Tommy started electrically. He recalled his father's vehement desire that his son should not fail to place the stock, his visit to Colonel Willetts's office, notwithstanding Tommy's urgent requests for non-intervention, his insane determination to have Tommy succeed. He remembered also Colonel Willetts's early confession that the deal did not interest him in a business way, and his inexplicable good nature at the second interview; his promise that he would himself see that the stock was apportioned later among Tommy's friends' fathers; the utter unbusinesslike quality of the entire affair. It was all plain to Tommy now. There was only one explanation. His quick imagination proceeded to dramatize it. Then, boy-like, he melodramatized it. His father had done it. His success in averting discovery for years, by making him feel safe against the danger that Tommy so poignantly dreaded, had made the trusted bank employee play for a last huge stake. To help his son at any cost had become not a habit, but an obsession. A madman had done this. But would the world so consider it? “Mr. Thompson?” he exclaimed, miserably. “Yes, my boy.” “I--I--” “Do you think you know now?” “N--no. But I--I must return to New York--at once--to-night!” “Can you tell me--” “I can't because I don't--know for sure.” He bit his lip. Thompson pulled out his pocket-book, took some yellowbacks from it, gave them to Tommy, and said: “A train leaves in forty minutes. Take my car, outside. Get your things. Come back from New York with the explanation. It is time you had it. If there isn't any explanation, come back anyhow. Tell me as much as you please--or nothing at all. It will make no difference to us here. We know you, Tommy, even if I did you an injustice for a moment, though I really couldn't see how I had made a mistake.” “I hope you haven't,” said Tommy. The time must come when Thompson would know all. “And, by the way, I'll take the stock off your hands at a slight--” “It isn't mine--” “No matter whose it is, I'll take it at a hundred and five. That will give you or your friends--” “No, sir. I must find out--” “You do what I tell you. At a hundred and five--two hundred and ten thousand dollars,” said Thompson, sternly. “But you come back here, do you hear? You are becoming really valuable to us. Run along now.” Tommy wrung Thompson's hand, pocketed the hundred dollars his chief had given him and, unable to speak, rushed from the office. He caught his train, but Dayton was far behind him before he was able to think coherently of the affair. The more calmly he thought, the more certain he became that his father was responsible. It gave him not a new problem to solve, but the conviction that the old problem plus this new phase must be settled once for all. He could not live through another six months like the last.