But, by midnight, it seemed as though the situation was solving itself.  In the segregated district there had been a small riot, and another along the river front, disturbances quickly ended by the police and the volunteer deputies.  The city had not gone dark.  The bombs had not exploded.  Word came in that by back roads and devious paths the most rabid of the agitators were leaving town.  And before two o’clock Howard Cardew and some of the others went home to bed.

At three o’clock the Cardew doorbell rang, and Howard, not asleep, flung on his dressing gown and went out into the hall.  Lily was in her doorway, intent and anxious.

“Don’t answer it, father,” she begged.  “You don’t know what it may be.”

Howard smiled, but went back and got his revolver.  The visitor was Willy Cameron.

“I don’t like to waken you,” he said, “but word has come in of suspicious movements at Baxter and Friendship, and one or two other places.  It looks like concerted action of some sort.”

“What sort of concerted action?”

“They still have one card to play.  The foreign element outside hasn’t been heard from.  It looks as though the fellows who left town to-night have been getting busy up the river.”

“They wouldn’t be such fools as to come to the city.”

“They’ve been made a lot of promises.  They may be out of hand, you know.”

While Howard was hastily dressing, Willy Cameron waited below.  He caught a glimpse of himself in the big mirror and looked away.  His face was drawn and haggard, his eyes hollow and his collar a wilted string.  He was dusty and shabby, too, and to Lily, coming down the staircase, he looked almost ill.

Lily was in a soft negligee garment, her bare feet thrust into slippers, but she was too anxious to be self-conscious.

“Willy,” she said, “there is trouble after all?”

“Not in the city.  Things are not so quiet up the river.”

She placed a hand on his arm.

“Are you and father going up the river?”

He explained, after a momentary hesitation.  “It may crystallize into something, or it may not,” he finished.

“You think it will, don’t you?”

“It will be nothing more, at the worst, than rioting.”

“But you may be hurt!”

“I may have one chance to fight for my country,” he said, rather grimly.  “Don’t begrudge me that.”  But he added:  “I’ll not be hurt.  The thing will blow up as soon as it starts.”

“You don’t really believe that, do you?”

“I know they’ll never get into the city.”

But as he moved away she called him back, more breathlessly than ever, and quite white.

“I don’t want you to go without knowing—­ Willy, do you remember once that you said you cared for me?”

“I remember.”  He stared straight ahead.

“Are you—­all over that?”

“You know better than that, don’t you?”