“Bear up!” whispered the doctor. “You have saved her, Ray! She has come back to you at last, and you must forgive her—in her coffin.” “Poor girl! Poor Mary!” Mr. Ray’s words came brokenly. He had forgotten the great wrong that this woman had done him. Dr. Brookes had to leave him to give an order about the coffin, and at that instant a young man wearing a press badge came running down from the prison. One of the guards whom he met turned and pointed toward Mr. Ray, and the next moment the reporter was close beside him. “Do you mind giving the details of this frightful mistake to the New York _Daily_?” he asked blandly. “Awfully sorry to distress you, sir, but, of course, we would like to have the story.” “I will give them to you,” said Marion, stepping up at once. It seemed wicked that this man should intrude upon Mr. Ray at this moment. The reporter turned to her respectfully, and Mr. Ray thanked her with a look. A moment later he was again leaning on the arm of Dr. Brookes, on his way to the Morgue to identify the body. Marion told the story as briefly as she could, but as she mentioned the name of Augustus Atherton the stolid reporter gave a long, low whistle. “He is here, Lawyer Atherton,” he said, quickly. “He came up in the boat with me, and he acted like a madman. Every one of us kept our eyes on him—we thought he was going to jump overboard.” “Well, he is a very wicked man!” said Marion, impulsively, “so I don’t pity him as much as I do her poor husband!” “Ray treated her all right for all I can learn,” said the reporter. “She was a ‘tough proposition,’ if you know what that means, but if the father is bad what can you expect from the children?” As they were walking back to the Penitentiary, Marion remembered the errand that she had been sent on, but she felt sure that the superintendent would excuse her when she heard her story. At the door of the warden’s office even the reporter halted. The scene in the office was almost appalling. Archie Ray and his father-in-law stood face to face, both pale as death and both glaring at each other. In an instant Marion knew that there had been hot words between them, and that they were each blaming the other for the day’s experience. “Come, Mr. Ray,” she said quickly, darting into the room. “Come away before you break down altogether! That man’s words should not annoy you—he is beneath your notice!” The lawyer glared at her, but did not recognize her for a moment, while Dr. Brookes and the warden looked on in intense amazement. “How dare you speak like that, miss?” said Augustus Atherton, hotly. Marion turned and faced him with a look of indignation. “I dare, because I know I am right,” she said, distinctly. “With your own daughter an outcast, a disgrace to her mother and to her husband, you do not hesitate to flatter and mislead young girls, or to compromise and wrong them if occasion offers!”