ngels."

CHAPTER XVII.

BLIND BENNER FULFILS HIS PROMISE.

"How did you know me," Levi asked Blind Benner as they went from the
side-show to the big tent.

"I don't know how; yer didn't speak and yer didn't laugh. Hunch was
bagpipin', an' all at once somethin' pulled me an' I follered, an' when
I got closer I knowed it was you."

"You have a bad cough, Benner," Levi remarked sympathetically, as he
listened to the blind man struggling for breath.

"Yes; I ketched it soon after we left the Sisters. It goes hard with me
sometimes, but mostly it's only a little hack."

Here he caught Levi's arm and asked in a whisper:

"Did yer hear anything of him?"

"Yes, we heard something of him, but we did not find him."

"Yer oughter hed me with yer from the first; I'd hev found him. Bill an'
Hunch an' me's been huntin' yer all this time."

"That's why you left Three-Sisters and joined the circus?"

"Yes, we thought yer would come to the show when yer seen Bill's and
Hunch's names on the bills."

"You have been on another road from us. We did not see any bills posted
before to-night. We had been workin' in a choppin' over the hill yonder,
and just come to the town to settle our account and go somewhere else.
But didn't you hear anything of Gill?"

"Nuthin'. Hunch kep' askin' 'bout him, an' I kep' watchin' the folks
goin' inter the tent when I could. I allers waited 'bout Hunch when he
was bagpipin', thinkin' mebbe Gill 'ud be in the crowd an' I'd hear him
laugh er somethin, but I didn't."

A tear rolled over Blind Benner's cheek, and in the red firelight
resembled blood.

Blood! It is typical of vengeance, emblematic of atonement. It is a
scarlet thread through the history of the world. On it are strung
covenants; from it dangle the names of covenant-breakers, and close to
these latter hang the names of avengers. Blood on Blind Benner's cheek.
It sent a thrill through Levi's being. The blood in his own heart warmed
and leaped to his face as he grasped fraternally the blind man's hand.

Then Hope, coy, fickle, and false, appeared, like a comet in the
heavens, which stretched without horizon their black expanse before
Blind Benner's eyes. Behind her trailed a long train of gleaming
possibilities, and he said with emotion:

"We'll find him yit."

Levi replied in a trembling voice:

"You may; we can't."

And the blind man answered:

"I will."

Then they were in the tent, and the evening show began.

The