Before she could prevent, Elijah had s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand from his shoulder and was pressing it to his lips. Helen wrenched her hand from his lips.

As if drawn by her resisting hand he rose to his feet, his burning eyes resting on hers. In vain she tried to withdraw her hand from his fierce clasp.

"Don't leave me, Helen, don't leave me!" With wide open arms he sprang toward her.

With hardly a perceptible motion, she was beyond the reach of his outstretched hands. She had no palliating knowledge of his inner thoughts, no knowledge of the malevolent suggestions of Mrs. MacGregor, no knowledge of the scene in Elijah's house, where the lamplight fell on a tear-stained baby face, on blistered sheets with hopeless figures, upon renunciation, as Elijah closed the door and deliberately put his wife from him.

Helen stood erect, composed, her eyes filled with loathing, contempt, but not for Elijah alone. This was the hardest to bear. What had she said, what had she done to bring this horrible thing upon herself?

Elijah slowly grasped the meaning of Helen's eyes. She had not spoken.

There was no need that she should speak.

"No! no! no! Helen, not that, not that; you don't understand."

"Stop! I won't listen. Not to a word."

"You will! You must!" There was no pa.s.sion now either in words or looks, only a set determination to be heard.

Try as she would, Helen could not stop the explanation he offered, the palliation of his sins past and to come. Even as he had said, she was compelled to listen, but there was no softening of her eyes, no change in the set, hard face.

"You and I cannot stay any longer in this office. You will go or I."

Elijah made as if to speak. "Stop!" Her voice was imperative. "I would be justified in leaving everything, but I began this wretched business and at whatever cost to myself, I will see it through."

Elijah felt the hopelessness of further words. Like one in a horrible dream, he turned to his desk and began to straighten his papers.

"I will attend to that. Go!"

Without a word or look, Elijah closed the office door behind him.

It required all Helen's fort.i.tude to control herself. She attempted no self-palliation, she put this aside. She had been innocent of intentional wrong doing, but this made no difference. The fact was beyond recall. Only the future was hers in which to make atonement at whatever cost to herself.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Uncle Sid and Winston, after leaving the office, went toward the Rio Vista. Winston was the first to break the silence. He spoke musingly.

"Helen doesn't absolutely know whether Elijah got that money or not. If she had known certainly, she would have told us. But she suspects that he got it and used it, or at least a part of it. There are only two who do know surely, Mellin and Elijah. Mellin has a strong hold on Elijah, or he couldn't have got that note from him. Elijah drew the money, converted it to his own use, and Mellin knows it and is making Elijah pay him to keep quiet."

"Well!" Uncle Sid stopped abruptly and thrust his walking stick into the sand. "Well!" he repeated, "what are you going to do about it?"

"I'm going to hunt Mellin down and make him give up." Winston's jaws set.

Uncle Sid smiled grimly.

"Well, young man, I'm all-fired rejoiced that you ain't a-huntin' me.

I'm goin' a-huntin' too."

At the Rio Vista they parted. Uncle Sid stumped up to the hotel office.

"Say, senner," he was addressing the clerk, "Mrs. MacGregor ain't been sighted yet, has she?"

The clerk smiled affably.

"Not yet, Captain. Expect her to make port today. Any messages?"

"Yes, plenty, but I'll deliver 'em myself."

Mrs. MacGregor made port promptly and as promptly Uncle Sid began to deliver his message.

"Well, Eunice, it seems you've finally settled to the conviction that there's more money in a servant o' the Lord than in folks that's got handles to their names."

"What do you mean, Sidney?"

"What do you mean, Eunice, takin' your ward's money an' puttin' it into this wild-cat business?"

"I'm not aware that I have told you or any one else what I have done with Alice's money."

"I'm perfectly aware o' you, Eunice, an' I have been for a good many years. You ain't got a cent o' your own an' you've been spungin' off from Alice. She didn't seem to mind, so I didn't interfere; but this is different. You just back right out now or I'll make you." Uncle Sid's face was not pleasant to contemplate.

Mrs. MacGregor smiled complacently.

"It seems to me that you are very suddenly and deeply interested in my doings."

"I am!" Uncle Sid snapped out. "An' for two reasons. In the first place you are swindling Alice out o' her money, an' in the second, the good name o' the Harwoods is in danger. Either one is enough to rile my fightin' blood, an' take 'em both together, I'm fifty years younger'n my birthday calls for."

Mrs. MacGregor spoke coldly.

"You are very much mistaken, Sidney, if you think you are frightening me."

"I am mistaken. I never thought you a fool, I declare if I did! Not this kind. Accordin' to my notion, you've tried on a powerful lot o'

different kinds o' fool, but I never thought you'd settle down to this."

Mrs. MacGregor vouchsafed no reply. She went to her closet, and began sorting various articles of clothing and laying them out on the bed.

"What are you up to now?"

"I'm going East on business."

Uncle Sid rose to his feet and walked to Mrs. MacGregor. Laying his hands on her shoulders, he turned her sharply till her eyes met his. The eyes that looked coldly into his had a well-bred, unruffled stare, exasperatingly insolent, exasperating, because they gave no open ground for resentment.

"Eunice, I'm going to make a fool of myself. I've got two hundred thousand laid up in the best kind o' securities. They bring me in ten thousand a year. You just get back that girl's money, an' I'll give you this so long as I live. If I go first, an' it's likely I will, I'll fix it so you'll get it so long's you live."

Mrs. MacGregor spoke calmly.

"Why didn't you say this to me before?"