"Reade! Reade! You can't imagine how grateful you'll find me if I really can rely upon you to forget what you overheard to-night!" cried the humiliated man. "And you, Mr. Prescott—-may I depend upon you, also, to preserve silence?"
"I'm afraid, sir, you're putting me in Reade's class as an insulted man," Dick smiled grimly. "My friend, the people of this country, in the person of their President, have issued to me a commission certifying that I am worthy to wear the shoulder-straps of an army officer. The shoulder-straps stand for the strictest sense of honor in all things. If I depart, ever so little, from the laws of honor, I prove my unfitness to wear shoulder-straps. Have I answered you."
There was silence for a few moments. Then, Mr. Bascomb, having smoked his cigar out, tossed the butt away.
"I'd like to offer you a little advice, Mr. Bascomb, if you won't think
I'm too forward."
"What is it?" asked the president, turning briskly upon the young chief engineer.
"Just as long as you both live, Mr. Bascomb, Evarts is likely to bother you, in one way or another. Even if he goes to prison himself he'll find a way to bother you from the other side of the grated door. Mr. Bascomb, why don't you yourself disclose this little affair in your past history to the board of directors? Then it would be past any blackmailer's power to harm you."
"I could tell the directors in only one way," Mr. Bascomb answered, his face growing sallow. "That would be to tell my story and hand in my resignation in the same breath. Reade, you don't realize how much the presidency of the Melliston Company means to me! To resign, or to be kicked out, would end my career in the business world."
In the near darkness a step sounded on the gravel. Then Mr. Prenter came briskly forward.
"Bascomb," said the treasurer of the company, "Reade's advice was good, though wholly unnecessary. There is no need to tell the directors the story of your past misfortune. Most of them know it already."
The president's face grew grayish as he listened in torment.