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The Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart
page 92 of 477 (19%)
the affair at the ranch would be missing now, or when found the
first accuracy of their statements would either be dulled by time or
have been added to with the passing years. The ranch itself might
have passed into other hands. To reconstruct the events of ten
years ago might be impossible, or nearly so. But that was not his
problem. He would have to connect Norada with Haverly, Clark with
Livingstone. One thing only was simple. If he found Livingstone's
story was correct, that he had lived on a ranch near Norada before
the crime and as Livingstone, then he would acknowledge that two men
could look precisely alike and come from the same place, and yet not
be the same. If not--

But, after he had turned out his light and got into bed, he began
to feel a certain distaste for his self-appointed task. If
Livingstone were Clark, if after years of effort he had pulled
himself up by his own boot-straps, had made himself a man out of
the reckless boy he had been, a decent and useful citizen, why pull
him down? After all, the world hadn't lost much in Lucas; a sleek,
not over-intelligent big animal, that had been Howard Lucas.

He decided to sleep over it, and by morning he found himself not
only disinclined to the business, but firmly resolved to let it drop.
Things were well enough as they were. The woman in the case was
making good. Jud was making good. And nothing would restore Howard
Lucas to that small theatrical world of his which had waved him
good-bye at the station so long ago.

He shaved and dressed, his resolution still holding. He had indeed
almost a conscious glow of virtue, for he was making one of those
inglorious and unsung sacrifices which ought to bring a man credit
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