There was a pregnant pause in which both men watched each other with a curious expression on their faces. Finally Wilkinson rose and strode around the end of the desk, and holding out his hand, he said: "Colonel, I've been curt and disagreeable in my talk to you. I want to say now that I take back everything, except the good things, that I've said. You're a wonder--a perfect wonder!" "Remember, I'm to manage this campaign," warned the Colonel. "Everything will be done from the outside. No one, not even Leslie nor Beekman, must know a word about it. You promise?" "I promise to keep my hands off," agreed Wilkinson, but the next instant he added: "Come to think of it, though, I don't see why we have to do it. I'm sure that my conviction will never get that far. If necessary I'll buy up every judge from here to Washington." XIV Labouring evidently under the stress of some new and strange excitement, a man strode swiftly through the darkness of the night. He was a tall, spare individual, clothed from neck to heel in a long, loose raincoat that clung closely to his body, though the ends flapped freely in the wind. It was a dark, stormy night early in November, and although the storm pelted his uplifted face as he sped along, he never heeded the elements; nor did he notice that few pedestrians were abroad on a night that, had the weather been more propitious, would have been a gala night. As it was, the crowds were under cover. Street-cars were loaded to their limit, taxi-cabs and hansoms by the hundreds passed and repassed, so that any time he might have escaped this drenching by lifting his finger. But the storm, after all, was what he wanted; it cooled and steadied him; and as he went along he laughed gently to himself from time to time. "I got away from them, all right," he murmured, half-aloud. "Them" had been a mob of men at the Barristers' Club. They had surrounded him suddenly with outstretched hands, dragging him unmercifully about. But at last, though this demonstration had made him happy, he had torn himself away to enjoy a greater happiness--one that meant all the world to him. At the foot of a long hill he stopped and glanced toward its summit. To him, somehow, it seemed typical of his own career--a slow climb, but with a vision of glory at the top. And before he knew it he had mounted the summit and was waiting to be admitted into the presence of the one woman he loved. "This way, sir," Jeffries whispered in his ear. With a hasty movement Beekman flung off his dripping raincoat, dashed the drops from his face with a flirt of his handkerchief, and the next instant he was standing face to face with Leslie, who came toward him, smiling as she exclaimed: "Where have you been hiding? I've kept the wires going all this afternoon and evening trying to find out about you."