7; L; .)7; [-]; ^V

“M,” suddenly left the mayor’s writhing lips; then slowly, letter by letter, “E-R-C-Y.  Mercy!” he vociferated.  “Why does my wife appeal for mercy to you—­a stranger—­and in your own cipher!  Miserable woman!  What secret’s here?  Either you are—­”

“Hush! some one’s at the door!” admonished the secretary.

Mr. Packard turned quickly, and, smoothing his face rapidly, as such men must, started for the door.  Mrs. Packard, flinging her whole soul into a look, met the secretary’s eyes for a moment and then let her head sink forward on her hands above those telltale matches, from whose arrangement she had reaped despair in place of hope.

Mr. Steele smiled again, his fine, false smile, but after her head had fallen; not before.  Indeed, he had vouchsafed no reply to her eloquent look.  It was as if it had met marble till her eyes were bidden; then—­

But Nixon was in the open doorway and Nixon was speaking: 

“A telegram, your Honor.”

The old man spoke briskly, even a little crisply—­perhaps he always did when he addressed the mayor.  But his eyes roamed eagerly and changed to a burning, red color when they fell upon the dejected figure of his mistress.  I fancied that, had he dared, he would have leaped into the room and taken his own part—­and who could rightly gage what that was?—­in the scene which may have been far more comprehensive to him than to me.  But he did not dare, and my eyes passed from him to the mayor.

“From Haines,” that gentleman announced, forgetting the suggestive discovery he had just made in the great and absorbing interest of his campaign. “’Speech good—­great applause becoming thunderous at flash of your picture.  All right so far if—­’” he read out, ceasing abruptly at the “if” which, as I afterward understood, really ended the message.  “No answer,” he explained to Nixon as he hurriedly, dismissed him.  “That ‘if’ concerns you,” he now declared, coming back to his wife and to his troubles at the same instant.  “Explain the mystery which seems likely to undo me.  Why do you sit there bowed under my accusations?  Why should Henry Packard’s wife cry for mercy, to any man?  Because those damnable accusations are true?  Because you have a secret in your past and this man knows it?”

Slowly she rose, slowly she met his eyes, and even he started back at her pallor and the drawn misery in her face.  But she did not speak.  Instead of that she simply reached out and laid her hand on Mr. Steele’s arm, drooping almost to the ground as she did so.  “Mercy!” she suddenly wailed, but this time to the man who had so relentlessly accused her.  The effect was appalling.  The mayor reeled, then sprang forward with his hand outstretched for his secretary’s throat.  But his words were for his wife.  “What does this mean?  Why do you take your stand by the side of another man than myself?  What have I done or what have you done that I should live to face such an abomination as this?”