As the car went by slowly the second time, the child still fought, the boy stepped back, while James Minturn with grim face, bent under the light and by force took into his arms the twisting, fighting boy. "Heaven help him!" cried Douglas. "Not a sign of happy reconciliation there!" Leslie tried to choke down her sobs. "Oh Nellie Minturn! Poor woman!" she wailed. "So _that's_ what he was doing!" marvelled Douglas. "A house he has built to suit himself; training his sons personally, with the assistance of his Little Brother. That boy was William. I see him in Minturn's office every day." "Oh I think he might have given her a chance!" protested Leslie. "Remember how she was reared! Think what a struggle it was for her even to contemplate trying to be different." "Evidently she was too late!" said Douglas. "He must have been gone before you returned from the swamp." "I'm going back there and tell him a few things! I think he might have waited. Douglas, I'm afraid he did wait! She said he told her he wanted to talk with her when she came back--and oh Douglas, she said he had a small box and he threatend to 'freeze her soul with its contents!' Douglas, _what_ could he have had?" "'Freeze her soul!' Let me think!" said Douglas. "I met Professor Tickner and Dr. Wills coming from his offices a few days ago, while he's just back from a trip that he didn't tell me he was taking---- "You mean Tickner, the scientist; Wills, the surgeon?" "Yes," answered Douglas. "But those children! Aren't they perfectly healthy?" "They look it! Lord, Leslie!" cried Douglas, "I have it! He _has_ made good his threat. He has frozen her soul! What you want to do is to go to her, Leslie!" "Douglas, tell me!" she demanded. "I can't!" said Douglas. "I may be mistaken. I think I am not, but there is always a chance! Drive to the Minturn residence," he ordered. They found a closed dark pile of stone. "Go past that place where the children were again!" said Leslie. The upper story was quiet. Outlined by veranda lights the massive form of James Minturn paced back and forth under the big trees, his hands clasped behind him, his head bowed, and he walked alone. "Douglas, I'm going to speak to him. I'm going to tell him!" declared Leslie. "But you're now conceding that _she_ saw him!" Douglas pointed out. "Then what have you to tell him that she would not? If she couldn't move him with what she said, and while you don't know his side, what could you say to him?" "Nothing," she conceded. "Precisely my opinion," said Douglas. "Remember Leslie I am a little ahead of you in this. You know _her_ side. I know all you have told me of her, also I know what he has told me; while putting what I have seen, and heard at the office, and him here with the boys, in a house she would consider too plebeian for words----" "No Douglas. No! She is changed!" cried Leslie. "Completely changed, I tell you! She said she would wipe Malcolm's nose and fix James' studs----"