“I am thinking not of the point, but of your philanthropy. It is beautiful. Do you sleep well nights?”
“Very,” he answered, with a quick glance into my eyes.
“I should think that the troubles of the world would keep you awake.”
His face flushed a little, and then he smiled. “You lawyers have no suspicion of the amount of goodness there is in the world—you're always looking for rascals,” he said.
“But we have wandered. Let us take the nearest road to Rome. You say they must have money to-day.”
“Before three o'clock.”
“We'll give them ten thousand dollars—not a cent more. You must tell them to use it gently, for it's the last they'll get from us. To whom shall I draw the check?”
“To me—Lysander Wilton,” he answered, with a look of relief.
I gave him the check. He put on his coat and began to purr again; he was glad to know me, and rightly thought that he could turn some business my way.
As he left my office I went to one of the front windows and took out my handkerchief. The fog-whistle blew a blast that swept sea and land with its echoes. In a moment I saw a certain clever, keen-eyed man who was studying current history under the direction of Prof. William J. Bums come out of a door opposite and walk at a leisurely pace down the main street of Pointview toward the station. He was now taking the first steps in a systematic effort to see what was in and behind the man Wilton.