William clasped his hands between his gaunt knees. He had once deliberately planned suicide to avoid facing his accusers. Yet now, with safety in his grasp, how could he face the defamers of his innocent brother? Strange, but this was agony--even greater agony than the other situation. He told himself that he must get away from it, for the moment, anyway. Bradford had suggested a loophole. No man of refinement would want to be present during the investigation of his own brother's ill conduct. No, he would go out, home, for a walk--somewhere, anywhere. He had left Charles's note with Bradford. That was sufficient in all reason to absolve William from any suspicion whatever. Yes, he would go. There were situations under which a man's leaving such a scene would suggest complicity, but this would imply naught else than broken-hearted innocence burdened beyond physical endurance. Taking his hat, he went out into the street. As he passed the main counting-room many eyes were lifted from ponderous tomes and machines. Curiosity and sympathy combined were in the awed and stealthy glances. Outside, at the door, a group had gathered. It was as if a telepathic sense of the tragedy within had permeated the walls. "There he goes! That's his brother!" reached William's ears as he elbowed his way to the pavement. "Hey! there comes the chief of police!" the same voice said. "Quick action, if he _is_ fat, eh?" William did not care to see the official in question even at a distance. He kept his eyes on the ground and hurried away. Home? he asked himself. No, not now--not now. Celeste would wonder. She would have to be told, and how could he tell her the thing that his reason assured him she would never believe? A woman's intuition! Ah, it was to be dreaded! It did not lend itself readily to practical subterfuge. Business men, bank examiners, skilled detectives would be led by mere physical evidence--a man's written confession, his open flight, his reckless past and inebriety, but a woman's faith was too deep and well-informed for that. What was to be done--what? He crossed the Common; he plunged into the Public Gardens; he strode through into Commonwealth Avenue, and on and on. He knew not where he was going or with what object in view, but he must keep in motion. He wanted to put a certain thing behind him, but that thing was in his brain and it was producing a thousand pictures--pictures of his boyhood with Charles as a toddling infant beside him; of his later young manhood with Charles, a careless school-boy shirking his studies for open-air sport; Charles as he entered the bank under his protection; Charles in the beginning of his reckless career; Charles as he had last seen him, drawing the accumulated burthen of another man's folly upon his sturdy, repentant shoulders. Great God! How could he go through with it? And yet it must be done. The terrible game must be played to a finish. After all, was