"But on what evidence am I arrested? What did those abominable people say to the Grand Jury? Am I never to know?" "Well, rather. It's all in the afternoon papers, for one of the reporters got the evidence before the Grand Jury did." He had taken off his overcoat, and he crossed the room and took from a pocket a copy of _The Evening News_. She glanced over it with her lips drawn back from her teeth. It contained not only the story the enterprising Mr. Bruce had managed to obtain from Frieda and Conrad Jr., but a corroboration of the maid's assertion that, warned by the family friend and lawyer, Mr. Dwight Rush, to disappear, she had gone to Papa Kraus for advice. Not a word, however, of blackmail. "So the public believes already that I am a murderess! No doubt I should be convinced as readily myself. It is all so adroit!" Mrs. Balfame spoke quietly but with intense bitterness. "I suppose I must be tried--more and still more publicity. No one will ever forget it. Do you suppose it is true young Kraus saw me that night?" "God knows!" He got up again and moved nervously about the room. "I wish I could be sure. That is the point to which I must give the deepest consideration--whether you are to admit or not that you went out. The Grand Jury and Gore believe it. Young Kraus has a very good name. Frieda has always been well behaved. There are six Germans on the Grand Jury, moreover. We must see that none get on the trial jury. Gore wants to believe--" "But he was a friend of Dave's." "Exactly. He is making much of that point. Affects to be filled with righteous wrath because you killed his dear old friend. Trust a district attorney. All they care for is to win out, and he has his spurs to win, in the bargain. I met him a few moments ago; he was about equally full of gin fizzes and the 'indisputable fact' that you are the only person in sight with a motive. Oh, don't! Don't!" Mrs. Balfame had broken down. She flung her arms over the table and her head upon them. More than once in her life she had shed tears both diplomatic and spontaneous, but for the first time since she was a child she sobbed heavily. She felt forlorn, deserted, in awful straits. "Anna is ill," she articulated. "Anna! My one real friend--the only one that has meant anything to me. Life has gone pretty well with me. Now everything is changed. I know that terrible things are about to happen to me." "Not while I am alive. I heard of Dr. Anna's illness on my way to New York. Lequeur was on the train. You--you must let me take her place. I am devoted to you heart and soul. You surely know that." "But you are not a woman. It's a woman friend I want now, a strong one like Anna. Those other women--oh, yes, they're devoted to me--have been, but they've suddenly ceased to count, somehow. Besides, they'll soon believe me guilty. I hate them all. Only Anna would have understood--and believed."