“What is it, Miss Castleman?”
“It’s about Frank Shirley.”
“Oh!” he said, in surprise.
“You know that I was engaged to him, Mr. Bates?”
“Yes, I was told that.”
“And you can guess, perhaps, how I have suffered. I know only what the newspapers printed—nothing more. And now—you are a man, and you were at Harvard—you must know. Is it true that Frank—that he did something that would make it wrong for me ever to see him again?”
The blood had pressed into Sylvia’s face, but still she did not lower her eyes. She was gazing intensely at her friend. She must know the truth! The whole truth!
He considered, and then said, gravely, “No, Miss Castleman, I don’t think he did that.”
There was a pause. “But—it was a place——” she could go no further.
“I know,” he said. “But you see, Shirley had a room-mate—Jack Colton. And he was always trying to help him—to keep him out of trouble and get him home sober——”