"--And she so pure, so high, so much above us....It makes me crazy.

And all the time she's been breathing the same air, she's thought him a Moses in the Wilderness, and us nothing but the sticks. Think of her believing in that jelly pulp, that steel engraving in a Family Bible!

No, I mean to open her eyes, and get her out of his spider's web."

"I see your point of view."

"You do if you have eyes. Think of that perfect angel--but just say _Grace Noir_ and you've called all the virtues. And her in his house!--"

"You still believe in angels?" inquired Abbott gravely.

"Yap; and devils with long sort-of-curly hair, and pretty womanish faces, and voices like mola.s.ses."

"But Fran wants Mrs. Gregory spared--"

"Abbott, when I think of Grace Noir spending one more night under the roof of that burrowing mole, that crocodile with tears in his eyes and the rest of him nothing but bone and gristle--"

"Bob, if I a.s.sure you that Miss Noir will never spend another day under his roof, will you agree to keep this discovery to yourself?"

"You can't make no such a.s.surance. If she ain't put wise to what branch of the animal kingdom he twigs to, she'll not leave his roof."

"Bob, if she leaves that house in the morning, for ever, won't you agree to silence, for Mrs. Gregory's sake--and because Fran asks it?"

"Fran's another angel, bless her heart! But you can't work it."

"Leave it to me, Bob. I'll be guided by the spur of the moment."

"I need a bookkeeper at my store," Robert said, ruminating.

"I promise you that Miss Noir will soon be open to offers."

"See here, Abbott, I can't afford to lose any chances on this thing.

I'm going into that house before this night pa.s.ses, and I'm going to see the feathers fly. No--I don't want Mrs. Gregory to learn about it, any more than you or Fran; but I'll limit the thing to Grace--"

"She'd tell Mrs. Gregory."

"Don't you say anything against Grace Noir, Abbott, for though you are my friend--"

"I say nothing against her; I say only that she's a woman."

"Well," Clinton reluctantly agreed, "I reckon she is. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go with you into that wolf's den, and I'll let you do all the talking; and if you can manage things in half an hour--just thirty minutes by my watch--so that Grace leaves there to-morrow, I'll leave you to steer things, and it's mum for keeps. But I'm going to be present, though I don't want to say one word to that--that--But if he don't crawl out of his wool far enough to suit the purpose, in short, if he don't cave, and in half an hour--"

"Half an hour will do the business," said Abbott stoutly. "Come!"

"Be sure to call for Mr. Gregory by himself," said Robert, as they walked swiftly back to the Gregory residence. "If Grace comes into the room while we're talking, or Mrs. Gregory--"

"If they do," Abbott said quickly, "you are not to utter one word, _not one,_ about Springfield--you understand? It's the bargain, and I shall hold you to your word of honor."

"For half an hour I won't say a word," Clinton declared, "unless it's some word just drawn out of my bosom by the sight of that villain.

Come!"

CHAPTER XVIII

JUST THIRTY MINUTES

During the weeks spent by Robert Clinton in search of Fran's life- secret, a consciousness of absence and its cause was like a hot iron branding Gregory's brain. What a mocking fatality, that it should have been Grace to send Robert on his terrible errand,--an errand which must result in ruin! Whenever Gregory tried to antic.i.p.ate results, he stood appalled; hour by hour his mind was ever darting forward into the future, trying to build it of related parts of probabilities.

Mrs. Gregory would be pitied when it became known how she had been deceived; Fran would be pitied because she was a disowned daughter; Grace would be pitied for trusting in the integrity of her employer,-- but Gregory, who of all men needed pity most, would be utterly despised. He did not think of himself alone, but of his works of charity--they, too, would fall, in his disgrace, and Walnut Street church--even religion itself--would be discredited because of an exposure that could avail nothing.

Gregory had been too long proclaiming the living G.o.d not to feel Him as a Presence, and in this Presence he felt a shuddering fear that could suggest no relief but propitiation. He as well as Abbott Ashton had kept himself informed of Robert's movements as far as they were known to Miss Sapphira, hence the day of Robert's return found his thought of atonement at its most frenzied stage.

As evening wore on, he made up his mind to the fatal step.

Before Robert could expose him, Gregory would confess. It had seemed inevitable since learning of the school-director's mission; but he could not shorten, by one hour, the sweet comradeship in the library.

Now that the last hour had come, he sought his wife, reeling like a sick man as he descended the hall stairs.

Mrs. Gregory was softly playing an old hymn, when he discovered her presence in the brilliantly lighted parlor. Grace was expecting a visit from Clinton and had made the room cheerful for his coming, and Mrs. Gregory, looking in and finding no one present, had sunk upon the stool before the piano. She did not see her husband, for her face was bent low as she feelingly played, _I Need Thee Every Hour_.

Gregory, well-nigh overwhelmed with the realization of what he meant to do, grasped the door for support. Presently he spoke, brokenly, "Lucy, how true that is--we do, indeed, need Him every hour."

She did not start at his voice, though his presence had been unsuspected. She raised her serious eyes, and observed his haggard face. "Mr. Gregory, you are ill."

"No--the light hurts my eyes." He turned off the lights and drew a chair near her. The room was partly revealed by an electric arc that swung at the street corner--its mellowed beams entered the open window. "Lucy, I have something very important to say to you."

Her fingers continued to wander among the keys, making the hymn barely audible, then letting it die away, only to be revived. She supposed it was the old matter of her going to church--but since her name had been taken "off the book", what was left to be said?

"Lucy, I have never spoken of this before, but it has seemed to me for a long time that we have wandered rather far apart--yes, very far apart. We sit close together, alone, our hands could touch, but our souls live in different worlds. Do you ever feel that way?"

She ceased playing abruptly, and answered almost in a whisper, "Yes."

"Perhaps it is my fault," said Gregory, "although I know that if you had taken more interest in what interests me, if you had been true to the Faith as I have tried to be--"

"I have been true to you," said Mrs. Gregory.

"Of course--of course--there is no question of our being true to each other. But it's because you have alienated yourself from what I look upon as the only duty in life, that we have drifted--and you could have prevented that. I feel that I am not wholly to blame, Lucy, it has been my fault and it has been your fault--that is how I look at it."

There was silence, then she said, "There seems nothing to be done."

"How do you mean? You speak as if our love were dead and buried--"

She rose abruptly, saying, "And its grave unmarked."

"Sit down, Lucy--I haven't told you what I came to tell--you must listen and try to see it as I see it. Let us be reasonable and discuss the future in a--in a sensible and matter-of-fact way. If you will agree--"