With a quiet shifting of his figure which brought him into a better line with the woman he was asked to address, the secretary opened his lips to reply when she, starting, reached out one hand and drew toward herself the little innocent figure of her child, which she at once placed between herself and him.  Seeing this, I recalled the scraps of cipher left in my room above and wished I had succeeded in determining their meaning, if only to understand the present enigmatical situation.

Meanwhile Mr. Steele was saying in the mellow tone of a man accustomed to tune his voice to suit all occasions:  “Mrs. Packard will excuse me if I seem abrupt.  In obedience to commands laid upon me by his Honor, I spent both Tuesday and Wednesday in inquiries as to the origin of the offensive paragraph which appeared in Monday’s issue of the Leader.  Names were given me, but too many of them.  It took me two days to sift these down to one, and when I had succeeded in doing this, it was only to find that the man I sought was ninety miles away.  Madam, I journeyed those ninety miles to learn that meanwhile he had returned to this city.  While I was covering those miles for the second time, to-day’s paragraph appeared.  I hastened to accuse its author of libel, but the result was hardly what I expected.  Perhaps you know what he said.”

“No,” she harshly returned, “I do not.”  And with the instinctive gesture of one awaiting attack she raised her now sleepy and nodding child in front of her laboring breast, with a look in her eyes which I see yet.

“He said—­pardon me, your Honor, pardon me, Madam—­that I was at liberty to point out what was false in it.”

With a leap she was on her feet, towering above us all in her indignation and overpowering revolt against the man who was the conscious instrument of this insult.  The child, loosened so suddenly from her arms, tottered and would have fallen, had not Mr. Steele leaned forward and drawn the little one across to himself.  Mr. Packard, who, we must remember, had been more or less prepared for what his secretary had to say, cast a glance at his wife, teeming with varied emotions.

“And what did you reply to that?” were the words she hurled at the unabashed secretary.

“Nothing,” was his grave reply.  “I did not know myself what was false in it.”

With sudden faltering, Mrs. Packard reseated herself, while the mayor, outraged by what was evidently a very unexpected answer, leaned forward in great anger, crying: 

“That was not the account you gave me of this wretched interview.  Explain yourself, Mr. Steele.  Don’t you see that your silence at such a moment, to say nothing of the attitude you at present assume, is an insult to Mrs. Packard?”

The smile he met in reply was deprecatory enough; so were the words his outburst had called forth.

“I did not mean, and do not mean to insult Mrs. Packard.  I am merely showing you how hampered a man is, whatever his feelings, when it comes to a question of facts known only to a lady with whom he has not exchanged fifty words since he came into her house.  If Mrs. Packard will be good enough to inform me just how much and how little is true in the paragraph we are considering, I shall see this rascally reporter again and give him a better answer.”