“Mother, what does this mean?” No man who had once seen it, could forget the look she gave him. There was heartbreak in it; there was more than that, there was the crushing back of a life-long pride. “What can it mean?” she asked. His head fell on his breast. He had never guessed before the bitterness that life can have, that a moment of time can bring. She never took her eyes from his. Whatever the sentence, she would meet it as became her past. Slowly his head came up; slowly the misery in his eyes rose to hers. Then he came and laid his lips on her forehead and said: “You are my mother: I shall obey your wish.” CHAPTER X A Second Murder? “Mr. McManus,” said Trafford, after they had completed the re-examination of Wing’s private papers at the office and in his safe at home, “was Mr. Wing of a peculiarly secretive disposition?” “If he had a fault,” McManus answered, “and since he was human, he must have had, it was his excessive frankness and openness.” “And yet we find him lugging papers on some affair, which he shared with no one, back and forth from office to house, and when not so doing, keeping them locked in a safe in his library to which only he had access. How do you account for this?” McManus glanced over his shoulder before answering and then dropped his voice almost to a whisper, although they were sitting in the very centre of the great library at the Parlin house, with the door closed. “I think he was afraid.” “Afraid!” repeated Trafford, almost thrown off his guard, but instinctively lowering his tone in sympathy with his companion. “Afraid of what?” “Just about two years ago, he found one morning that his desk at the office had been ransacked. Papers were turned topsy-turvy and packages of papers had been opened and tied up again hastily. The thoroughness with which the search was made showed that the person had a well-shaped purpose, while the fact that a considerable amount of money, which was loose in a drawer, was not touched, proved that it was not robbery. We made every effort to find out the culprit, but without success. We had at one time suspicion of an office-boy, but nothing positive, and Mr. Wing wouldn’t let him be discharged under circumstances that would do him a grave injustice if he were innocent. So we retained him.” “And he repeated the performance,” Trafford said in a tone of conviction. McManus looked at him, questioning whether this assertion came from knowledge of the affair or was merely a shrewd guess. Failing to satisfy himself, he went on: “The performance was repeated, but under conditions that made it impossible for the boy to be guilty. He was away on his vacation.” “Not shrewd of the culprit. You are certain it was some one in the office?” “Yes; but we never discovered his identity.” “And from that time Mr. Wing began carrying these papers back and forth and keeping them in this safe.” McManus nodded. “And the desk was never troubled again.” “How do you know?” “Was it?”