"
"I have much to say, but I can't blame you if you refuse to believe
most of it," Larry said desperately, fighting for what seemed his last
chance. "I loved Maggie Carlisle. I believed she had splendid
qualities. Only she was dominated by the twisted ideas Old Jimmie
Carlisle had planted in her. I wanted to eradicate those twisted
ideas, and make her good qualities her ruling ones. But she didn't
believe in me. She thought me a soft-head, a police stool, a squealer.
Then I had to disappear; you know all about that. Not till I had been
with you for several weeks did I learn that she was being used in a
swindling scheme against Dick.
"I did think of telling you or Dick. But my greatest interest was to
awaken that better person I believed to be in her; and I knew that the
certain result of my exposing her to you would be for me to lose the
last bit of influence I had with her, and for her to pass right on to
another enterprise of similar character. So the idea came to me that
if I didn't expose her, but caused her to be received with every
courtesy by her intended victims, the effect upon her would be that
she would feel a revulsion for what she was doing and she would come
to her best senses. I told this to Mr. Hunt; that's why he agreed not
to give her away.
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