ng how well they worked by this double power of
human kindness, the warders laughed again, and made a mock at
Sunlocks for his former cry of weakness. And so, amid tender words
between themselves, and jeers cast in upon them by the warders, they
made shift to cheat time of another weary day.

The fifth day went by like the fourth, with heavy toil and pain to
make it hard, and cruel taunts to make it bitter. And many a time, as
they delved the yellow sulphur bank, a dark chill crossed the hearts
of both, and they thought in their misery how cheerfully they would
dig for death itself, if only it lay in the hot clay beneath them.

That night when they had returned to the hut wherein they slept, or
tried to sleep, they found that some well-meaning stranger had been
there in their absence and nailed up on the grimy walls above their
beds, a card bearing the text, "Come unto Me all ye that labor and
are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." And so ghastly seemed the
irony of those words in that place that Jason muttered an oath
between his teeth as he read them, and Sunlocks threw himself down,
being unbound for the night, with a peal of noisy laughter, and a
soul full of strange bitterness.

The next day after that, the sixth of their life together, rose
darker than any day that had gone before it, for the wounded hand of
Michael Sunlocks was then purple and black, and swollen to the size
of two hands, and his bodily strength was so low that, try as bravely
as he might to stand erect, whenever he struggled to his feet he fell
to the ground again. Thinking nothing of this, the warders were for
strapping him up to Jason as before, but while they were in the act
of doing so he fainted in their hands. Then Jason swept them from
him, and vowed that the first man that touched Sunlocks again should
lie dead at his feet.

"Send for the Captain," he cried, "and if the man has any bowels of
compassion let him come and see what you have done."

The warders took Jason at his word, and sent a message to the office
saying that one of their prisoners was mutinous, and the other
pretending to be ill. After a time the Captain despatched two other
warders to the help of the first two and these words along with them
for his answer: "If one rebels, punish both."

Nothing loth for such exercise, the four warders set themselves to
decide what the punishment should be, and while they laid their heads
together, Jason was bending over Sunlo