go to a knockout, to use Bryce Cardigan's language, because she
believed Bryce Cardigan would be vanquished--and she had desired to
see him smashed--but not beyond repair, for her joy in the conflict
was to lie in the task of putting the pieces together afterward! She
realized now, however, that she had permitted matters to go too far.
A revulsion of feeling toward her uncle, induced by the memory of
Bryce Cardigan's blood on her white finger-tips, convinced the girl
that, at all hazards to her financial future, henceforth she and her
uncle must tread separate paths. She had found him out at last, and
because in her nature there was some of his own fixity of purpose,
the resolution cost her no particular pang.

It was rather a relief, therefore, when the imperturbable James
handed her at breakfast the following note:

Shirley, Dear

After leaving you last night, I decided that in your present frame of
mind my absence for a few days might tend to a calmer and clearer
perception, on your part, of the necessary tactics which in a moment
of desperation, I saw fit, with regret, to pursue last night. And in
the hope that you will have attained your old attitude toward me
before my return, I am leaving in the motor for San Francisco. Your
terrible accusation has grieved me to such an extent that I do not
feel equal to the task of confronting you until, in a more judicial
frame of mind, you can truly absolve me of the charge of wishing to
do away with young Cardigan. Your affectionate Uncle Seth.

Shirley's lip curled. With a rarer, keener intuition than she had
hitherto manifested, she sensed the hypocrisy between the lines; she