wards Detricand on his knees. "Let me go, let me
go," he whined. "I was mad; I didn't know what I was doing; I've not
been right in the head since I was in the Guiana prison."

At that moment it struck Detricand that the old man must have had
some awful experience in prison, for now his eyes had the most painful
terror, the most abject fear. He had never seen so craven a sight.

"What were you in prison for in Guiana, and what did they do to you
there?" asked Detricand sternly. Again the old man shivered horribly,
and tears streamed down his cheeks, as he whined piteously: "Oh no, no,
no--for the mercy of Christ, no!" He threw up his hands as if to ward
off a blow.

Detricand saw that this was not acting, that it was a supreme terror, an
awful momentary aberration; for the traitor's eyes were wildly staring,
the mouth was drawn in agony, the hands were now rigidly clutching an
imaginary something, the body stiffened where it crouched.

Detricand understood now. The old man had been tied to a triangle and
whipped--how horribly who might know? His mood towards the miserable
creature changed: he spoke to him in a firm, quiet tone.

"There, there, you're not going to be hurt. Be quiet now, and you shall
not be touched."

Then he stooped over, and quickly undoing the old man's waistcoat, he
pulled down the coat and shirt and looked at his back. As far as he
could see it was scarred as though by a red-hot iron, and the healed
welts were like whipcords on the shrivelled skin. The old man whimpered
yet, but he was growing quieter. Detricand lifted him up, and buttoning
the shirt and straightening the coat again, he said:

"Now, you're to go home and sleep the sleep of the unjust, and you're to
keep the sixth commandment, and you're to tell no more lies. You've made
a shameful mess of your son's life, and you're to die now as soon as you
can without attracting notice. You're to pray for an accident to take
you out of the world: a wind to blow you over a cliff, a roof to fall on
you, a boat to go down with you, a hole in the ground to swallow you up,
a fever or a plague to end you in a day."

He opened the door to let him go; but suddenly catching his arms held
him in a close grip. "Hark!" he said in a mysterious whisper.

There was only the weird sound of the running water through the open
trap-door of the floor. He knew how superstitious was every Jerseyman,
from highest to lowest, and he would work upon that weakness