needed, and they must be employed at no matter what
cost either to himself or Vane.

And yet it was an awful thing to do. Year after year he had shrunk from
it, hoping that it would never be necessary; but now the necessity had
come at last. There could be no doubt of that. He had left his son sane
and strong, with brave, wise words on his lips. An hour after he had
gone back and found him a senseless thing, human only in shape. There
could be no hesitation after that. It must be done.

Like many men of his kind, men whose lives have been passed in wrestling
with the barbarisms, the ignorance and the superstitions of lower races,
as well as with the blind forces of nature and the scourges of
pestilence and famine in distant lands, Arthur Maxwell was a man of deep
though mostly silent religious convictions, and if ever there was a time
when such a man could find strength and guidance in prayer surely this
was such a time, and yet he had walked up and down his room, which since
he had entered it had been his Gethsemane, for hours before he knelt
down by his bedside and lifted up his heart, if not his voice, in
prayer.

He rose from his knees with clearer sight and greater strength to see
and face the terrible task which lay before him. It was quite plain to
him now that the task must be faced and carried through, and he was more
strongly determined than ever that before the next day was over Vane
should know everything that he could tell him. Still, there was no rest
for him yet, and for hours longer he walked up and down the room
thinking of the past and the future; but most of the past.

About seven sheer physical fatigue compelled him to lie down on his bed,
and in a few minutes he fell off into an uneasy sleep. Just about this
time Vane woke--his mouth parched, his brain burning and throbbing, and
every nerve in his body tingling. As soon as he opened his eyes he saw
Koda Bux standing by his bedside.

"What on earth's the matter, Koda?" he said in a voice that was half a
groan. "Great Scott, what a head I've got! Ah, I remember now. It was
that infernal whiskey. What the devil made me drink it?"

"You are right, Vane Sahib," said Koda sententiously; "it was the
whiskey, which surely is distilled from fruits that grow only on the
shores of the Sea of Sorrow. Now your head is wracked with the torments
of hell, and your mouth is like a cave in the desert; but you shall be
cured and sleep, and when you wake you sha