timeliness of the man's entrance, and his unpreparedness to meet
the blow that was to crush him.

"May I ask, Mr. Hodder," he said, in an unemotional voice, "what you are
doing in this house?"

Still Hodder hesitated, an unwilling executioner.

"Father," said Alison, "Mr. Hodder has come with a message."

Never, perhaps, had Eldon Parr given such complete proof of his lack of
spiritual intuition. The atmosphere, charged with presage for him, gave
him nothing.

"Mr. Hodder takes a strange way of delivering it," was his comment.

Mercy took precedence over her natural directness. She laid her hand
gently on his arm. And she had, at that instant, no thought of the long
years he had neglected her for her brother.

"It's about--Preston," she said.

"Preston!" The name came sharply from Eldon Parr's lips. "What about
him? Speak, can't you?"

"He died this evening," said Alison, simply.

Hodder plainly heard the ticking of the clock on the mantel . . . .
And the drama that occurred was the more horrible because it was hidden;
played, as it were, behind closed doors. For the spectators, there was