It was so he learned what had come to him, sitting in a diningroom chair beside his sister with his hand upon her bowed head and little Lib in his lap, her face against his breast, sobbing as her mother told the story brokenly. Mase, she said, was out trying to see a lawyer and find out what to do. But there wasn’t anything to do. Everybody said there wasn’t anything to do. The case was all against him. Darcy took the blow straight with white, stern face and steady eyes. The hand that held little Lib’s did not tremble and his voice did not shake. The thing he was thinking was: “Now I shall have to stop hunting for Joyce. Oh God, take care of Joyce!” But he opened his lips and said: “Well, Ellen, don’t take it so hard! It’s all in the day’s work, and it’ll all come out in the wash. Anyhow, Ellen, I’ve found a new line. God isn’t forgetting any of us and you just put that away and think about it.” Ellen sat up and wiped her eyes and stared at him. This was strange talk from Darcy, and yet it was like him. She broke out afresh with indignant tears that they should fasten a crime so heinous on this beloved brother. She was engulfed, overwhelmed by the shame and disgrace that had befallen them. She was old enough to have remembered their gentle mother who always tried to keep them “respectable.” “Never mind, Ellen, don’t cry any more. Give me a bite to eat and I’ll go out and see what can be done.” “Oh, but you mustn’t go out!” cried Ellen, and little Lib gripped him fiercely. “You mustn’t! They’ll get you. They’re looking everywhere for you.” “That’s all right,” said Darcy cheerfully. “I’ll help them. I’ll go and give myself up.” And go he would in spite of all their efforts. He went away whistling down the street, just as he always did when he was at home. Whistling! So first he went to the police headquarters and walked in as he had done many a time before, and they stared at him: “I understand you’re looking for me?” he said, gravely with a new dignity about him they scarcely understood. “Yes,” said the chief, embarrassedly, almost deferentially, for Darcy had been almost like one of themselves. “Yes.” “Well. Here I am.” They scarcely knew what to say to him. They treated him like a gentleman, a stranger. It cut him the way they went about it. They were not his friends any more. It seemed that they were afraid of him, as if they did not know how to take him. They had been prepared for rebellion, subterfuge. He gave none. He was his old grave self, with the old winning smile as he met them, his eyes upon them with the old question in them, the wistfulness. It disarmed them. They would have rather had to fight with him. And by and by he asked to see Dan Peterson. He would find out if he had any friends left. * * * * *