“Open up the Rookeries to the health authorities and to private physicians other than Dr. De Vito.  Call Tip O’Farrell’s blockade off.  Clean out and disinfect the tenements.  If necessary, quarantine every building that’s suspected.”

“Why, what do you think the disease is?” cried Hollenbeck, taken aback by the positiveness of Hal’s speech.

“Do you tell me.  You’ve come here to give directions.”

“Something in the nature of malaria,” said Hollenbeck, recovering himself.  “So there’s no call for extreme measures.  The Old Home Week Committee will look after the cleaning-up.  As for quarantine, that would be a confession.  And we want to do the thing as quietly as possible.”

“You’ve come to the wrong shop to buy quiet,” said Hal mildly.

“Now listen to me.”  Elias M. Pierce sat forward in his chair and fixed his stony gaze on Hal’s face.  “This is what you’ll do with the ‘Clarion.’  You’ll agree here and now to print nothing about this alleged epidemic.”

Hal turned upon him a silent but benign regard.  The recollection of that contained smile lent an acid edge to the magnate’s next speech.

“You will further promise,” continued Pierce, “to quit all your muckraking of the business interests and business men of this town.”

Still Hal smiled.

“And you will publish to-morrow a full retraction of the article about my daughter and an ample apology for the attack upon me.”

The editorial expression did not change.

“On those conditions,” Pierce concluded, “I will withdraw the criminal proceedings against you, but not the civil suit.  The indictment will be handed down to-morrow.”

“I’m ready for it.”

“Are you ready for this?  We have two unbiased witnesses—­unbiased, mind you—­who will swear that the accident was Miss Cleary’s own fault.  And—­” there was the hint of an evil smile on the thin lips, as they released the final words very slowly—­“and Miss Cleary’s own affidavit to that effect.”

For the moment the words seemed a jumble to Hal.  Meaning, dire and disastrous, informed them, as he repeated them to himself.  Providentially his telephone rang, giving him an excuse to go out.  He hurried over to McGuire Ellis.

“I’m afraid it’s right, Boss,” said the associate editor, after hearing Hal’s report.

“But how can it be?  I saw the whole thing.”

“E.M.  Pierce is rich.  The nurse is poor.  That is, she has been poor.  Lately I’ve had a man keeping tabs on her.  Since leaving the hospital, she’s moved into an expensive flat, and has splurged out into good clothes.  Whence the wherewithal?”

“Bribery!”

“Without a doubt.”

“Then Pierce has got us.”

“It looks so,” admitted Ellis sorrowfully.

“But we can’t give in,” groaned Hal.  “It means the end of the ‘Clarion.’  What is there to do?”