ch it? Was there time?

With a shriek of warning he rushed forward,--stumbling against, leaping
over obstacles,--gaining upon that menacing point of fire and fume,
which now seemed to race him like a living thing.

The miracle was wrought--two miracles! A few more seconds, and it would
have been too late; but now the lame walked and, as it were, the dead
came back to life.

Hallam's shriek, the uproar of overturned obstructions, reverberated
through the empty building and brought Archibald Wingate, Amy, and poor
Fayette face to face with the panting, excited rescuer. All comprehended
at once what had been attempted and how prevented. The mill owner laid
an iron grip upon the half-wit's shoulder, who made no effort to escape;
for at last, at last, there had penetrated to his dim intelligence the
wide, the awful difference between good and evil. When he saw the once
crippled lad, whom his own hands had restored to health, thus fling
away his life with unstinted hand, that he might save the life of
another,--once his enemy also,--there had roused within the dormant
brain of the foundling a sudden perception of Hallam's nobility and his
own baseness. Therefore, stunned by this new knowledge, he stood humble
and unresisting.

Amy's great heart comprehended just what and how her poor protege was
suffering. With her, to think was to act. She sprang to him and laid her
small hand on his other shoulder, and the tender sympathy of this touch
thrilled him more than the hard grasp of his master.

"Oh! but Hallam--Hallam--you _walked_! _walked!_ you ran! You--you--who
never--"

Her voice choked, ceased, and she turned from Fayette to fling herself
headlong into her brother's arms. For the first time in their lives he
could receive her and support her firmly. Then she stepped back and
shook him. Gently at first, then violently. His crutches were--nobody
cared where, though certainly not at hand; yet he stood fixedly,
resisting her attacks, and again catching her to him with that
overflowing joy that only such as he could guess.

"But I don't understand. Tell--tell; not here, though. Is all safe? No
danger any more?"

"No," said Fayette to her demand, "there ain't no danger. Not 'less the
fuse had burned out to the end. It's under the desk. He'll find it.
I--I--but it's put out. I--"

"You didn't mean it, did you, boy? You could not. You didn't
understand."

"No, I didn't, I didn't," whimpered the stricken fellow.

Mr.