"Have _you_ any reason not to have faith in him?" Baker was silent, and a curious expression, which she could not fathom, formed on his face. "No," he murmured finally, with what seemed like an effort, "I have not." "Personally I have the utmost confidence in him," said Judith with a shortness which brooked no further discussion of the topic. Baker looked at her thoughtfully for a moment. Then he pressed a button on his desk. "It's your funeral, Judith. I never thought you were a fool...." "Before?" she interrupted, with her first smile. It was significant that he made no reply. In due course Good arrived, accompanied by another lawyer, a tall, thin man, with a prodigious moustache, who said absolutely nothing that was intelligible to her. While he and Baker were conferring, Good drew her into an ante-room and closed the door. He was greatly agitated, and the perspiration kept coming out on his forehead in spite of his constant efforts to wipe it away. He presented a curious contrast to her perfect calm. "Miss Wynrod--before we go into this thing--you must know what it means--absolutely. I mustn't hide anything." "Don't I know all?" She lifted her eyebrows. She smiled inwardly as she thought how much more she knew about it than Good did. He paced nervously in front of her. "I hope so. I don't know. But you must." "What is lacking?" "It's going to cost--more than the purchase price--" "I know that." "It's going to cost more than you guess--incalculably more." "I don't understand." "I know--but you must. We're going to dedicate this paper to one thing--the truth. Sometimes the truth isn't easy to tell. The telling of it may bring you--it may--oh, don't you see--those closest to you--dearest to you--they may be the least able to stand the truth. You don't know what it means. You can't. Are you ready to forsake--all? ... I mean that literally, Miss Wynrod." She had never seen him so utterly excited, so moved to the depths. "Are you ready to give up everything that has been dear to you in the days that are gone, for this crazy ideal? For if you are not," he finished with a solemnity that brought a queer lump to her throat, "I had much rather that you stopped before you began." She rose and faced him, and her eyes looked steadily into his. They gleamed dull grey, like the hulls of battleships on the fighting line, and her chin was grimly firm. The stock from which she sprang had been a pioneering stock, and none who bore the name of Wynrod, in days when life was simple but hard, had turned back when once their hands were on the plough. Their sturdy courage was in her blood, and the echo of that Hugh Wynrod who had defied his King and left all that life had held dear for him, to seek a new life in a new world, for the sake of an ideal, sounded in her vibrant voice. "I understand, Mr. Good. I am ready--for anything." "It means--fight--always," he said softly. "I have played always. I _want_--fight."