He knew that it was so, and the knowledge did not tend to sweeten his disposition.  He told himself again and again that he could not help it,—­it was the force of circumstances and the curse of competition.  Like the fly in the spider’s parlor, he found himself inextricably enveloped in the silken maze of deceit which he had entered so blithely years ago.  He had ceased to question bitterly whether the game was worth the candle.  He told himself the Fates had decreed it, and the game had to be played out to the end, The principal thing now was to keep the pieces moving and prevent a checkmate, for that would mean ruin!

One of the office boys knocked at the door and presented a card, for into this sanctum sanctorum no one was permitted to enter unannounced.  The card bore the name of the nominal president of the Consolidated Provident Savings Company, which was one of the numerous schemes that Judge Hildreth had on hand.  It was not always wise to have his name appear.  He believed in sleeping partnerships.  As he explained it to himself, that gave one a free hand.

The Consolidated Provident Savings Company was a popular institution in Marlborough.  There were conservative financiers who shook their heads and feared that its methods were not based on sound business principles and savored too much of wild-cat schemes and fraudulent speculations, but they were voted cranks by the majority, and the Consolidated Provident Savings Company grew and flourished.  It paid large dividends, and its stockholders were duly impressed with the magnificence of its buildings and the grandiose tone of its officials.

Judge Hildreth frowned heavily as he read the name, and was about to deny himself to the visitor, but on second thought he curtly ordered the boy to show him in.

The man who obeyed the invitation bowed deferentially to his chief and then took a chair in front of him, with the table between.  He was elaborately dressed, and the shiny silk hat which he deposited on the table looked aggressively prosperous.  His manner betokened a man suddenly inflated with a sense of his own importance.  His hair was sandy, and the thin moustache and beard failed to cover the pitifully weak lines of his mouth and chin.

“Good-morning, Peters.”  The Judge nodded carelessly as he spoke, but he moved uneasily in his chair.  Of late the sight of this man fretted him.  It seemed as if he always saw him accompanied by a ghostly form.  He tried to shake off the impression, and told himself angrily that he was falling into his dotage; but his memory would not yield.  He saw again the pleading, trustful face of the man’s mother as, years ago, she had besought him to do what he could for her son.

“Just make a man of him, like yourself, Judge Hildreth,” she had pleaded.  “I will be more than satisfied then.  I want my boy to be respected and to have a place in the world.  Folks needn’t know how hard his mother had to work.”