It could not be said that these moments of a consciousness of guilt were so frequent as ever to become confluent, and to form a mood. They came and went; perhaps toward the last they were more frequent. What seems certain is that in the end there began to mix with his longing for home a desire, feeble and formless enough, for expiation. There began to be suggested to him from somewhere, somehow, something like the thought that if he had really done wrong, there might be rest and help in accepting the legal penalty, disproportionate and excessive as it might be. He tried to make this notion appreciable to Pinney when they first met after he summoned Pinney to Quebec; he offered it as an explanation of his action. In making up his mind to return at all hazards and to take all the chances, he remembered what Pinney had said to him about his willingness to bear him company. It was not wholly a generous impulse that prompted him to send for Pinney, or the self-sacrificing desire to make Pinney's fortune in his new quality of detective; he simply dreaded the long journey alone; he wanted the comfort of Pinney's society. He liked Pinney, and he longed for the vulgar cheerfulness of his buoyant spirit. He felt that he could rest upon it in the fate he was bringing himself to face; he instinctively desired the kindly, lying sympathy of a soul that had so much affinity with his own. He telegraphed Pinney to come for him, and he was impatient till he came. Pinney started the instant he received Northwick's telegram, and met him with an enthusiasm of congratulation. "Well, Mr. Northwick, this is a great thing. It's the right thing, and it's the wise thing. It's going to have a tremendous effect. I suppose," he added, a little tremulously, "that you've thought it all thoroughly over?" "Yes; I'm prepared for the worst," said Northwick. "Oh, there won't be any _worst_," Pinney returned gayly. "There'll be legal means of delaying the trial; your lawyer can manage that; or if he can't, and you have to face the music at once, we can have you brought into court without the least publicity, and the judge will go through with the forms, and it'll be all over before anybody knows anything about it. I'll see that there's no _interviewing_, and that there are no reporters present. There'll probably be a brief announcement among the cases in court; but there won't be anything painful. You needn't be afraid. But what I'm anxious about now is, not to bring any influence to bear on you. I promised my wife I wouldn't urge you, and I won't; I know I'm a little optimistic, and if you don't see this thing exactly _couleur de rose_, don't you do it from anything _I_ say." Pinney apparently put great stress upon himself to get this out. "I've looked it in the face," said Northwick. "And your friends know you're coming back?" "They expect me at any time. You can notify them."