A moment later Braine opened his eyes, and the policeman assisted him to his feet. Servan, with a nod, ordered the police to help the wounded man to the taxicab which had just arrived. Braine, now wholly conscious, flung back one look of supreme hatred toward Hargreave; and that was the last either Florence or her father ever saw of Braine of the Black Hundred--a fine specimen of a man gone wrong through greed and an inordinate lust for revenge. The policeman returned to Hargreave. "It's pretty quiet up-stairs," he suggested. "Don't you think, sir, that I'd better try that bedroom door again?" "Well, if you must," assented Hargreave reluctantly. "But don't be rough with her if you can help it." For Braine he had no sympathy. When he recalled all the misery that devil's emissary had caused him, the years of hiding and pursuit, the loss of the happiness that had rightfully been his, his heart became adamant. For eighteen years to have ridden and driven and sailed up and down the world, always confident that sooner or later that demon would find him! He had lost the childhood of his daughter; and now he was to lose her in her womanhood. And because of this implacable hatred the child's mother had died in the Petrograd prison-fortress. But what an enemy the man had been! He, Hargreave, had needed all his wits constantly; he had never dared to go to sleep except with one eye open. But in employing ordinary crooks, Braine had at length overreached himself; and now he must pay the penalty. The way of the transgressor is hard; and though this ancient saying looks dingy with the wear and tear of centuries, it still holds good. But he felt sorry for the woman up above. She had loved not wisely but too well. Far better for her if she put an end to life. She would not live a year in the God-forsaken snows of Siberia. "My kind father!" said Florence, as if she could read his thoughts. "I had a hard time of it, child. It was difficult to play the butler with you about. The times that I fought down the desire to sweep you up in my arms! But I kept an iron grip on that impulse. It would have imperiled you. In some manner it would have leaked out; and your life and mine wouldn't have been worth a button." [Illustration: THE MYSTIC MILLION] Florence threw her arms around him and held him tightly. "That poor woman up-stairs!" she murmured. "Can't they let her go?" "No, dear. She has lost, and losers pay the stakes. That's life. Norton, you knew who I was all the time, didn't you?"