“Please, please, Miss Lawton, I am shocked and awfully grieved and ashamed. Don’t be so hard on yourself and on me as to think that I dreamed of any such condition existing. We reporters do not rejoice in the misfortunes of others. But that it is not the time for such things, I could tell you that one of the reasons I had in beginning life in this way was to get to the bottom of things, and see if some people at least didn’t really want to tell and hear the truth in the newspapers. Of course I will believe what you tell me, and all that remains is for me to apologize for pushing in upon you and—go as quickly as possible. I only wish I could help or do something to ease you.” “You forget that I have told you nothing,” said Brooke, hesitating and catching at the throat of her blouse as if she wished to pull it away and give herself more room to breathe—“I only said _if_, and if you are looking for truth, to be certain you must see it, not ask about it.” Then, as the new thought grew upon her, and she realized that her mother was asleep, the tragedy fled from her eyes, that she had fixed upon the face of the reporter,—who, fast losing his self-possession, stood looking uncomfortable and foolish, turning his hat about by its rim like an applicant for a situation,—her entire poise had altered, and she seemed several inches taller. “Oh, Mr. Brownell, don’t you see that the only way that you can help us in telling the truth about father is by seeing for yourself? Put down your hat and come with me—” and before he had recovered from his astonishment, Brooke grasped Tom Brownell by the wrist and literally led him from the room, up the hallway, not toward the entrance but along the side passage, where the electricity had not yet been turned on and which was in a dim and uncertain light. Pausing before the door of Adam Lawton’s room, and without releasing her hold of Brownell’s wrist, she turned the handle carefully, entered, and was standing with her companion in the shadow of the bed before the nurse at the opposite side realized that any one had come in, or could even raise her hand in caution. No one spoke, and the footsteps on the thick rug that covered the floor made no sound—the breathing of the pale figure prone upon the bed was the only vibration even of the air. For two, perhaps three, minutes, that held an eternity of torture to Brownell, who stood with bent head, they remained, so that no detail could escape his notice. Then Brooke led him back to the den, leaving the nurse in grave doubt as to what manner of man this might be who had seemingly been forcibly led into the room where, by the doctor’s orders, no one but mother and daughter were to be admitted.