“Rion,” said the Colonel, turning to his friend, “would you mind taking the girls home? I’ve just remembered something I have to do that will detain me for a few minutes. I’ll go round the other way and be at Folsom Street almost as soon as you are.” He waited to see Rion enter and then slammed the door on him, and drew back from the curb. As the carriage disappeared around the corner he walked forward to the spot where Jerry was concealed. He could see his figure pressed back against the fence, faintly discernible as a darker bulk amid the darkness about it, a pale line of shirt bosom showing between the straight blackness of the loosened coat fronts. “I knew that was you, Jerry,” he said. “It’s no good hiding.” Jerry stepped forward into the light of the lamp. He was enraged and chagrined at the encounter. “Hiding?” he exclaimed haughtily. “Why should I be hiding?” The Colonel came close to him and said with low-toned emphasis: “Because you’re a liar and a coward, Jerry Barclay; and you were afraid to meet me.” Jerry drew back crying with amazed rage: “Colonel Parrish!” “And you tried to hide from me to-night when I know what you are and what you’ve done. You scrub--you--” Barclay hit furiously at him, but the older man evaded the blow, and seizing him by the loosened fronts of his coat, with his open hand struck him on both sides of the face and then flung him against the fence. He squared himself to meet an onslaught but Jerry struck heavily and fell, a dark, sprawling mass on the sidewalk. The oath that he shouted as he reeled back was bitten in two by an ejaculation of pain and he lay motionless, groaning in the dark. “Stay there and howl,” said the Colonel. “If I stayed another moment I’d kick you as you lie.” And he turned and ran down the street. The rattle of a carriage struck his ear and a coupé turned the corner, its lamps glaring like two round yellow eyes. He hailed it, thrust a handful of silver into the driver’s hand, and gave him the Allen address on Folsom Street. As the carriage rattled across town he lay back, his blood singing in his ears, his heart racked with rage and pain. He had done no good, probably been very foolish. But as June’s face rose on his memory, he wished he had hit harder, and the recollection of Jerry groaning against the fence soothed his pain. CHAPTER XIII THE BREAKING POINT In the middle of the December afternoon the Colonel had come in early to his rooms to change his coat and brush up a bit. He was going to call on the wife of a pioneer friend who had just returned from Europe. The Colonel was punctilious and called in a black coat, which he now stood brushing beside the window and anxiously surveying, for he had been a man who was careful of his dress, and the coat looked shiny.