"No, no," cried out Shirley, relenting.
"Yes," he went on mercilessly, "it is true. It was my ambition that did it. Besides, I was tempted by a woman——"
"A woman——" faltered the girl.
"Like Adam, I'm blaming it on Eve. This woman wanted me to be, well, really great——"
"You——"
"Yes," he persisted, "I was bribed. I took the money. Oh, you don't know about me! You don't know what I was five years ago! It seemed to me then that money was the only thing that could make me really great. I knelt at the shrine of money—loved it as a dipsomaniac loves his bottle."
He paused; then he continued in a low voice:—
"Yes, I took money to acquit Challoner, and then I convicted him. Why? Because the instinct within me to do my duty was too strong to allow me to do otherwise. All the evidence was against him; he had confessed; I had to convict him."
"And the money—" ventured Shirley.
"Like a dipsomaniac,—a reformed dipsomaniac,—I put that money as he might have his bottle, on the shelf—corked. There it was—I could have it any time I wanted it." His face became more serious as he proceeded: "Then I kept on being a thief, for there was a new and overpowering motive that got the best of me. Like the reformed dipsomaniac I was determined to see what I could do without it. It became a passion with me. I knew that every move I made meant the expenditure of money. A hundred times, yes, a thousand times I have had my fingers on those seals about to break them, and then have crawled away—once more to do without the money. Somehow, I knew, that my time must come. Besides, there was that overwhelming ambition,—prompted by a woman."