Exhausted by the vehemence of her passionate outburst, Shirley hurried from the room, leaving Ryder speechless, staring at his son.

CHAPTER XVI

When Shirley reached her rooms she broke down completely, she threw herself upon a sofa and burst into a fit of violent sobbing.  After all, she was only a woman and the ordeal through which she had passed would have taxed the strongest powers of endurance.  She had borne up courageously while there remained the faintest chance that she might succeed in moving the financier to pity, but now that all hopes in that direction were shattered and she herself had been ordered harshly from the house like any ordinary malefactor, the reaction set in, and she gave way freely to her long pent-up anguish and distress.  Nothing now could save her father—­not even this journey to Washington which she determined to take nevertheless, for, according to what Stott had said, the Senate was to take a vote that very night.

She looked at the time—­eleven o’clock.  She had told Mr. Ryder that she would leave his house at once, but on reflection it was impossible for a girl alone to seek a room at that hour.  It would be midnight before she could get her things packed.  No, she would stay under this hated roof until morning and then take the first train to Washington.  There was still a chance that the vote might be delayed, in which case she might yet succeed in winning over some of the senators.  She began to gather her things together and was thus engaged when she heard a knock at her door.

“Who’s there?” she called out.

“It’s I,” replied a familiar voice.

Shirley went to the door and opening it found Jefferson on the threshold.  He made no attempt to enter, nor did she invite him in.  He looked tired and careworn.  “Of course, you’re not going to-night?” he asked anxiously.  “My father did not mean to-night.”

“No, Jeff,” she said wearily; “not to-night.  It’s a little too late.  I did not realize it.  To-morrow morning, early.”

He seemed reassured and held out his hand: 

“Good-night, dearest—­you’re a brave girl.  You made a splendid fight.”

“It didn’t do much good,” she replied in a disheartened, listless way.

“But it set him thinking,” rejoined Jefferson.  “No one ever spoke to my father like that before.  It did him good.  He’s still marching up and down the library, chewing the cud—­”

Noticing Shirley’s tired face and her eyes, with great black circles underneath, he stopped short.

“Now don’t do any more packing to-night,” he said.  “Go to bed and in the morning I’ll come up and help you.  Good night!”

“Good night, Jeff,” she smiled.

He went downstairs, and after doing some more packing she went to bed.  But it was hours before she got to sleep, and then she dreamed that she was in the Senate Chamber and that she saw Ryder suddenly rise and denounce himself before the astonished senators as a perjurer and traitor to his country, while she returned to Massapequa with the glad news that her father was acquitted.