"I don't. He came as near telling me as he could without making me an accessory before the fact. There were none of the loose ends that the most orderly man would leave if he died suddenly. Take my word for it, old man." A long look passed between them. Each seemed to be trying to find out with his eyes something that words had not helped him to. Finally Chantry protested once more. "But Ferguson couldn't love like that." Havelock the Dane laid one hand on the arm of Chantry's chair and spoke sternly. "He not only could, but did. And there I am a better authority than you. Think what you please, but I will not have that fact challenged. Perhaps you could count up on your fingers the women who are loved like that; but, anyhow, she was. My second cousin once removed, damn her!" He ended with a vicious twang. "And now"--Havelock rose--"I'd like your opinion." "About what?" "Well, can't you see the beautiful sanity of Ferguson?" "No, I can't," snapped Chantry. "I think he was wrong, both in the beginning and in the end. But I will admit he was not a coward. I respect him, but I do not think, at any point, he was right--except perhaps in 'doing' the coroner." "That settles it, then," said Havelock. And he started towards the door. "Settles what, in heaven's name?" "What I came to have settled. I shan't tell her. If I could have got one other decent citizen--and I confess you were my only chance--to agree with me that Ferguson was right,--right about his fellow passengers on the _Argentina_, right about tow-head on the track,--I'd have gone to her, I think. I'd rather like to ruin her life, if I could." A great conviction approached Chantry just then. He felt the rush of it through his brain. "No," he cried. "Ferguson loved her too much. He wouldn't like that--not as you'd put it to her." Havelock thought a moment. "No," he said in turn; but his "no" was very humble. "He wouldn't. I shall never do it. But, my God, how I wanted to!" "And I'll tell you another thing, too." Chantry's tone was curious. "You may agree with Ferguson all you like; you may admire him as much as you say; but you, Havelock, would never have done what he did. Not even"--he lifted a hand against interruption--"if you knew you had the brain you think Ferguson had. You'd have been at the bottom of the sea, or under the engine wheels, and you know it." He folded his arms with a hint of truculence. But Havelock the Dane, to Chantry's surprise, was meek. "Yes," he said, "I know it. Now let me out of here." "Well, then,"--Chantry's voice rang out triumphant,--"what does that prove?" "Prove?" Havelock's great fist crashed down on the table. "It proves that Ferguson's a better man than either of us. I can think straight, but he had the sand to act straight. You haven't even the sand to think straight. You and your reactionary rot! The world's moving, Chantry. Ferguson was ahead of it, beckoning. You're an ant that got caught in the machinery, I shouldn't wonder."