"Yes; but if you didn't forge it, you could easily prove it; people wouldn't have to know the rest--they are hushing up things of that kind every day." A silence dropped on the three like a choking, blinding fog. The two outside the hangings must have been staring at each other, too bewildered or shocked to speak. The one inside clutched her throat, muttering, "If my heart keeps up this thumping, faith, he'll think it's the police and run." At last the voice of the man came, hushed but strained almost to breaking. To Patsy it sounded as if he were staking his very soul in the words, uncertain of the balance. "Marjorie, you don't understand! I cashed that check because--because I want to take the responsibility of it and whatever penalty comes along with it. I don't believe father will ever tell. He's too proud; it would strike back at him too hard. But you would have to know; he'd tell you; and I wanted to tell you first myself. I want to go away knowing you believe and trust me, no matter what father says about me, no matter what every one thinks about me. I want to hear you say it--that you will be waiting--just like this--for me to come back to when I've squared it all off and can explain.... Why, Marjorie--Marjorie!" Patsy waited in an agony of dread, hope, prayer--waited for the answer she, the girl he loved, would make. It came at last, slowly, deliberately, as if spoken, impersonally, by the foreman of a jury: "I don't believe in you, Billy. I'm sorry, but I don't believe I could ever trust you again. Your father has always said you couldn't take care of money; this simply means you have got yourself into some wretched hole, and forging your father's name was the only way out of it. I suppose you think the circumstances, whatever they may be, have warranted the act; but that act puts a stigma on your name which makes it unfit for any woman to bear; and if you have any spark of manhood left, you'll unwish the wish--you will unthink the thought--that I would wait--or even want you--ever--to come back." A cry--a startled, frightened cry--rang through the rooms. It did not come from either Marjorie or her leading man. Patsy stood with a vagabond glove pressed hard over her mouth--quite unconscious that the cry had escaped and that there was no longer need of muzzling--then plunged headlong through the hangings into the library. Marjorie Schuyler was standing alone. "Where is he--your man?" "He's gone--and please don't call him--that!" "Go after him--hurry--don't let him go! Don't ye understand? He mustn't go away with no one believing in him. Tell him it's a mistake; tell him anything--only go!"