“Jesus Christ!” Judge Hildreth repeated the words in an awestruck tone.  Did she see him cower in his chair?  It must have been an optical illusion.  The storm outside was making the house shiver and the lights dance.

“You must consult your aunt,” he said in a changed voice.  She noticed with a pang how old and careworn he looked.

“Kate,” he called, as just then he heard his wife’s step in the hall, “come here.”

“What do you wish, Lawrence?” and there was a soft frou frou of silken draperies as Mrs. Hildreth’s dress swept over the carpet.

“Evadne wishes to become a nurse.”

“Are you crazy?” There was a steely glitter in Mrs. Hildreth’s eyes, and her tone fell cold and measured through the room.

“She says not,” said the Judge with a feeble smile.

“Why should you think so, Aunt Kate?” asked Evadne gently.  “Look how the world honors Florence Nightingale, and think how many splendid women have followed her example.”

“To earn your own living by the labor of your hands.  A Hildreth!”

“All the people who amount to anything in the world have to work, Aunt Kate.  There is nothing degrading in it.”

“Just try it and you will soon find out your mistake.  If you do this thing you will be ostracized by the world.  People make a great talk about the dignity of labor, but a girl who works has no footing in polite society.”

Evadne’s sweet laugh fell softly through the silence.  “I don’t believe I have any time for society, Aunt Kate.  Life seems too real to be frittered away over afternoon teas.”

“Are you mad, Lawrence, to let her take this step?  Think of the Hildreth honor!”

Again Judge Hildreth laughed—­that strange, feeble laugh.  “Evadne is of age, Kate; she must do as she thinks right.  As to the rest—­I think the less we say about the Hildreth honor now the better for us all.”

He was alone.  Mrs. Hildreth had swept away in a storm of wrath.  Evadne had followed her, leaving a soft kiss upon his brow.  He lifted his hand to the place her lips had touched—­he felt as if he had been stung—­but there was no outward wound.

The Hildreth honor!  The letters in the drawer at his side seemed to confront him with scorn blazing from every page.  He put forth his hand with a sudden determination.  He would crush their impertinent obtrusiveness under his heel; then, when their damaging evidence was buried in the dust of oblivion, he would be safe and fret!  Evadne knew her father had left her something.  He would make special mention of it in his will—­a Trust fund—­enough to yield her maintenance and the paltry pin money which was all the allowance he had ever seen his way clear to make his brother’s child.  It was not his fault, he argued—­he had meant to do right—­but gilt-edged securities were as waste, paper in the unprecedented monetary depression which was sweeping stronger men than himself to the