not quite understand. Occasionally the bold look

of a man he did not know but who apparently recognized him had in it a

quality of cynicism or of gloating.

With a disagreeable feeling of embarrassment which he did not undertake

to explain, the minister turned away from the crowd and fell to watching

the sweep of bay and the plowing craft upon it. The fresh salt breeze

was very grateful to his face and lungs after the noisome alleys through

which his mission had taken him. The water this evening was amethyst

blue, and under the prows of the passing boats broke into foam of marble

whiteness. The sky above was a pure turquoise, except towards the west,

where the descending sun kindled a conflagration of glory in the

low-lying clouds. All this wealth of refreshing color and the tonic in

the stiffening breeze made the world not only seem fresh and pure, but

full of power; as if to give assurance that the ocean and the coming

night were big enough and strong enough to swallow all the

unpleasantness and all the weakness and wickedness of men, and send the

sun up to-morrow morning upon a new day that was fresh and pristine,

like the day of creation itself.

Hampstead remembered his prayer of the morning that this particular day

might be a great one, and felt a trifle disappointed. In a kind of a

way it had been big. Rollie Burbeck had come to him, broken and

cowering. He had helped him; he believed he had saved him. Surely, for

the time being, he had saved that gifted mother of his from the awful

shock of knowing that her son was a defaulter and a thief. True, he had

plunged heavily in rescuing that boy; yet the money came from people who

believed in Hampstead sufficiently to give him of their surplus wealth

for just such ventures. If the effort failed, they would regret the

loss of the man more than the loss of the money.

Yet the minister really believed that Rollie was going to take the "way

up", and assuring himself once more of this, fell to wondering how Miss

Dounay received the penitent when he brought back the diamonds, and

whether she had acted generously or spitefully. Speculating next whether

the story of the return of the diamonds had been given to the newspapers

yet, and anxious to know how they had handled it, if it had, Hampstead

bethought him of the paper in his hand and unfolded it for inspection.

But the make-up of the front page forced his attention back upon the

matter of the minister who was to be arrested. The sub-head startled

him, for it contained his own name, while the opening sentence revealed

that it was himself who was to be arrested, and that the occasion of the

arrest was the charge that he had stolen the Dounay diamonds.

At the first impact of this astounding piece of news, an exclamation of

amazement broke from the minister's lips; but immediately his teeth were

set hard as his eye dived down the column, lapping up the words of the

story by sentences and almost by paragraphs.

Miss Dounay, it appeared, had gone to the office of District Attorney

Miller at three o'clock that afternoon by appointment, and had there

sworn to a complaint, charging him, the Reverend John Hampstead, with

the theft of her diamond necklace, valued at twenty-two thousand

dollars. There were a few lines of an interview with District Attorney

Miller, in which that official stated that at first he had not regarded

Miss Dounay's charges seriously, but that the actress was so emphatic in

her demand for the warrant of arrest that he had not felt himself

justified in refusing it. At the same time, the District Attorney

expressed his personal belief in the innocence of the minister.

An attempt to serve the warrant immediately, the story said, had been

frustrated by the temporary absence of the Reverend Hampstead in San

Francisco upon one of his accustomed missions of mercy.

The article concluded with the statement that while it was generally

known that Doctor Hampstead was one of Miss Dounay's guests on the night

before, the report that he had been charged with the theft of the

diamonds was everywhere received with a smile, and there was some harsh

criticism of the District Attorney for issuing a complaint, the only

effect of which must be to gratify the enemies of the clergyman, and to

lessen his influence, thus hampering him in the good work he was doing

in the community. This would be all to no purpose, since even a

preliminary hearing must be sufficient to show that there was no

evidence against him, and that the complaint itself was due to the

extravagant suspicion of a highly nervous woman, laboring under great

emotional strain.

That the actress herself, a woman of moods and caprices, had no adequate

appreciation of the seriousness of her act in thus attacking the

character of Doctor Hampstead was made evident to the reporters, when a

telephone call to her apartments revealed that in the very hour when an

endeavor to serve the warrant of arrest was being made, the actress was

leaving her hotel in the company of a well-known young business man for

a pleasure cruise upon the Bay.

The minister saw with satisfaction how completely the facts as developed

had been edited into a story, the assumptions of which were entirely

favorable to him. That was good. It was also right. That in itself

would show this reckless woman that the people would refuse to believe

ill of him upon the word of any mere stranger.

Nevertheless, reflection on the sheer impudence of the woman's attack

made Hampstead angry, and with a quick, nervous movement he crushed the

paper into a ball and hurled it over the side.

Was there ever a story of blacker ingratitude? Was there ever a weaker,

more craven specimen of a man? Was there ever a more clever, more

devilish woman?

So this was the way she made good her threat. She had set this trap,

had persuaded Rollie to pretend to steal the diamonds and to make a

false confession to him, during which the minister had actually sealed

the diamonds in one of his own envelopes. John wished he could be sure

whether the young rascal actually took the diamonds away with him, as he

appeared to do, or whether he didn't drop them in a drawer of the desk

or about the study, where a search would reveal them.

With facial expression quite unministerial Hampstead's mind raced on to

the question whether the story of the defalcation was also trumped up?

But at this point his excited mental processes halted, puzzled for a

moment; and then abruptly his face cleared, as he saw the untenableness

of his suddenly conceived theory. No; it would not do. Rollie had

undoubtedly been perfectly sincere, and this scheming Jezebel of a woman

had merely taken advantage of him in the moment of confession, and made

him either consciously or unconsciously, and perhaps helplessly, a tool

of her desperate vengeance.

And vengeance for what? Hampstead kept asking himself that, and never

got farther with an answer than the rage of a self-centered, heartless

woman at his failure to pay the supreme tribute to vanity by making love

to her as once he had done, and giving her the gloating satisfaction of

spurning him as she had spurned him before. This was the extent of his

crime against her, and this bold, bald attempt to destroy him was the

punishment she had devised. Heavens! Had the woman no sense of

responsibility at all? No consciousness of all the terrible harm she

would be doing to so many others besides himself if she succeeded in

ruining him? Think of the men and women who trusted him, the young boys

and girls to whom he was pointed out as a shining example, the

struggling people who found inspiration and courage in the spectacle of

his own dauntless battlings for the right.

John felt that it was not egotism to think of himself in this way. He

knew it as a fact because he had to know it, because men told him so

continually, and because it was a supremely steadying influence upon his

own life. He dared not swerve. Rollie Burbeck was not the only man in

the community who owed him for escape from a fall, or who was toiling

laboriously upward, with an eye on the minister climbing far above and

turning cheerfully to beckon or lower an Alpine rope for part of the

weakened climber's load.

And the Dounay woman knew all of this. Some of it he had shown to her

in the hope that it would be an inspiration. Some of it she had seen

for herself. But now, in her malice and hatred, she took no account of

all that. Unable to make him swerve, she was wickedly determined to

hurl him down. And having used Rollo Burbeck this far, John had no

doubt at all that her genius would be entirely equal to using him still

further, by binding him to absolute secrecy as to his knowledge of the

minister's innocence.

But this thought brought home another with shocking force,--the

realization that Rollie, the one man who could vindicate him of this

charge must not vindicate him! For Rollie to speak and ruin himself

seemed only fair, rather than for the minister to be ruined; yet for the

young man to confess would be a terrible blow to the mother,--would in

fact most likely kill her. That was unthinkable. That blow must be

prevented at all hazards.

But even eliminating the mother, and supposing the young man too craven

to speak out for himself, Hampstead knew, thinking back a few hours,

that on his honor as a minister he had sealed his own lips concerning

the young man's confession; he had hinged his appeal to the moral

consciousness of that misguided youth upon his own fealty as a priest of

God to the sacred trust of confession. How presumptuous this afternoon

sounded that speech which he had made to the wretched penitent this

morning with such easy assurance.

Yet, presumptuous or not, Hampstead's reasonings had led him quickly to

the one outstanding fact: His knowledge of who did steal the diamonds

could never be used in his defense. His vindication must depend solely

on the inability of Miss Dounay to prove her case. This in itself put

him in a negative and an unnatural position, an all but helpless

position. His nature was aggressive. He was a fighter, not a

"stander." Instead of vindication, he could never get more than a

Scotch verdict of "not proven." He would have to face the community

with that. Well, thank God, he was strong enough for that; strong

enough to simply stand and endure! Yes, testing his moral fiber by the

best judgment he could form of what the strain would be like, he felt

equal to the load. In the consciousness of this strength, his shoulders

stiffened with pride and a sort of eagerness to take up their burden. A

sense of triumph even came to him. This self-deluding woman should see

how strong he was, and how unshakable was the faith of the community in

the integrity of his character.

But when the minister, rather calmed by having hardened himself thus

against what appeared to be coming upon him, lifted his eyes suddenly

from the deck, he was disconcerted to observe a group of people eyeing

him curiously at a distance of some dozen or twenty feet. These were

people whom he did not recognize, but some one of them evidently knew

him and had pointed him out to the rest. He reflected that they must

have been watching him for some time. No doubt they had observed his

demeanor as he read the paper, and afterwards when he tossed it away in

anger. He must have made quite an exhibition of himself, and it gave

him a creepy sensation to catch these curious, unfeeling eyes upon him

as if they viewed the struggles of a fly in a spider's web. It made him

feel that he was entangled, and he began to realize what a diversion his

entanglement would afford this whole metropolitan community, and that

to-night, through the headlines in the papers, everybody was watching

him just as these people were. He reflected, too, that there is a

fascination about watching the fall of a tall tree, of a tall flagpole,

or of a tall human being. At the moment Hampstead did not feel so very

tall; yet he knew that deservedly or undeservedly, he was upon a

position of eminence, and his fall would afford an interesting

spectacle.

However, he did not intend to fall. Rising vigorously from his seat,

the minister confronted with a smile the group who had been gazing at

him. "Good evening, gentlemen," he said pleasantly, and walked toward

the front of the boat.

"Some nerve, what!" was a comment that broke out of the group as he

passed it. Whether the words were meant for his ears or not, they

reached them and caused another smile.

"I'll show them nerve!" he mused, with foolish but very human pride.

Mingling in the crowd which trampled and elbowed its way off the boat,

the minister was careful to bear himself with open-eyed good cheer. He

kept his chin up, a self-confident smile upon his face, and his eyes

roving for a sight of familiar faces. Whenever he caught the eye of an

acquaintance, the greeting he bestowed was hearty and betokened a man

without the slightest cause for anxiety of any sort.

Nevertheless, it was disturbing to perceive that people rather avoided

his eye. Generally quite the reverse was true, and it was rare upon the

boat that some one did not approach him and fall into conversation. Yet

so subtle is that mysterious psychology of the social impulse that now a

mere publication of the fact that he was to be arrested, even

accompanied, as it was, by the statement that nobody believed him

guilty, had yet sufficient influence to make him shunned. What a silly

world it was, after all!

But in making the transfer from the ferry to the suburban train, there

was a walk of two hundred feet, with a news stand on the way, and then

fresh disillusionment lay in wait for Doctor Hampstead, in the form of a

later edition of another Oakland paper.

"CLERIC FLIES ARREST," bawled this headline stridently.

The minister's lip curled sarcastically at sight of this, but he bought

the paper, reading as he walked to the car steps. But the sub-head was

more disturbing. "Hampstead's Premises Searched," it declared, the types

seeming to scream the words exultantly.

Searched--and in his absence! This was outrageous! More; it was

alarming, for there were papers in his study which he had good reason

for keeping from the eyes of the police. Fortunately, however, the most

important of these were in the safe deposit box. He felt deeply

grateful now for this box, the key to which was in his pocket; and after

a sympathetic thought for Rose, Dick, and Tayna, and the excited,

bewildered state in which they must have received the officers, the

clergyman turned his mind to a contemplation of this new account in

detail, and thereby got his first real taste of what an unfriendly

attitude on the part of a newspaper can make of the most innocent

circumstances.

Up to now, the minister, his utterances, his denunciations, even his

moral crusades, had been popular. The papers had put the most favorable

construction upon all his acts. Their columns and their headlines had

done him respect and honor. But now this paper had put every

circumstance in the worst possible light. It cleverly touched up those

scenes in the picture which looked incriminating and left the others

unillumined, until one would never gather from the story that there was

any reason to doubt the guilt or the guilty flight of the minister.

Hampstead attributed this to mere unfriendliness, never suspecting that

in one hour between editions an editor could have subtly sensed a

popular readiness to accept the worst view of his case, and deliberately

pandered to it as a mere matter of commercial newsmongering; nor that

this unfavorable account was to be accepted as the first straw blown up

in a hurricane of adverse criticism which would rise and sweep over the

city and blow its very hardest in the aisles of All People's Church

itself.

The effect of this narrative upon Hampstead's mind was unspeakably

oppressive, and he looked up from its perusal with relief and pleasure

at finding a well-known physician in the seat beside him. The doctor

was prominent in the work of one of the Encina churches, and had been

particularly sympathetic with Hampstead in campaigns against petty

crime. The minister had a right, therefore, to feel that this man was

one of his friends; yet the physician greeted him with a self-conscious

air and immediately relapsed into silence. Hampstead endured this until

the humor of the situation forced itself upon him.

"Oh, cheer up," he laughed, poking the physician with an elbow. "You

probably know worse people than diamond thieves."

The doctor also laughed and disclaimed any sense of gloom, but his was

an embarrassed merriment, and he refrained from meeting the eye of the

minister. However, after another interval of silence, as if feeling

that he should at any rate say something, he reached over and laid a

patronizing hand upon the minister's knee.

"Of course, Doctor Hampstead," he suggested, "every one is confident you

will be able to prove your innocence."

The minister made an ejaculation that was short and sharp.

The doctor looked at him with surprise, as if questioning whether he

heard aright.

"Under the law, I thought a man was presumed to be innocent, and that

his accusers had to prove his guilt," went on Hampstead.

The doctor flushed slightly, and while his eyes roved through the car

window, declared:

"Well, I am afraid, Doctor Hampstead, you will find that a public man

against whom a charge like this is hurled is presumed to be guilty until

he proves himself innocent."

"That is your attitude?" inquired Hampstead coldly.

"Oh, by no means," protested the physician.

"It is his attitude all the same," commented the minister to himself,

somewhat bitterly, as he descended from the train at the station nearest

his home.

"How does he take it?" asked one sage citizen, crowding into the vacant

seat beside the physician, while a second leaned over from behind to

hear the answer.

"Very much worried," replied the doctor, as gravely and as oracularly as

he would have pronounced upon another man's patient. "Very much

worried!"

"Would you believe," the physician inquired presently of the first

citizen, with a hesitating and extremely confidential air, "would you

believe that Doctor Hampstead would say 'hell'--outside of a sermon, I

mean?"

"No," answered the man addressed, "I would not," and his eyebrows were

lifted, while his whole face expressed surprise, shock, and a desire for

confirmation.

"Well," concluded the doctor enigmatically, "neither would I." And that

was all Doctor Mann did say upon the subject, yet citizen number one,

while casting the dice with citizen number two at the Tobacco Emporium

on the corner next the railroad station to see which should pay for

their after-dinner smoke, communicated in confidence that the Reverend

Hampstead had, in the stress of his emotion, uttered an oath; in fact,

and to be specific, had said that his persecutors, all and singular, and

this actress woman in particular, could go to hell!

This conference between citizen one and two may have been overheard. An

inference that it was so overheard might have been drawn from the

columns of _The Sentinel_, which next morning concluded its story of the

remarkable developments of the night with the observation that the

character of the minister was evidently cracking under the strain, since

last night upon the suburban train, when a friend addressed him with a

solicitous inquiry, the accused clergyman had broken into a stream of

profane objurgations loud enough to be heard above the roar of the train

in several seats around. It was added that the reverend gentleman

quickly regained control of his feelings and apologized for his form of

expression by saying that he had been overworked for a long time and the

developments of the day had seriously upset him.

John Hampstead read this particular paragraph in _The Sentinel_ with a

sense of utter amazement at the wicked mendacity of public rumor, since

what he had said to Doctor Mann was merely "Humph!" uttered with sharp

and scornful emphasis.

But there was a far bigger story than that in the morning _Sentinel_.

It had to do with those things which happened between the hour when John

Hampstead dropped from his train, a little irritated with Doctor Mann,

and the hour when he went to bed, but not to sleep.

*CHAPTER XXVIII*

*THE ARREST*

As the perturbed minister, hurrying from the train, turned into the

short street leading toward his home upon the Bay-side, he was charged

upon by Dick and Tayna, both of whom, in the state of their emotion,

forgot High School dignity and came rushing upon their uncle with feet

thudding like running ostriches. Tayna's cheeks were red as her Titian

hair with flaming indignation, and her eyes burned like lights, while

her full red lips pouted out: "Isn't it a shame?"

"It's a darn piece of blackmail, that's what it is, and it's actionable,

too!"

This oracular verdict, of course, came panting from the lips of Dick,

who, over-exerted by his run, stood with arms akimbo, hands holding his

sides, and his too heavy head tipping backward on his shoulders, while

with scrutinizing eye he studied the face of his uncle.

As for Hampstead, in the devoted loyalty of these fatherless children

and the distress of mind which each exhibited, he entirely forgot the

sense of hot injustice and wrong burning in his own breast. All the

emotion he was then capable of turned itself into sympathy for them and

solicitous anticipations as to the effect of the whole wretched business

upon his sister Rose. With a sweep of his strong arms, he gathered the

two young people to his breast, printing a kiss on Tayna's cheek, which

he found burning hot, and squeezing Dick until the stripling gasped and

struggled for release as he used to do when a squirming youngster. With

his arms still affectionately about the shoulders of the two, Hampstead

walked on down the street, palm-studded, with flower-bordered skirts of

green on either side and the blue vista of the Bay showing dimly in the

growing dusk.

Rose was waiting on the piazza. Her face was very calm, yet to John's

keen eye, it bore a look of desperately mustered self-control. With the

ready intuition of her sex, she had divined far more completely than her

brother how desperate and dangerous was the struggle upon which he was

entering, and she was determined to give him every advantage that

sympathy, poise, and unwavering loyalty could supply.

"It's all right, Rose, all right," he hastened to assure her, as the

steps were mounted. "A mere extravagance of an excited woman that the

papers have made into a great sensation. It will melt away like fog.

We are helpless for a few days until I can demand and receive a hearing

upon preliminary trial. That will show that they have no case at all.

Until then, we must simply stand and be strong."

Rose was already in her brother's arms, yet his speech, instead of

reassuring her, made the tears flow.

"It is so--so humiliating to think of you defending yourself," she

protested, "to hear you talk of their inability to make out a case. It

seems so--so lowering, as if you were going to be put on trial just like

a criminal."

"Why," replied John, "that's just what it all means. _Just like a

criminal!_"

He said the thing strongly enough, but after it came a choke in the

throat. He had not really comprehended this before. He had thought of

making his defense from the standpoint of the popular idol that he was.

As a matter of fact, he was going to trial like any criminal. His

vantage ground was merely that of the prisoner at the bar. This

prepared him for what Rose had to say next; for subtly perceiving that

her brother had sustained an additional shock, her own self-control

revived. Wiping her eyes, she turned to lead the way within.

"They," she said solemnly, "are waiting in the study."

"They?" inquired Hampstead.

"There are four men in there," Rose replied. "They want," and her voice

threatened to break, "they want you!"

At this bald putting of the horrible fact, Tayna burst into a wail of

woe and flung her arms about her uncle, whom she had followed into the

hall.

"There, there, girl, don't cry," urged her uncle soothingly. "There is

no occasion for it; this is annoying but not necessarily distressing.

It is a mere formality of the law which must be complied with. Run

along now, all of you, and wash the tears out of your eyes. I will be

with you in five minutes. Let us sit down to a happy, cheerful dinner.

I confess I am a little upset myself, but not too disturbed to be

hungry," and with a weak attempt at grimacing humor, the big man laid a

hand upon the region of his diaphragm.

In his study, as Rose had forewarned him, the minister found four men:

Searle, Assistant District Attorney; Wyatt, Deputy Sheriff; and two city

detectives.

Searle was a suave, resourceful man and the one assistant in the

District Attorney's office whom Hampstead had found himself unable to

trust; and that rather because of his personal and political

associations than for any overt act of which the minister was cognizant.

Wyatt was a bloated person, amiable in disposition, whose excess of

egotism was coupled with a paucity of intelligence, yet wholly

incorruptible and with an exaggerated sense of duty that made him a

capable officer,--a thing with which his breeding, which was obtrusively

low, did not interfere.

Hampstead was able to master his feelings sufficiently to greet the

quartet urbanely, if not cordially.

"A disagreeable duty, I assure you," conceded Searle.

"A disagreeable experience," laughed Hampstead, but with no great

suggestion of levity.

"I guess I don't need to read this to you, Doc," said the Deputy

Sheriff, as he opened to Hampstead a document drawn from his pocket.

"It is a warrant for your arrest."

The minister took the document and glanced it through, his eyes

hesitating for a moment at the name of the complaining witness.

"Alice Higgins?" he asked, with an inquiring glance.

"The true name of the complaining witness and accuser," replied Searle.

"Oh, I see," assented John.

It had never occurred to him that Marien Dounay was only a stage name.

Was there anything at all about this woman that was not false, he

wondered.

John returned the warrant to Wyatt and caught the look in that officer's

eye. A sense of the horrible indignity of arrest came over the

minister, a perception of what it meant: this yielding of one's liberty,

of one's body to the possession of another, who might be a coarser and

more inferior person than one's self. With a guilty flush, John thought

how many times in his crusades against the gamblers and small

law-breakers he had procured the swearing out of complaints that led to

the arrest of scores of men. He had marveled at the venomous hatred

which those men later displayed toward himself, regarding him as the

author of a public disgrace put upon them, and not upon them alone but

upon their families also. Now he understood.

"The bail is fixed at ten thousand dollars," explained Searle smoothly.

"When we got your telephone message that you would be home at seven

o'clock, I took the liberty of arranging for Judge Brennan to be in his

chambers at nine to-night so that you could be there with your bondsmen

and not have to spend the night in jail."

"That was very considerate of you," assented the minister, a huskiness

in his tone despite himself.

The night in jail! The very idea. And ten thousand dollars bail! He

had expected to be released upon his own recognizance. Again that

disagreeable intimation of being treated like a common criminal came

crowding in with a suffocating effect upon his spirit. But he rallied,

exclaiming with another effort at easy urbanity: "Very well, I

acknowledge my arrest, and it will be unnecessary to detain you

gentlemen further. I shall be glad to meet you with my bondsmen in the

judge's chambers."

The Deputy Sheriff coughed in an embarrassed way, but stood stolidly

before his prisoner.

"I am sorry, Doctor Hampstead," explained Searle, "but we shall have to

search you. Benson's men here will do that."

"Search me?" exclaimed Hampstead, with a sudden sense of insult. "By

the appearance of things," he added, while casting a sarcastic look at

the signs of disorder about, "I should think this farce had been carried

far enough. You did not find the diamonds here. You do not expect to

find them upon my person, do you?"

The speaker's tones witnessed a natural indignation and considerable

irritability.

"I got to do my duty," replied Wyatt stubbornly, making a sign to the

two detectives, who immediately arose and advanced upon the minister.

For an instant the situation was exceedingly tense. Hampstead was a very

strong man, and his resentment at what seemed an insult put upon him

with malice, was very hot. But good sense triumphed in the interval of

thought which the officers diplomatically allowed.

"Oh, of course," he exclaimed with a gesture of submission, "you men are

only cogs. Once the machinery of the law is put in motion, you must

turn with the other wheels. Pardon my irritation, gentlemen, but the

situation is unusual for me and rather hard. I feel the injustice and

indignity of it very keenly."

"We appreciate your situation perfectly," said Assistant District

Attorney Searle smoothly. "As you say, we are all of us cogs."

Yet the actual search of his person, once entered on, seemed to

Hampstead to proceed rather perfunctorily, although at the same time he

got from the faces and manner of all four an impression of something

they were holding in reserve.

"What is this?" asked one of the detectives dramatically, holding up a

long, narrow key with a red rubber band doubled and looped about the

neck, which he had just extracted from the minister's pocket.

"That is the key to my safe deposit box at the Amalgamated National,"

replied Hampstead, naturally enough.

"Then," said Wyatt bluntly, "we've got to search that box."

The minister was instantly on his guard.

Some play of eyes between the four men, accompanied by a subtle change

in the expression of their faces, warned him that they must have been

apprised of the existence of this box and that the key was the real

object of their personal search. Hampstead resolved hastily to defeat

them.

"I decline to permit it," he declared shortly. "There are very private

papers in that box, things which have been communicated to me in the

utmost confidence, and I would not be justified in permitting you--or

any one else--to handle them. Under the rules of the bank, without my

consent or an order of court, you could not reach the box."

"I have that order of court here," said Searle, speaking up quickly, but

with cold precision of utterance, "in a search warrant directed

particularly to your safe deposit box."

Like a flash, Hampstead thought that he understood.

"So that is what you are here for, Searle?" he snapped sarcastically,

turning and confronting the Assistant District Attorney. "I never have

trusted you. I couldn't understand your presence here or your interest

in this silly charge; but now I comprehend fully. You have taken

advantage of it to get your eyes on the perjury case I have against your

bosom friend, Jack Roche. Well, I warn you! This is where I stop and

fight!"

But Searle refused to get angry at this bald impugnment of his integrity

and motives. No doubt it was his confidence in an ultimate and complete

humiliation of the minister that enabled him to maintain an unruffled

demeanor while he suggested blandly:

"Perhaps you ought not to proceed further, Doctor Hampstead, without the

advice of a lawyer."

The proposal touched the minister in his pride.

"A lawyer?" he objected scornfully. "Thank you, no! My cause requires

no expert advocacy. In my experience of the past four years, I have

learned quite enough about court practice to cope with this ridiculous

burlesque without professional assistance."

Searle, playing his cards deliberately, took advantage of the minister's

assumed acquaintance with legal lore to suggest with alacrity:

"You know then, Doctor, that it is useless to fight a court order of

this sort, as you spoke of doing in your excitement a moment ago. I

think, with the attorneys of your Civic League, you have gone through a

safe deposit box or two upon your own account, by means of just such a

search warrant as I now exhibit to you."

Again Hampstead's second thought assured him that he was powerless to

resist.

"Yes," he confessed resignedly to Searle's speech, after the necessary

interval for consideration, "I suppose I must admit it. When I spoke of

fighting, I spoke in heat; partly because I feel the gross injustice and

bitter wrong this senseless charge is doing to innocent people other

than myself, who am also innocent, and partly because, as I have already

told you, I utterly distrust your motive in making the whole of this

search. You must be as well aware as I that this charge is the work of

a woman who, to speak most charitably, is beside herself with

excitement."

But Searle only smiled, and observed with urbanity unruffled.

"I am sorry, Doctor, that you distrust me. You may have the privilege,

of course, of being present when we examine the contents of the box."

"Naturally I shall insist upon that," said the minister.

"In that case," Searle added with significant emphasis, "I think your

observations will convince you that we are solely concerned in a search

for the diamonds."

"As I like to believe well of all men, I shall hope so," countered the

minister; and then, since the demeanor of the officers made it clear

there was no more searching to be done, he continued, after a glance at

his watch: "If I am to meet Judge Brennan and yourself with my bondsmen

at nine o'clock, I suggest that we go from there direct to the bank

vaults. They are accessible until midnight, as you doubtless know."

"Very good, Doctor," replied Searle in that oily voice which indicated

how completely to his satisfaction affairs were progressing.

"And now," suggested the minister, with a nod toward the street door,

"as the hour is late, I will ask you gentlemen to excuse me."

Searle darted a look at Wyatt.

"Very sorry, Doc, but I got to stay with you," volunteered the deputy,

"and hand you over to the judge."

Once more the flush of offense mounted to the cheek of Hampstead. Hand

him over to the judge! How galling such language was when used of him!

Again he recalled with compunction how many arrests he had caused

without an emotion beyond the satisfaction of an angler when he hooks a

fish. But he--John Hampstead--minister, preacher, pastor of All

People's; a shining light in a vast metropolitan community! Surely it

was something different and infinitely more degrading for him to be

arrested than for a mere plasterer, or mayhap a councilman? He had a

greater right than they to be wrathful and resentful. Besides, they

were guilty. Judges, juries, or their own confessions, had unfailingly

so declared. He was innocent, spotlessly innocent of the charge against

him. His defenselessness proceeded from relations of comparative

intimacy with the actress, and his priestly knowledge of the guilty

person. Yet the thought of this helped humor and good sense to triumph

again, over his rising choler.

"Oh, very well," he exclaimed, half-jocularly, half-derisively. "Make

yourself at home; all of you make yourselves at home. We are accustomed

to an unexpected guest or two at the table. Be prepared to come out to

dinner. Listen, if you like, while an arrested felon telephones to his

friends, seeking bondsmen. You may hear secret codes and signals

passing over the wire. You may even wish to put under surveillance the

gentlemen with whom I communicate."

"Doctor! Doctor!" protested Searle, with hands uplifted comically.

"Your hospitality and your irony both embarrass us. The detectives and

I will be on our way. Wyatt will have to do his duty."

"As you please," exclaimed Hampstead, who was fast recovering his poise;

"quite as you please."

With this speech he held open the outside door and bade the three

departing guests good evening; and then, while the Deputy waited in the

room, the clergyman was busy at the telephone until he had the promise

of three different gentlemen of his acquaintance to meet him at Judge

Brennan's chambers at nine that night and qualify as his bondsmen in the

sum of ten thousand dollars.

This much attended to, dinner became the next order; but it was not a

very happy affair. There had never been a time when the little family

group, bound together by ties that were unusually tender, wished more to

be alone at a meal. Now, when the superfluous presence was the official

representative of the very thing that had plunged them into gloom, the

situation became one of torture. Food stuck to palates. Scraps of

conversation were dropped at rare intervals and upon entirely extraneous

subjects in which nobody, not even the speakers, had the slightest

interest. At times there was no sound save the audible enjoyment of his

food by their guest, for the Deputy Sheriff, accustomed to the ruthless

thrust of his official self into the personal and sometimes the domestic

life of individuals, was quite too crass to sense the embarrassment and

positive pain his presence caused and was also exceedingly hungry.

In this general silence, the grating of wheels on the graveled walk

outside the study door sounded loudly.

"Mrs. Burbeck!" exclaimed Hampstead in some surprise. "She never came to

me at night before. Finish your dinner, Deputy. If you will excuse me,

I must receive one of my parishioners in the study."

"Sorry, but I can't excuse you, Doc," replied Wyatt jocularly; "but if

you'll excuse me for just a minute, while I get away with this second

piece of loganberry pie, I'll be with you."

"Be with me?" asked the minister, color rising. "Do you mean that you

will intrude upon the privacy of an interview with a helpless lady in a

wheel chair who comes to see me alone?"

Wyatt's fat cheek was bulging, and there were tiny streams of crimson

juice at the corners of the lips; but he interrupted himself long enough

to reply bluntly: "I ain't agoin' to let you out of my sight. Orders is

orders, that's all I got to say."

"But tell me, Wyatt, who gave you such orders?" queried the minister,

with no effort to conceal his irritation.

"Searle. And they were give to him," answered the Deputy

phlegmatically, his fat-imbedded eyes intent upon the white and crimson

segment of pastry on his plate.

"And who gave such orders to him?" persisted Hampstead.

"If you ask me--" began the Deputy, and then exasperatingly blotted out

the possibility of further speech by the transfer of the dripping

triangle to his mouth.

"Well, I do ask you," declared the minister curtly.

"He got 'em from Miss Dounay."

"And is that woman running the District Attorney's office?" questioned

the minister scornfully.

"Search me!" gulped Wyatt, with a shrug of his shoulders. "I had one

look at her. She's got eyes like a pair of automatics. You take it

from me, Doc," and Wyatt laid his unoccupied hand upon the sleeve of the

minister, "if she's got anything on you, compromise and do it quick; if

she ain't, fight, and fight like h----." Wyatt stopped and shot an

apologetic glance around the table. "'Scuse my French," he blurted,

"but you know what I mean."

"Yes," said the minister, holding his head very straight, "I realize

that you do not mean to insult me."

"Insult you?" argued the Deputy, overflowing with satisfied amiability.

"After coming over here to arrest you, and you givin' me a dinner like

this? Pie like this? Well, I guess not. I'm bribed, Doc, that's what I

am. I got to go in that room with you when you see the old lady; but

I'll hold my thumbs in my ears, and I won't see a d---- there I go

again." Once more Wyatt's apologetic look swept around the table.

"Mrs. Burbeck is in the study," announced the maid.

*CHAPTER XXIX*

*THE ANGEL ADVISES*

Because locomotion was not easy for her, it was to have been expected

that the conferences between John Hampstead and Mrs. Burbeck, which,

especially in the early days of his pastorate, had been so many, would

take place in that lady's home; and they usually did. But as time went

on, her own independence of spirit and increased consideration for the

minister led Mrs. Burbeck frequently to prefer to come to him. To make

this easy, two planks had been laid to form a simple runway to the stoop

at the study door. When, therefore, the minister entered his library

to-night, closely followed by Wyatt, he found that good woman waiting in

the wheel chair beside his desk. The object of her call showed

instantly in an expression of boundless and tender solicitude; and yet

the clergyman immediately forgot himself in a conscience-stricken

concern for his visitor.

"You should not have come," he exclaimed quickly, sympathy and mild

reproach mingling, while a devotion like that of a son for a mother was

conveyed in his tone and glance.

Truly, Mrs. Burbeck had never looked so frail. All but the faintest

glow of color had gone from her cheeks; her eyes were bright, but with a

luster that seemed unearthly, and her skin had a transparent, wax-like

look that to the clergyman was alarmingly suggestive, as if the pale

bloom of another world were upon her cheeks, which a single breath must

wither.

Making these observations swiftly as his stride carried him to her, the

minister, speaking in that rich baritone of melting tenderness which was

one of Hampstead's most charming personal assets, concluded with: "You

are not well. You are not at all well."

"Oh, yes," the Angel answered, "I am well."

Although she spoke in a voice that appeared to be thin to the point of

breaking, her tone was even, and her senses proclaimed their alertness

by allowing her eyes to wander from the face of the minister and fix

themselves inquiringly over his shoulder on the unembarrassed, stolid

man at the door.

"Tell her not to mind me, Doc," interjected Wyatt in a stuffy voice. At

the same time an exploratory thumb brought up a quill from a vest

pocket, and the deputy began with entire assurance the after-dinner

toilet of his teeth, while his eyes roamed the ceiling and the tops of

the bookcases as if suddenly oblivious of the presence of other persons

in the room.

"Yes," said the minister reassuringly, "we will not be disturbed by Mr.

Wyatt's presence. He is merely doing his duty."

"You are--?" Mrs. Burbeck hesitated with an upward inflection, and the

disagreeable word unuttered.

"Yes," replied the minister gravely, his inflection falling where hers

had risen. "I am."

"Oh, that woman! That woman!" murmured Mrs. Burbeck, "I have mistrusted

her and been sorry for her all at once. But it was Rollie that I feared

for."

There was a sigh of relief that was as near to an exhibition of

selfishness as Mrs. Burbeck had ever approached; after which,

mother-like, she lapsed into a rhapsody over her son.

"Rollie," she began, in doting accents, "is so young, so handsome, so

responsive to beauty of any sort; so ready to believe the best of every

one. I feared that he would fall in love with her and ruin his business

career--you know how these theatrical marriages always turn out--or that

she would jilt him and break his heart. Rollie has such a sensitive,

expansive nature. He has always been trusted so widely by so many

people. Since that boy has grown up, I have lived my whole life in him.

Do you know," and she leaned forward and lowered her voice to an

impressive and exceedingly intimate note; "it seems to me that if

anything should happen to Rollie, it would crush me, that I should not

care to live,--in fact should not be able to live."

Tears came readily to the limpid pools of her eyes, and the delicately

chiseled lips trembled, though they bravely tried to smile.

Hampstead sat regarding her thoughtfully, love and apprehension mingling

upon his face. It suddenly reoccurred to him with compelling force that

the most awful cruelty that could be inflicted would be for this

delicate and fragile woman, who to-night looked more like an

ambassadress from some other existence than a thing of flesh and blood,

to know the truth about her son. Seeing her thus smiling trustfully

through her mother-tears, thinking of all that her sweet, saint-like

confidences had meant to him, Hampstead felt a mighty resolve growing

stronger and stronger within him.

But for once Mrs. Burbeck's intuitions were not sure, and she

misconstrued the meaning of her pastor's silence.

"Forgive me," she pleaded in tones of self-reproach. "Here I am in the

midst of your trouble babbling of myself and my son. Yet that is like a

mother. She never sees a young man's career blighted but she grows

suddenly apprehensive for the child of her own bosom. Now that feeling

comes to me with double force. I love you almost as a son.

Consequently, when I see my boy out there in the sun of life mounting so

buoyantly, and you, so worthy to mount, but struggling in mid-flight

under a cloud, I feel a mingling of two painful emotions. I suffer as if

struck upon the heart. My spirit of sympathy and apprehension rushes me

to you, yet when I get to you, my doting mother's heart makes me babble

first of my boy. And so," she concluded, with an apologetic smile, "you

see how weak and frail and egotistic I am, after all."

"But," protested Hampstead, who had been eager to break in, "my career

is not blighted. I am not under a cloud. It annoyed me to-night upon

the boat and train to discover how suddenly I was pilloried by my

enemies and avoided by my friends. They seem to take it for granted

that I am already smirched; that to me the subject must be painful, and

as there is no other subject to be thought of at the moment, hence

conversation will also be painful. Because of this I am a pariah, to be

shunned like any leper."

With rising feeling, the young minister snatched a breath and hurried

on.

"Now, Mrs. Burbeck, I do not feel like that at all. I have put myself

in the way of sustaining this attack through following the course of

duty, as I conceived it. I need not assure you that I am innocent of a

vulgar thing like burglary. I need not assure the public. It is

impossible that they should believe it. Nevertheless, I have seen

enough in the papers to-night to show how they will revel at seeing me

enmeshed in the toils of circumstance. To them it is a rare spectacle.

Very well, let it be a spectacle. It is one in which I shall triumph.

I propose to fight. I feel like fighting." His fist was clenched and

came down upon the arm of his chair, and his voice, though still low,

was full of vibrant power.

"I feel that I have the right to call upon every friend, upon every

member of All People's, upon every believer in those things for which I

have fought in this community, to rally to my side to fight shoulder to

shoulder in the battle to repel what in effect is an assault not upon

me, but upon the things for which I stand."

Mrs. Burbeck's expressive eyes were floating full with a look that

verged from sympathy toward pity.

"You will have to be a very expert tactician," she said soberly, drawing

on those fountains of ripe wisdom, so full at times that they seemed to

mount toward inspiration; "if you are to make the public think of your

embarrassment in that way. It is going to look at this as a disgraceful

personal entanglement of a minister with an actress!"

Hampstead writhed in his chair. Nothing but the depth of his

consideration for Mrs. Burbeck kept him from exclaiming vehemently

against what he deemed the enormous injustice of this assumption.

"She's right, Doc; right's your left leg," sounded a throaty voice,

which startled the two of them into remembering that they were not

alone.

"Why, Wyatt!" exclaimed the minister reprovingly, turning sharply on the

deputy.

"Excuse me, Doc," Wyatt mumbled abjectly. "I just thought that out

loud. All the same, she's wisin' you up to somethin' if you'll let 'er.

Some of these old dames that ain't got nothin' to do but just set and

think gets hep to a lot of things that a hustlin' man overlooks."

Hampstead was disgusted.

"Don't interrupt us again, please, Wyatt," he observed, combining

dignity and rebuke in his utterance.

But Wyatt, influenced no doubt by the look almost of fright on Mrs.

Burbeck's face, was already in apologetic mood.

"Say," he mumbled contritely, "you're right, Doc. I'm so sorry for the

break that, orders or no orders, I'll just step out in the hall while

you finish. But all the same, you listen to her," and he indicated the

disturbed and slightly offended Mrs. Burbeck with a stab of a toothpick

in the air, "and she'll tell you somethin' that's useful."

"Thank you very much, Wyatt," replied the minister in noncommittal

tones, but with a sigh of relief as the deputy withdrew from the room.

Yet he had a growing sense of depression. Wyatt's boorish, croaking

interruption had thrown him out of poise. Mrs. Burbeck's exaggerated

sense of the gravity of the matter weighed him down like lead, and the

more because an inner voice, sounding faintly and from far away, but

with significance unmistakable, seemed to tell him her view was right.

Nevertheless, his whole soul rose in protest. It ought not to be right.

It was a gross travesty on justice and on popular good sense.

Mrs. Burbeck, looking at him fixedly, noted this change in spirit and

the conflict of emotions which resulted. Reaching out impulsively, she

touched the large hand of the man where it lay upon the desk.

"I feared you would take it too lightly," she reflected. "Youth always

does that. For this world about you to turn and gnash you is mere human

nature, which it is your business to understand. Has it never occurred

to you that the same voices who upon Sunday cried out: 'Hosannah,

Hosannah to the son of David!' upon Friday shouted: 'Away with him!

Crucify him! Crucify him!'"

"But I am innocent," Hampstead protested, though weakly.

"And so was He," Mrs. Burbeck replied simply.

"But He was worthy to suffer. I am not," murmured Hampstead humbly.

"Sometimes," suggested the sweet-voiced woman, "suffering makes us

worthy."

"But," affirmed the minister, his fighting spirit coming back to him, "I

can prove my innocence!"

The face of Mrs. Burbeck lighted. "Then you must," she said decisively.

"You give me hope when you say that. It was to tell you that I came,

fearful that you would rely upon the public to assume your innocence

until your guilt was proven. Alas, they are more likely to assume the

contrary, to hold you guilty until you prove yourself innocent."

"I have been made to see that already," replied Hampstead. "At first,

no doubt, I did underestimate the gravity of the situation. You have

helped me to appraise its dangers more accurately."

But Mrs. Burbeck had more important advice to give.

"Yes," she went on half-musingly, because tactfulness appeared to

suggest that form of utterance, "you will have to vindicate yourself

absolutely. It is a practical situation. The danger is not that you

will be convicted and sent to jail. Nobody believes that, I should say.

The danger is that a question-mark will be permanently attached to your

name and character. The Reverend John Hampstead, interrogation point!

Is he a thief, or not? Did he compromise himself, or not? Is he weak,

or not? This is the thing to fear, the thing that would condemn you and

brand you as stripes brand a convict."

For a tense, reflective moment the minister's lips had grown dry and

bloodless; and then he confessed grudgingly: "I begin to see that you

are right."

"You should begin your defense by a counter-attack," Mrs. Burbeck

continued, feeling that the man was sufficiently aroused now to

appreciate the importance of vigorous defensive actions. "Declare your

disbelief that the diamonds have actually been stolen. Get out a

warrant of search, and you will probably find them now concealed among

her effects. At any rate this counter-search would hold the public

verdict in suspense; and it would be like your well-known aggressive

personality. If the search fails to reveal them, if her diamonds really

are stolen, your complete vindication must depend upon the capture and

exposure of the real thief."

Hampstead wiped his moist brow nervously. It was uncannily terrible

that this woman of all persons in the world should say this to him.

However, he had sufficient presence of mind to urge:

"But how unjust to force a contract like that upon me."

"It is unjust," admitted the Angel of the Chair. "Yet the innocent often

suffer injustice, and you must realize that you are not immune. That is

your only course, and I came specifically to warn you of it. Prove

there was no theft, or get the thief!"

There was snap and sparkle in Mrs. Burbeck's eyes. Despite her physical

frailty, her spirit was stout, and her conviction so forcefully conveyed

that the minister delivered himself of a gesture of utter helplessness.

"I cannot do either," he said, half-whispering his desperation. "Yet I

think I appreciate better than you how sound your advice has been. But

there are reasons that I cannot give you, that I cannot give to any one,

why the course which you suggest cannot be followed. I must go another

way to vindication; but," and his voice rose buoyantly, "I will go and I

will get it."

Mrs. Burbeck received with misgivings her pastor's complete rejection of

the advice she had offered, yet some unconscious force in the young

minister's manner swept her on quickly against her judgment and her will

to an enormous increase of faith, both in the strength and the judgment

of the man. As for Hampstead, he concluded his rejection by doing

something he had never done before. That was to lean low, his face

chiseled in lines of gravity and devotion, and taking the delicate hand

of Mrs. Burbeck, that in its weakness was like a drooping flower, lift

it to his lips and kiss it.

"Conserve all your spirit," he said solemnly, still clinging tenderly to

the hand. "It may be that I shall have to lean heavily upon you."

"You may have my life to the uttermost," she breathed trustfully, never

dreaming the thought unthinkable which the words suggested to her pastor

and friend. But an extraneous idea came pressing in, and Mrs. Burbeck

raised toward the minister, in a gesture of appeal, the hand his lips

had just been pressing, as she pleaded: "And do not think too hardly of

the woman. She loves you."

"Loves me!" protested Hampstead, with a ghastly hoarseness. "The woman

is incapable of love--of passion even. She is all fire, but without

heat--though once she had it. She is a mere blaze of ambition. All she

cared for was to bring me to my knees, to dangle me like a scalp at her

waist."

Mrs. Burbeck steadied him with a glance from a mind unimpressed.

"Be sorry, very sorry for her!" she insisted gravely. "Acquit yourself

of no impatience--not even a reproachful look, if you can help it. She

is to be pitied. Only the malice of unsated love could do what she has

done. Show yourself noble enough, Christ-like enough, to be very, very

sorry for her!"

"_We got to go if we get there by nine!_"

It was the smothered voice of Wyatt, calling through the door.

*CHAPTER XXX*

*THE SCENE IN THE VAULT*

Silas Wadham, mine-owner; William Hayes, merchant, and E. H. Wilson,

capitalist, subscribed to Hampstead's bond. Each was a big man in his

way; each had unbounded faith in the integrity and good sense of the

minister. They were not men to be swept off their feet by mere surface

currents. They laughed a little and rallied John upon his plight, yet

he knew somehow by the bend of the jaw when they dipped their pens in

ink and with clamped lips subscribed their signatures, that these men

were his unshakably.

One circumstance might have seemed strange. None of them were members

of All People's. Yet this was not because there were not men in All

People's who would have qualified as unhesitatingly; but because John

had a feeling that he was being assailed as a community character rather

than as a clerical one.

Within ten minutes the formalities in Judge Brennan's chamber were

concluded, Hampstead was free, but as he turned to Searle waiting

suavely, backed by the suggestive presence of the two detectives, there

came suddenly into his mind the memory that Rollie Burbeck's I.O.U. for

eleven hundred dollars was in his safe deposit box in the envelope

marked "Wadham Currency." This was a chaos-producing thought. If

Searle once got an eye on that card, it would start innumerable trains

of suspicion, each of which must center on the young bank cashier. In

his present state, that boy was too weak to resist pressure of any sort.

He would crumble and go to pieces, And yet, it was not the thought of

the exposure and ruin of this spoiled young man that moved Hampstead to

another of those acts which only riveted the chains of suspicion more

tightly upon himself. It was the vision of the mother who only an hour

before had murmured tremulously: "If anything should happen to him, I

should not be able to live."

"Searle!" exclaimed the minister passionately. "You must not proceed

with this. If you are a man of any heart, you will not persist against

my pleadings. I tell you frankly there are secrets in that box which,

while they would do you no good, could be used to ruin innocent

men--guilty ones, too, perhaps; but the innocent with the guilty."

Hampstead was speaking hoarsely, his voice raised and trembling with an

excitement and lack of nerve control he had never exhibited before in

public.

The prosecutor's face pictured surprise and even gloating, but his eyes

expressed a purpose unshaken.

"Confidences in my possession must be respected," Hampstead went on,

arguing vehemently. "The confidences of a patient to his physician, of

a penitent to his priest, are respected by the law. Because some of

these confidences happen to be in writing, you have no right to violate

them."

"And I tell you I have no intention to violate them," Searle returned

testily. "My order is a warrant of search for a diamond necklace."

"And I tell you I will not respect the order of the court," blazed the

minister. "You shall not examine the box!"

Judge Mortimer was startled; the bondsmen, although surprised by the

minister's show of feeling, were sympathetic.

"I do not care whether you consent or not," Searle rejoined

sarcastically. "I have the key, and I have the order of court, which

the vault custodian must respect. I have done you the courtesy to meet

you here so that you might be present when the box was examined. You

must be beside yourself to suppose that I can be swayed from my duty,

even temporarily, by an appeal like this."

"I think, Doctor, you should have the advice of your attorney on this,"

suggested Mr. Wilson considerately; and then turning to the Assistant

District Attorney, observed sharply: "It seems to me, Searle, that this

is rather a high-handed procedure."

But this remark of the practical Mr. Wilson had an instantly calming

effect upon the minister.

"No, no," Hampstead exclaimed, turning to his friend; "I do not want an

attorney. I do not need an attorney. I should only be misunderstood.

It is the thought of what might result to innocent people through an

examination of this box that stirs me so deeply."

"All the same, I think we had better have an attorney immediately,"

declared Wilson. "I can send my car for Bowen and have him here in

fifteen minutes."

"An attorney," commented Searle brusquely, "could do nothing except to

get an order from a Superior Court judge enjoining the bank from obeying

the search warrant of this court. He would be lucky if, at this time of

night, he caught a judge and got that under two or three hours. I will

be in that box in five minutes. Come along, if you want to."

Searle moved toward the door, followed by the two detectives, his

purpose perfectly plain; yet the minister hung back, for the first time

so confused by entangling developments that he could not see where to

put his foot down next.

"I think, Doctor Hampstead," advised Mr. Wadham kindly, "that since the

District Attorney has matters in his own hands, you had better go with

him and witness the search. If you do not object, we shall be glad to

accompany you. Our presence may prove helpful later."

Because his mind ran forward in an absorbed attempt to forecast and

forestall the probable developments from the impending discovery of the

clue against Rollie, the minister still paused, until his silence became

as conspicuous as his inaction.

"Oh, yes, yes," he exclaimed, suddenly aware of the waiting group about

him. "Yes, by all means, go with me. What we must face, we must face,"

he concluded desperately, with an uneasy inner intimation that he was

saying perhaps the wrong thing. Yet with the vision of Mrs. Burbeck's

saintly, smiling face before him, Hampstead, usually so calm and

self-controlled, had little care what he said or how he said it so long

as his mind was busy with some plan to fend off this frightful blow from

her.

Mr. Wadham was a man of mature years and fatherly ways. He took the

young minister's arm affectionately in his, and urged him forward in the

wake of Searle, who had already moved out into the wide hall accompanied

by the two plain-clothes men. Hayes and Wilson, still sympathetic, but

no longer quite comprehending the undue excitement of the young divine

in whose integrity their confidence was so great, fell in behind.

Once before the custodian of the vault, another evidence of the

thoughtfulness of Searle appeared. John R. Costello, attorney of the

bank, was conveniently on hand to read the warrant of the court and to

instruct the custodian of the vault upon whom it was served that it was

in proper form and must be obeyed.

Because the number of witnesses was too large to be accommodated in the

rooms provided for customers, the inspection of the minister's box was

made upon a table in the vault room itself. In the group of onlookers,

Hampstead, because of his commanding figure, his remarkable face, and

his very natural interest in the proceedings, was the most conspicuous

presence. As naturally as all eyes centered on the box, just so they

kept breaking away at intervals to scan the face of the big man who

stood before them in an attitude of embarrassed helplessness. He was

obviously making a considerable effort to control himself. Only Searle

was sure that he understood this. But at the same moment, two of the

bondsmen, the kind-hearted Wadham and the shrewd, practical Wilson,

appeared to observe this attitude and to detect its significance. They

exchanged questioning glances, and were further mystified when for a

single moment a look of confident reassurance flickered like the play of

a sunbeam upon the face of the minister.

That was in his one selfish moment, when he recalled how the search of

the box, after all these excessive precautions of the District

Attorney's office, could only recoil upon their case like a boomerang;

but his countenance shaded again to an expression of anxious

helplessness as Searle paused dramatically a moment with his hand upon

the box. Then the hand lifted the hinged cover, revealing the contents.

As if from a nervous eagerness to come quickly at the object of his

search, the Assistant District Attorney turned the box upside down and

emptied its contents on the table; and yet, when this was done, nothing

appeared but papers.

Searle attempted to open none of them. Proceeding with deliberate care,

as if to vindicate himself in the eyes of the bondsmen from the

suspicion of the minister that he might be on a "fishing expedition", he

merely took up each piece singly and precisely, felt it over with his

long, thin fingers and laid it by, until at length but two envelopes

remained. The first of these was long and empty looking and gave

evidence that the flap had been rudely, if not hastily, torn open.

Searle held it in his hand now.

Hampstead's heart stood still; he knew that this must be the envelope

which had contained the Wadham currency, hence between this attorney's

thumb and forefinger, screened by one thickness of paper, lay the card

that was the clue to Rollie Burbeck's crime. But the moment of suspense

passed.

Submitting it to the same inquisitive finger manipulation as the others,

yet not looking within it nor turning it over to read what might be

written on the face, Searle laid the Wadham envelope on the pile of

discards.

"Thank God," gulped Hampstead, yet with utterance so inchoate that

Hayes, the third bondsman, standing nearest, did not catch the words,

but a few minutes later, discussing the matter with Wilson, said: "I

heard the apprehensive rattle in his throat just before Searle came to

that last envelope."

But in the meantime, Hampstead was asking himself suspiciously what was

this last envelope? He thought he knew by heart every separate document

that was in the box, and he could not recall what this might be.

"You must be convinced by now," argued Searle, as if deliberately

heightening the suspense, while he turned a straight glance upon the

minister, "that I had no object in inspecting the contents of this box

except to search for the diamonds."

"And you have not found them!"

This was obviously the remark which should have come in triumphant,

challenging tones from the minister. As a matter of fact, it came

quietly, and with a sigh of relief, from Silas Wadham.

The minister did not speak at all, did not even raise his eyes to meet

the glance of Searle. His gaze was fixed as his mind was fascinated by

the mystery of the last lone envelope.

"Not yet," replied Searle significantly to Wadham's interjection, but

instead of disappointment there was that quality in his tones which

heightens and intensifies expectancy. At the same time he took up the

envelope by one end, but, under the weight of something within, the

paper bent surprisingly in the middle and the lower end swung pendant

and baglike, accompanied by the slightest perceptible metallic sound.

Every member of the group of witnesses leaned forward with an

involuntary start. Triumph flooded the face of Searle. With his left

hand he seized the heavy, bag-like end and raised it while the envelope

was turned in his fingers bringing into view the printing in the corner.

"This envelope bears the name and address of the Reverend John

Hampstead," he announced in formal tones. "I now open it in your

presence."

Nervously the Assistant District Attorney tore off the end of the

envelope, squinted within, and exclaimed: "It contains--" His voice

halted for an instant while he dramatically tipped the envelope toward

the table and a string of fire flowed out and lay quivering before the

eyes of all--"the Dounay diamonds!"

The jewels, trembling under the impulse of the movement by which they

had been deposited upon the table, sparkled as if with resentful

brilliance at having been thus darkly immured, and for an appreciable

interval they compelled the attention of all; then every eye was turned

upon the accused minister.

But these inquisitorial glances came too late. Amazement, bewilderment,

a sense of outrage, and hot indignation, had been reeled across the

screen of his features; but that was in the ticking seconds while the

gaze of all was on the envelope and then upon the diamonds and their

aggressive scintillations. Now the curious eyes rested upon a man who,

after a moment in which to think, had visioned himself surrounded and

overwhelmed by circumstances that were absolutely damning,--his own

conduct of the last few minutes the most damning of all. His face was

as white as the paper of the envelope which contained the irrefutable

evidence. His eyes revolved uncertainly and then went questioningly

from face to face in the circle round him as if for confirmation of the

conclusion to which the logic of his own mind forced him irresistibly.

In not one was that confirmation wanting.

"But," he protested wildly, and then his glance broke down. "It has

come," he murmured hoarsely, covering his face with his hands. "It has

come!"

His cross had come!

Some odd, disastrous chain of sequences which he had not yet had time to

reason out had fixed this crime on him. By another equally disastrous

chain of sequences, he must bear its guilt or be false to his

confessor's vow. Especially must he bear it, if he would shield that

doting mother who trusted him and loved him.

As if to hold himself together, he clasped his arms before him, and his

chin sunk forward on his breast. As if to accustom his mind to the new

view from which he must look out upon the world, he closed his eyes.

The heaving chest, the tense jaws, the quivering lips, and the mop of

hair that fell disheveled round his temples, all combined to make up the

convincing picture of a strong man breaking.

Not one of those present, crass or sympathetic, but felt himself the

witness to a tragedy in which a man of noble aspirations had been

overtaken and hopelessly crushed by an ingrained weakness which had

expressed itself in sordid crime.

Even the hard face of Searle softened. With the diamonds gleaming where

they lay, he began mechanically to replace the contents of the box. But

at the first sound of rustling papers, the minister appeared to rouse

again. He had stood all alone. No one had touched him. No one had

addressed him. The most indifferent in this circle were stricken dumb

by the spectacle of his fall, while his friends were almost as much

appalled and dazed as he himself appeared to be.

"I suppose," he said with melancholy interest, at the same time moving

round the table to the box, "that I may take it now."

"Certainly, Doctor," replied Searle suavely, yielding his place.

Nevertheless, there was a slight expression of surprise upon his face,

as upon those of the others, at the minister's sudden revival of concern

in what must now be an utterly trifling detail so far as his own future

went. Hampstead appeared to perceive this.

"There are sacred responsibilities here," he explained gravely, with a

halting utterance that proclaimed the deeps that heaved within him;

"which, strange as it may seem to you gentlemen, even at such an hour I

would not like to forget."

Taking up a handful of the papers, he ran them through his fingers, his

eye pausing for a moment to scan each one of them, and his expression

kindling with first one memory and then another, as if he found a

mournful satisfaction in recalling past days when many a man and woman

had found peace for their souls in making him the sharer in their

heart-burdens,--days which every member of that little circle felt

instinctively were now gone forever.

Last of all his eye checked itself upon the envelope marked "Wadham

Currency." Allowing the other papers to slip back to their place in the

box the minister turned his glance into the open side of this remaining

envelope. It was empty, save for a card tucked in the corner.

"This thing appears to have served its purpose," he commented absently,

as if talking to himself. Then casually he tore the envelope across,

and then again and again; finer and finer; yet not so fine as to excite

suspicion. Looking for a wastebasket and finding none, he was about to

drop the fragments in his coat pocket.

"I will take them," said the vault custodian, holding out his hand. To

it the minister unhesitatingly committed the shredded envelope and card

which contained the only documentary clue to any other person than

himself as the thief of the Dounay diamonds. A few minutes later, this

clue was in the wastebasket outside. The next morning it was in the

furnace.

The group in the vault room broke away with dispirited slowness, as

mourners turn from the freshly heaped earth. Behind all the minister

lingered, as if unwilling to leave the presence of his dead reputation.

But the man's appearance somewhat belied his mood. He was thinking

swiftly. This was no uncommon plot which had overtaken him. It was

conceived in craft and laid with power to kill. The diabolical cunning

of the scheme was that it forced him to be silent or to be a traitor.

The indications were that he had been betrayed outrageously; but he did

not know this positively, therefore he could venture no defense at all

against this black array of circumstances. It might be only some

terrible mistake, and for him to venture more now than the most general

denial might bring about the very calamities he was trying to avert. He

dared not even tell the truth: that he did not know the diamonds were in

the box. Especially, he dared not say that he did not put them there.

For the first time an emotion like fear entered his soul, but it passed

the moment the priestly ardor in him saw which way his duty lay. If

Rollie had grossly sold him into the power of the actress at the price

of his own escape, he felt more sorry for the poor wretch than before.

He was glad that he had destroyed the I.O.U., discovery of which might

have incriminated the young man helplessly, and he resolved to continue

upon his mission as a saviour, even though he himself were lost. It

suddenly occurred to him with doubling force that this was what it meant

to be a saviour.

With this conviction firmly in his mind, Hampstead turned to Wilson,

Wadham, and Hayes, who had been waiting in considerate silence, and led

the way upward to the dimly lighted lobby of the bank, feeling himself

grow stronger with every step he mounted; for the maze of complexities

in which he found himself had quickly reduced itself to the simple duty

of being true to trust. Eternal Loyalty was again to be the price of

success.

As his friends gathered about him on the upper floor for a word of

conference, they were astonished at the change in his expression. It

was calm and even confident; while a kind of spiritual radiance suffused

his features.

"My friends," the minister began in an even voice, that nevertheless was

full of the echo of deep feeling, "I can offer you no explanation of the

scene to which you have just been witnesses. It is almost inevitable

that you should think me guilty or criminally culpable. I am neither!"

The affirmation was made as if to acquit his conscience, rather than as

if to be expected to be believed.

"But," and his utterance became incisive, "there is nothing to that

effect which can be said now."

"Something had better be said now," blurted out the practical Wilson

flatly, "or this story in the morning papers will damn you as black as

tar."

"Not one word," declared the minister with quiet emphasis, "can be

spoken now!"

In Hampstead's bearing there was a notable return of that subtle power

of man mastery which had been so important an element in his success.

Before this even the aggressive, outspoken Wilson was silent; but the

three men stood regarding John with an air at once sympathetic and

doubtful. They were also expectant, for it was evident from the

minister's manner that he was deliberating whether he might not take

them at least a little way into his confidence.

"Only this much I can indicate," he volunteered presently. "A part of

what has happened I understand very clearly. A part I do not understand

at all. In the meantime, some one, but not myself, is in jeopardy.

Until the confusion is cleared, or until I can see better what to do

than I see now, I can do nothing but rest under the circumstances which

you have seen enmesh me to-night. Of course, it is impossible that such

a monstrous injustice can long continue. I hold the power to clear

myself instantly, but it is a power I cannot use without violating the

most sacred obligation a minister can assume. I will not violate it. I

must insist that not one single word which I have just hinted to you be

given to the public. Silence, absolute and unwavering silence, is the

course which is forced upon me and upon every friend who would be true

to me, as I shall seek to be true to my duty."

The three friends heard this declaration rather helplessly. In the

presence of such a lofty spirit of self-immolation, what were mere men

like themselves to say, or do? Obviously nothing, except to look the

reverence and wonder which they felt and to bow tacitly to his will.

Hampstead knew instinctively and without one word of assurance that

these men, at first overwhelmingly convinced of his guilt by what they

had seen, and then bewildered by his manner, now believed in him

absolutely. It put him at ease with them and gave him assurance to add:

"I know that not one of you is a man to desert a friend in the hour of

his extremity, and no matter what happens I believe your faith in me

will not falter. You will understand my wish to thank you for what you

have done and may do, and to say good-by for to-night. My burning

desire now is to get by myself and try to comprehend what has happened

and what may yet happen before this miserable business is concluded."

Cordially taking the hand of each, while the men one after another

responded with fervent expressions of faith and confidence, the minister

turned quickly upon his heel, crossed the street, and leaped lightly

upon a passing car.

Silence! Silence! Unwavering silence! The car wheels seemed to beat

this injunction up to him with every revolution. Silence for the sake

of others, some of whom were supremely worthy, one at least of whom

might be wretchedly unworthy! Above all, silence for the sake of his

vow as a vicar of Christ on earth. What was it to be a Christian if not

to be a miniature Christ,--a poor, stumbling, tottering, stained and

far-off pattern of the mighty archetype of human goodness and

perfection? According to his strength, he, John Hampstead, was to be

permitted to suffer as a saviour of a very small part of mankind and in

a very temporary and no doubt in a very inadequate way, the virtue of

which should lie in the fact that it pointed beyond himself to the one

saviour who was supremely able. He, too, must be "dumb before his

shearers", not stubbornly, not guiltily, and not spectacularly, but

faithfully and for a worth-while purpose,--the saving of a man.

For a change had come swiftly in the relative importance of the motives

which determined his course. With the actual coming of his cross, he

had caught a loftier vision. It was not to save the few remaining weeks

or months or years of the life of a saintly and beautiful woman that he

was to stand silent even to trial, conviction, and disgrace. It was to

save the soul of a man, a wretched, vain, ornamental and unutilitarian

sort of person, but none the less unusually gifted in many of his

faculties, perhaps wanting only an experience like this to precipitate

the better elements in his nature into the foundation of such a

character as his mother believed him to possess.

This change of emphasis strengthened Hampstead enormously. It gave him

calm and resolution, increasing self-control and fortitude, a dignity of

bearing that promised at least to remain unbroken, and a sense of the

presence of the Presence which it seemed could not depart from him.

When John reached home, he found Rose, Dick, and Tayna waiting

anxiously. A sight of his face, with the new strength and dignity upon

it, allayed their apprehension, but the solemnity of manner in which he

gathered them about him in the study roused their fears again. Briefly

he related how the diamonds had been discovered in his safe deposit

vault. Sternly but kindly he repressed the hot outburst of Dick;

sympathetically he tried to stem the tears of Tayna, but before the pale

face and the dry, fixed eyes of Rose he stood a moment, mute and

hesitant, then said with tender brotherliness:

"Old girl, in the silence of waiting for my vindication, it is going to

be easier for you and the children to trust me than for others. But

even for you it will be hard. Others can withdraw from me, can wash

their hands of me; and they may do it. You cannot, and would not if you

could."

Rose clasped her brother's hand in silent assurance; but Hampstead went

on with saddened voice to portray what was to be expected.

"You will all have to bear the shame with me. In fact, my shame will be

yours. You, Rose, will be pointed out upon the street as my sister.

Tayna, at school to-morrow, may encounter fewer smiles and some eyes

that refuse to meet hers. Dick will have some hurts to bear among his

fellows, for he has been loyally and perhaps boastfully proud of me. I

have only this to ask, that you will each walk with head up and

unafraid, with no attempt at apology nor justification, and with no

unkind word for those who in act or judgment seem unkind to me."

The feeling that they were to be honored with bearing a part of the

burden of the big man whom they loved so deeply stirred the emotions of

the little group almost beyond control. Dick moved first, clutching his

uncle's hand.

"You bet your life!" he blurted, then turned and bolted from the room.

Tayna next flung her arms about her uncle's neck and wet his cheek with

scalding tears, then dashed away after Dick. Last of all, Rose stood

with her hands upon his shoulders. She was taller for a woman than he

for a man, and could look almost level into his eyes.

"My brother!" she said significantly. "My strong, noble, innocent"--and

then a gleam of light shot into her eyes as she added--"my triumphant

brother!"

"My bravest, truest of sisters!" The big man breathed softly, and

drawing the woman to him imprinted that kiss upon the forehead which,

seldom bestowed, marked when given his genuine tribute of respect and

affection to the woman who, older than himself by ten years, had been

the mother to his orphaned youth and had created the obligation which,

uncharged, he none the less acknowledged and had striven to repay by a

life of conscientious devotion to her and to her children.

The door closed after her "Good night", and John stood alone glancing

reflectively about the long, book-lined room. Here many of his greatest

experiences had come to him. Here he had caught the far-off kindling

visions of that rarely human Galilean, with his rarely human group about

him, trudging over the hills, sitting by the side of the sea, teaching,

healing, helping. Here he had caught the vision of himself following,

afar off, two thousand years behind, but following--teaching, healing,

helping--in His name.

The telephone rang, its sharp, metallic jingle shocking the very

atmosphere into apprehensive tremors. Yet instantly recalled to himself

and to the new height on which he stood, Hampstead lifted the receiver

with a firm hand and replied in an even, measured voice: "_The

Sentinel_?--Yes--Yes--No--There is nothing to say--Absolutely!--I do."

The receiver was hung up. The only change in Hampstead's voice from the

beginning to the end of this conversation, the larger part of which had

taken place upon the other end of the line, was a deepening gravity of

utterance. In a few moments the 'phone rang again. It was _The Press_.

The papers all had the story now. The Oakland offices of the San

Francisco papers were also clamoring. Each wanted to know what the

minister had to say to the damning discovery of the diamonds in his box.

For them all Hampstead had the same answer: "I have nothing to

say--yet." Some of the inquisitors cleverly attempted to draw the

clergyman out by suggesting that there was plenty of opportunity for a

countercharge that the diamonds had been planted in his box, since it

was improbable in the last degree that a man of ordinary intelligence

would conceal stolen diamonds in a safe deposit box held in his own

name, the key to which he carried in his own pocket; but the

self-controlled man at the other end of the telephone fell into no such

trap. To direct attention to an inquiry as to who had visited his

vault, or might have visited it, during the time since the diamonds were

stolen was the last thing the minister would do. Already he had

reasoned that the vault custodian on duty in the morning, knowing that

Hampstead had not been to the vault during the day, but that Assistant

Cashier Burbeck had, would do some excogitating upon his own account;

but the minister reflected that this would not be dangerous, since the

custodian, sharing in the very great confidence which Rollie enjoyed,

would conclude that this young man had been made the innocent messenger

for depositing the diamonds in the vault, and for the sake of unpleasant

consequences which might result to the bank, would no doubt keep his

mouth tightly shut.

The last call of all came from Haggard, whose city editor had just told

him that the minister declined any sort of an explanation. Haggard was

managing editor of _The Press_ and Hampstead's true friend.

"Do you know what this does to your friends?" demanded Haggard

passionately. "It makes them as dumb as you are. I know you; you've

got something up your sleeve. But this case isn't going to be tried in

the courts. It's being tried in the newspapers right now. Once the

court of public opinion goes against you, it's hard to get a reversal.

And it's going against you from the minute this story gets before the

public--our version of it even--for we have got to print the news, you

know. We've never had bigger."

Some sort of a protest gurgled from Hampstead's lips.

"Oh," broke out Haggard still more impatiently, "I think the majority

have too much sense to believe you're a common thief; but they're going

to be convinced you're a damned fool. A public man had better be found

guilty of being a thief than an ass, any day. Now, what can I say?"

"I am very sorry," replied Hampstead in a patient voice, "but you can

say nothing--absolutely nothing."

*CHAPTER XXXI*

*A MISADVENTURE*

Counting back from the scene in the vault room of the Amalgamated

National, which took place at about nine-thirty, it was five and

one-half hours to the time when Marien Dounay and Rollie Burbeck had

steamed out with Mrs. Harrington upon her luxurious launch, the _Black

Swan_, which was so commodious and powerful that it just escaped being a

sea-going yacht.

But now, after the lapse of this five and one-half hours, neither Marien

nor Rollie had returned, and only one of them had an inkling of what

might have been happening in their absence. Information from the

Harrington residence that the _Black Swan_ would return to the pier

about ten-thirty, caused a group of hopeful young men from the newspaper

offices to take up their station on the yacht pier slightly in advance

of that hour. But their wait was long, so long in fact that one by one

they gave up their vigil and returned to their respective offices with

no answer as yet to the burning question of what had led Miss Dounay to

suspect that her diamonds were in the minister's safe deposit vault.

But the distress and disappointment of the reporters was nothing like so

great as the distress and disappointment upon the _Black Swan_, although

for a very different reason.

The evening with Mrs. Harrington and her guests had begun pleasantly

enough. The party itself was a jolly one, and so far as might be judged

from outward appearances, Miss Marien Dounay was quite the jolliest of

all; excepting perhaps Mrs. Harrington herself who was elated over the

unexpected appearance of the actress; and Rollie, over its effect in

immediately restoring him to the lost favor of his hostess. As many

times as it was demanded, Miss Dounay told and retold the story of the

loss of her jewels. She was the recipient of much sympathy and of many

compliments because of the admirable fortitude with which she endured

her loss.

Rollie thought Miss Dounay appeared able to dispense with the sympathy,

but perceived that she greatly enjoyed the compliments. That she should

keep the company in ignorance that her diamonds were to be recovered and

continue to enact the role of the heroine who had been cruelly robbed of

her chief possession, did not even surprise him. It was her affair

entirely since she had bound him to secrecy, and whatever the motive, in

the present state of his nerves, he was exceedingly grateful for it;

having meantime not a doubt that the disclosure would be made ultimately

in a manner which would permit the actress to gratify to the full her

childish love of theatrical sensation.

The cruise began with a run far up San Pablo Bay toward Carquinez

Straits, followed by a straightaway drive out through the Golden Gate to

watch the sun sink between the horns of the Farallones; but here the

heavy swells made the ladies gasp and clamor for a return to the shelter

of the Bay. Re-entering the Gate as night fell, there was good fun in

playing hide-and-seek from searchlight practice of the forts on either

side the famous tideway, and some mischievous satisfaction in lounging

in the track of the floundering, pounding ferryboats, and getting

vigorously whistled out of the way. It was even enjoyable to grow

sentimental over the phosphorescent glow of the waves in the wake or the

play of the moonbeams on the bone-white crest at the bow. But after an

hour or so of this, when it would seem that all of these things together

with the tonic of the fresh salt breeze had made everybody wolfishly

hungry, Mrs. Harrington's butler, expertly assisted, opened great

hampers of eatables and drinkables, and began to serve them in the cabin

which would have been rather spacious if the crowd had not been so

large.

"Calmer water, James, while supper is being served!" Mrs. Harrington had

ordered with a peace-be-still air.

James communicated the order to the captain, who understood very well

that Mrs. Harrington was a lady to be obeyed. But it happened that

there was a very fresh breeze on the Bay that night, and that a swell

which was a kind of left-over from a gale outside two days before was

still sloshing about inside, so that "calmer water" was not just the

easiest thing to find, though the captain looked for it hard.

"Calmer water, James, I said!" Mrs. Harrington directed reprovingly,

after an interval of watchful impatience, accompanying the observation

by a look that shot barbs into the eye of the butler. A close observer

would have noticed--and James was a close observer of his mistress--that

Mrs. Harrington's neck swelled slightly, and that a flush began to mount

upon her cheeks.

James knew this pouter-pigeon swelling well and its significance. Mrs.

Harrington _must_ now be obeyed. Calmer water had to be had, if it had

to be made.

"Back of Yerba Buena, it is calmer," the lady concluded, with an

increase of acerbity.

James lost no time in conveying this second command and a description of

its accompanying signal, to the captain.

"'Behind the Goat,' she said," James concluded.

Now this island which humps like a camel in the middle of the San

Francisco Bay is known to the esthetics as Yerba Buena, but to folks and

to mariners it is Goat Island. James was folks; the captain was a

mariner. Mrs. Harrington might have been esthetic.

"She draws too much to go nosin' round in there," replied the captain

reluctantly, and explained his reluctance with a mixture of emphasis and

the picturesque, by adding, "Behind the Goat it's shoal from hell to

breakfast."

"She said it," replied James truculently; and stood by to see the helm

shift.

"In she goes then, dod gast her!" muttered the captain.

"So much calmer in here under the sheltering lee of Yerba Buena,"

chirped Miss Gwendolyn Briggs, another quarter of an hour later.

"Why, to be sure," assented the hostess, as with a provident air she

surveyed her contented and consuming guests who were ranged like a

circling frieze upon the seat of Pullman plush which ran round the

luxurious cabin, with James and his two assistants serving from the long

table in the center.

It has been hinted that Mrs. Harrington was inclined to stoutness. She

was also inclined to Russian caviar. Having seen her guests abundantly

supplied, she lifted to her lips a triangle of toast, thickly spread

with the Romanof confection. James stood before her, supporting a plate

upon which were more triangles of toast and more caviar in a frilled and

corrugated carton.

But quite abruptly Mrs. Harrington, who was proper as well as expert in

all her food-taking manners, did an unaccountable thing. She turned the

toast sidewise and smeared the caviar across her wide cheek almost from

the corner of her mouth to her ear. At the same moment James himself

did an even more unaccountable thing. He lurched forward, decorated his

mistress's shoulders with the triangles of toast, like a new form of

epaulette and upset the carton of caviar upon her expansive bosom, where

the dark, oleaginous mass clung helplessly, quivered hesitantly, and

then began to roll away in tiny, black spheres and to send out trickling

exploratory streams, the general tendency of which was downward.

Nor was Mrs. Harrington alone in this sudden eccentricity of deportment.

Over on the right Major Hassler, florid of person and extremely

dignified of manner, was filling the wine glass of Mrs. Marston Conant,

when abruptly he moved the mouth of the bottle a full twelve inches and

began to pour its contents in a frothy gurgling stream down the back of

the withered neck of John Ray, a rich, irascible, slightly deaf, and

sinfully rich bachelor, who at the moment had leaned very low and

forward to catch a remark that the lady next beyond was making. As if

not content with the ruin thus wrought, Major Hassler next swept the

bottle in a dizzy, cascading circle round him, sprinkling every toilet

within a radius of three yards, and after dropping the bottle and

flourishing his arms wildly, ended by plunging both hands to the bottom

of the huge bowl of punch on the end of the table nearest him.

The only palliating feature of these amazing performances of Major

Hassler, of James, and of Mrs. Harrington, was that nearly everybody

else was executing the same sort of scrambling, lurching, colliding,

capsizing, and smearing manoeuvres upon their own account. For a moment

everybody glared at everybody else accusingly, and then Ernest

Cartwright, sitting on the floor where he had been hurled, offered an

interpretation of the phenomena.

"We struck something!" he suggested brightly.

"By Gad!" declared Major Hassler with sudden conviction, as he

straightened up and viewed his dripping hands and cuffs with an

expression quite indescribable. "By Gad! That's just what I think!"

"James!" murmured a voice almost entirely smothered by rage.

James, despite the horrible fear in his soul, dared to turn his gaze

upon his mistress, when suddenly a spasm of pain crossed the lady's

face.

"Oh!" she gasped. "Oh, my heart!" Wrath had given way to fright, and

the hue of wrath to pallor.

In the meantime, the _Black Swan_ was standing very still, as still as

if on land,--which to be exact was where she was. From without came the

sound of waves slapping idly against her sides, and then she shivered

while the screws were reversed and churned desperately. From end to end

of the cabin there were "Ohs" and "Ahs," and shrieks of dismay, with

short ejaculations, as the guests struggled to their feet and stood to

view the ruin which the sudden stoppage of the craft had wrought upon

toilets, dispositions, and the atmosphere of Mrs. Harrington's happy

party.

The next half hour, to employ a marine phrase, was devoted to salvage of

one sort and another. One thing became speedily clear. The _Black

Swan_ had her nose fast in most tenacious clay. No amount of churning

of the screw could drag her off. And no amount of tooting of whistles

brought any sort of craft to her assistance. She was stuck there till

the tide should take her off. The tide was running out. By rough

calculation, it would be eight hours till it came back strong enough to

lift up her stern and rock her nose loose.

It was an unpleasant prospect.

With Mrs. Harrington sitting propped and pale in the end of the cabin,

her guests tried to cheer her by making light of their plight and the

prospect; but as the waters slipped out and out from under the _Black

Swan_, till she lay on the bottom with a drunken list, and the hours

crept along with dreary slowness through the tiresome night, one

disposition after another succumbed to the inevitable and became cattish

or bearish, according to sex. But the very first disposition of all to

go permanently bad was that of Marien Dounay. Young Burbeck thought he

understood to the full her capacity to be disagreeable, but learned in

the first hour that this was a ridiculously mistaken assumption.

Nor could any mere petulance on account of weariness or cramped quarters

among people who under these circumstances speedily became a bore to

themselves and to each other, account for her behavior. Never had

Rollie seen so many manifestations of her feline restlessness, or her

wiry endurance. When other women had sunk exhausted to sleep upon a

cushion in a corner, or upon the shoulders of an escort who obligingly

supported the fair head with his own weary body, Miss Dounay sat bolt

and desperate, staring at the myriad shoreward lights as if they held

some secret her wilful eyes would yet bore out of them.

Though Rollie loyally tried, as endurance would permit, to watch with

Marien through the night, sustaining snubs and shafts with humble

patience and venturing an occasional dismal attempt at cheer, the first

sign of relaxation in Miss Dounay's mood was vouchsafed not to him but

to Francois.

This was when at eight o'clock the next morning, after toiling painfully

up the steps at the landing pier, her eyes fell upon the huge black

limousine, with the faithful chauffeur, his arms folded upon the wheel,

his head leaning forward upon them, sound asleep. He had been there

since ten-thirty of the night before. Other chauffeurs had waited and

fumed, had sputtered to and fro in joy-riding intervals, and had gone

home; but not Francois. A smile of pride and satisfaction played across

Miss Dounay's face at this exhibition of faithfulness,--and especially

in the presence of this jaded, dispirited crowd.

"Francois," Miss Dounay exclaimed, prodding his elbow until his head

rolled sleepily into wakefulness, "I could kiss you!"