Stott's words to her on the dock had in part prepared her for the worst, he had told her what to expect at home, but the realization was so much more vivid.

While hundreds of miles of ocean still lay between, it had all seemed less real, almost attractive as a romance in modern life, but now she was face to face with the grim reality--this shabby cottage, cheap neighbourhood and commonplace surroundings, her mother's air of resignation to the inevitable, her father's pale, drawn face telling so eloquently of the keen mental anguish through which he had passed.

She compared this pitiful spectacle with what they had been when she left for Europe, the fine mansion on Madison Avenue with its rich furnishings and well-trained servants, and her father's proud aristocratic face illumined with the consciousness of his high rank in the community, and the attention he attracted every time he appeared on the street or in public places as one of the most brilliant and most respected judges on the bench.

Then to have come to this all in the brief space of a few months! It was incredible, terrible, heart rending! And what of the future?
What was to be done to save her father from this impeachment which she knew well would hurry him to his grave?
He could not survive that humiliation, that degradation.

He must be saved in the Senate, but how--how?
She dried her eyes and began to think.