After a hectic quarter of an hour, Mr. ’Gene Carey got hold of himself, and was able to listen intelligently, and to take in and assimilate the heavy tidings Luke Manders had brought him. Old Ben Birdsall, the young superintendent told him, as briefly and coolly as possible, had been cheating him for years, pilfering from the Altonia, altering the books, destroying incriminating letters, covering up his perfidy with a depth of guile amazing in a man of his mentality--or of what they had innocently believed to be his mentality. The old gentleman took it very hard. The two girls, palely listening, were afraid he would swoon in the violence of his grief and indignation, and Glen, witnessing the slow death of his faith in his old retainer, found her heart softening toward him. Nancy took him home at last, bewildered and broken, and it was arranged that Luke should come to see him that evening, after he had dined and rested, and tell him more of the grim details. Glen, left alone with Luke, felt a great uprushing tide of loyalty and admiration engulfing her. No wonder he had become almost a fanatic on work, with this avalanche of debt and treachery sliding down upon the Altonia! No wonder he had seemed ruthless in his zeal to make up for the scandalous losses! She, too, had liked and trusted old Ben Birdsall, and was shocked at his deep and calculating wickedness, and the whole thing left her dazed and shaken. Timidly, she tried to make Luke see a little of what she was feeling, but he took her words somberly, in a deep preoccupation, and she slipped away, to leave him with his grave and serious responsibilities. When she came down to breakfast next morning Miss Ada’s eyes, never without the look of recent tears, showed signs of fresh weeping. Mr. ’Gene Carey, after a long evening with his superintendent, had fallen into an uneasy sleep, and at four in the morning had suffered a stroke. One side was paralyzed, and he could not speak. Glen went down the hill to work in a tight-lipped silence. In view of his dreadful physical calamity, added to his business tragedy, and remembering his stout-hearted loyalty to old Ben, it was impossible to keep on casting him for the villain of the piece. She did not idealize him in the least, but she pitied him, and saw him for what he was--a rather futile and pathetic unit in a vicious feudal system. The bulk of her rage and resentment, hereafter, would center on Peter Parker of Pasadena, and directly she reached the mill she found Black Orlo and held earnest converse with him.