w and ponderous, as always, as he went back and told the old man,
who sat drinking it in, every detail of that night before, when he
had stooped and risen and sent the stone jug crashing through the
window--when he had turned, with blood dripping from his chin, to find
Dryad Anderson there in the doorway, eyes wide with horror and
loathing. Not until he had reached that point did Old Jerry move or
hint at an interruption.

"But why in time didn't you tell her yourself?" he asked then. "Why
didn't you explain that old Tom hit you a clip out there in the
dark?"

Young Denny's face burned.

"I--I tried to," he explained simply. "I--I started toward her,
meaning to explain, but I tripped, there on the threshold, and went
down on my knees. I must have been a little sick--a little giddy. And
when I got up again she--she was gone."

Old Jerry nodded his head judicially. He sucked in his lips from sheer
delight in the thrill of it all, and nodded his head in profound
solemnity.

"Jest like a woman--jest like a woman, a-condemnin' of a man without a
bit of mercy! Jest like 'em! I ain't never been enticed yet into
givin' up my freedom; but many's the time I've said--says I----"

The boy's set face checked him; made him remember. This was no mimic
thing. It was real; too real to need play-acting. And with that
thought came recollection. All in a flash it dawned on him that this
was no man-created situation; it must have something greater than that
behind it.

That morning had seen his passing from the circle to which he had
belonged as long as the circle had existed. All through that dreary
day he had known that he could never go back to it. Just why he could
not say, but he felt that that decision was irrevocable. And for that
whole day he had been alone--more utterly, absolutely alone than he
had ever been in his whole life--yet here was a place awaiting him,
needing him. For some reason it was not quite so hard to look straight
back into the eyes of that soul which he had discovered that day; it
wasn't so hard, even though he knew it now for the pitiful old fraud
it really was.

His thin, leathery face was working spasmodically. And it was
alight--aglow with a light that came entirely from within.

"Could you maybe explain," he quavered hungrily; "could you kinda tell
me--just why it is--you're a-askin' me? It--it ain't jest because you
hev to, entirely; now, is it? It ain't because there ain't nothin'
else left yo