"What can be the matter with Dick?" said Elizabeth. "I never saw him so excited before. He seemed--" She paused, and bit her lip. "Well, my dear," said Mrs. Ward calmly, "you see now, I hope, just how the world regards such a wild action. It was his love and respect for his sister, of course." XI "No, don’t say anything more. I’ve thought it all out; my duty’s clear now, I must go." Elizabeth laid her hand on her father’s shoulder, and though he turned from the great desk at which he sat in his private office, he hesitated. "Come on." "That conscience of yours, Bess--" he began, drawing down the lid of his desk. "Yes, I know, but I can’t help it." "How did you decide at last to go?" asked Ward, as they walked rapidly along in the crowded street. "Well, it tortured me--I couldn’t decide. It seemed so difficult,--every one--mama, our dear Modderwell, Mr. Eades, Dick--he nearly lost his reason, and he did lose his temper--thought it impossible. But at last I decided--" "Yes?" "--just to go." Elizabeth gave a little laugh at this not very illuminating explanation. "I didn’t know what the proprieties were," she went on. "Our little code had not provided rules--what to wear, the chaperonage, and all that, you know. And then,"--she abandoned her irony,--"I thought of you." "As a last resort, eh?" said Ward, looking fondly into her face, flushing behind her veil in the keen November air. She drew close to him, put her hand on his arm. "Yes," she said, "and as a first resort, as a constant, never-failing resort." She gave his arm a little squeeze, and he pressed her hand to his side in silence. "Do you know where it is?" Elizabeth asked presently. "Oh, yes, I was there once." "When?" "When that boy of mine was arrested--Graves." "Yes, I remember." "I wonder," he said after a pause, and he paused again at the question he seemed to fear--"whatever became of him!" She had never told him of that day at the charity bureau; she wondered if she should do so now, but she heard him sigh, and she let it pass. "Yes," he went on as if she had been privy to his rapid train of thought, "I suppose such things must be; something must be done with them, of course. I hope I did right." At the Central Station they encountered a young policeman, who, when he saw Ward, evidently recognized him as a man of affairs, for he came forward with flattering alacrity, touching his helmet in the respect which authority always has ready for the rich, as perhaps the real source of its privilege and its strength. The young policeman, with a smile on his pleasant Irish face, took Ward and Elizabeth in charge. "I’ll take yez to the front office," he said, "and let yez speak to the inspector himself."