"Mr. Mac and me are friends," she said. "He's been awful nice to me; he's given me more good times than I ever had in my whole life before. But I didn't know the money wasn't his or I wouldn't have gone with him." "And I suppose you thought it was all right for a young man in Mac's position to be paying attention to a young woman in yours?" Mr. Clarke studied her face intently, but her fearless eyes did not falter under his scrutiny. "Are you trying to implicate Mac in this matter to spare Lewis, is that it?" "No, sir. I don't say it was Mr. Mac. I only say it wasn't Dan. There are some people you just _know_ are straight, and Dan's one of them." Mr. Clarke got up and took a turn about the room, his hands locked behind him. Her last shot had evidently taken effect. "Tell me exactly what Mac told you about this Meyers note," he demanded. Nance recounted the facts in the case, ending with the promise Mac had made her to tell his father everything and begin anew. "I wish I had known this Saturday!" Mr. Clarke said, sinking heavily into his chair. "I came down on the boy pretty severely on another score and gave him little chance to say anything. Did he happen to mention the exact amount of his indebtedness to Meyers?" "He said it was five hundred and sixty dollars." A sigh that was very like a groan escaped from Mr. Clarke; then he pulled himself together with an effort. "You understand, Miss Molloy," he said, "that it is quite a different thing for my son to have done this, and for Lewis to have done it. Mac knows that what is mine will be his eventually. If he signed that check, he was signing his own name as well as mine. Of course, he ought to have spoken to me about it. I am not excusing him. He has been indiscreet in this as well as in other ways. I shall probably get a letter from him in a few days explaining the whole business. In the meanwhile the matter must go no further. I insist upon absolute silence. You understand?" She nodded. "And one thing more," Mr. Clarke added. "I forbid any further communication between you and Mac. He is not coming home at Christmas, and we are thinking of sending him abroad in June. I propose to keep him away from here for the next two or three years." Nance fingered the blotter on the table absently. It was all very well for them to plan what they were going to do with Mac, but she knew in her heart that a line from her would set at naught all their calculations. Then her mind flew back to Dan. "If he comes back--Dan, I mean,--are you going to take him on again?" Mr. Clarke saw his chance and seized it. "On one condition," he said. "Will you give me your word of honor not to communicate with Mac in any way?" They were both standing now, facing each other, and Nance saw no compromise in the stern eyes of her employer. "I'll promise if I've got to," she said. "Very well," said Mr. Clarke. "That's settled." CHAPTER XXVII FATE TAKES A HAND