In the light of the days of calm afterthought which followed, this attempt upon the peace of the Sanford home grew more monstrous, and helped largely to mitigate the feeling against the banker. Besides, he had not run away; that was a strong point in his favor. "Don't that show," argued Vance, in the post-office--"don't that show he didn't intend to steal? An' don't it show he's goin' to try to make things square?" "I guess we might as well think that as anything." "I claim the boys has a right t' take sumpthin' out o' his hide," Bent Wilson stubbornly insisted. "Ain't enough t' go 'round," laughed McPhail. "Besides, I can't have it. Link an' I own the biggest share in 'im, an' we can't have him hurt." McIlvaine and Vance grinned. "That's a fact, Mac. We four fellers are the main losers. He's ours, an' we can't have him foundered 'r crippled 'r cut up in any way. Ain't that woman of his gritty?" "Gritty ain't no name for her. She's goin' into business." "So I hear. They say Jim was crawling around a little yesterday. I didn't see 'im. "I did. He looks pretty streak-id--now you bet." "Wha'd he say for himself?" "Oh, said give 'im time--he'd fix it all up." "How much time?" "Time enough. Hain't been able to look at a book since. Say, ain't it a little curious he was so sick just then--sick as a p'isened dog?" The two men looked at each other in a manner most comically significant. The thought of poison was in the mind of each. It was under these trying circumstances that Sanford began to crawl about, a week or ten days after his sickness. It was really the most terrible punishment for him. Before, everybody used to sing out, "Hello, Jim!" or "Mornin', banker," or some other jovial, heart-warming salutation. Now, as he went down the street, the groups of men smoking on the sunny side of the stores ignored him, or looked at him with scornful eyes. Nobody said, "Hello, Jim!"--not even McPhail or Vance. They nodded merely, and went on with their smoking. The children followed him and stared at him without compassion. They had heard him called a scoundrel and a thief too often at home to feel any pity for his pale face. After his first trip down the street, bright with the December sunshine, he came home in a bitter, weak mood, smarting, aching with a poignant self-pity over the treatment he had received from his old cronies. "It's all your fault," he burst out to his wife. "If you'd only let me go away and look up another place I wouldn't have to put up with all these sneers and insults." "What sneers and insults?" she asked, coming over to him. "Why, nobody 'll speak to me." "Won't Mr. McPhail and Mr. McIlvaine?" "Yes; but not as they used to." "You can't blame 'em, Jim. You must go to work and win back their confidence." "I can't do that. Let's go away, Nell, and try again."