But in my heart I felt there wasn't much likelihood that this breach would be healed. Knowing May as I did, I had no idea that she would let Will continue with me, even in another position. No compromise for her! To-morrow or next day Will would come into the office to take his leave.... [Illustration: _Somehow years had gone by in that evening._] "I guess, Van, I'll go to bed." It was the first word Sarah had spoken for half an hour. The tears had dried on her face. She gave me a light kiss, and left me.... The house seemed cold and desolate, as if the pleasant kindliness of life had gone out of it when my brother and his wife had left. I made up the fire, lighted a fresh cigar, and sat down to think. Somehow years had gone by in that evening; I was heavy with the heaviness of middle life. To take the other road, her road--that was what May demanded of me. How little she knew the situation! That would mean immediate ruin for me and mine, and for those men who had trusted me with their money. The world that I had been building all these years would crumble and vanish like smoke into the void out of which I had made it! Not that May's talk had meaning or sense to it, either. Nor do men made as I am alter at the sound of words. We are as we are, and we grow with the power to do that which we must do. May was merely an unreasonable and narrow woman, who saw but one kind of good. In all the forty years of my life there had been no evil as I know evil. No man could say that he had harm from me--unless it might be poor Ed Hostetter--and for thousands of such workers as live from day to day, depending on men like me to give them their chance to earn bread for their wives and children, I had made the world better rather than worse. Unthinking thousands lived and had children and got what good there was in life because of me and my will. But to the others, the good ones, to Farson and Dround and May, I was but a common thief, a criminal, who fattened on the evil of the world. What had they done to make life? What was their virtue good for? They took the dainty paths and kept their clothes from the soil of the road. Yes, and what then? A renewed sense of irritation rose within me. Why should I be pestered like this, why should I lose my brother and May, why should Sarah be hurt, because they were too good to do as I had done?