re urging
him, and ignoring the remonstrance which Mrs. Rickett had barely begun he
made headlong for the door, dragged it open, and was gone.

He went past his little playmate in the yard, shambling blindly for the
open, deaf to the baby's cry of welcome, insensible to everything but the
bitter burden of his pain. He slammed the gate behind him and set off at
a lumbering run down the glaring road.

The evening sun smote full in his face as he went; but it might have been
midnight, for he neither saw nor felt. Instinct alone guided him--the
instinct of the wild creature, hunted by disaster, wounded to the heart,
that must be alone with its agony and its fruitless strife against fate.

He went up the cliff-path, but he did not follow it far. Something drew
him down the narrow cleft that led to the spot where first he had seen
her lying on the shingle dreaming with her head upon her arm. He turned
off the path to the place where he had crouched among the gorse-bushes
and flung stones to scare her away, and stood there panting and gazing.

The memory of her, the gracious charm, the quick sympathy, went through
him, pierced him. He caught his breath as though he listened for the
beloved sound of her voice. She had not been really angry with him for
the wantonness of those stones. She had been very ready with her
forgiveness, her kindly offer of friendship. She had never been other
than kind to him ever since. She had awakened in him the deepest, most
humble gratitude and devotion. She had even once or twice shielded him
from Dicky's never unjust wrath. And he had come to love her second only
to Dicky who must for ever hold the foremost place in his heart.

He had come to love her--and he stood between her and happiness. He did
not reason the matter. He had small reasoning power. He recognized that
Jack's brain was superior to his, and Jack had made known to him this
monstrous thing. True, Dicky had denied it, but somehow that denial had
not been so convincing as Jack's statement had been. The corrosive poison
had already done its work, and there was no antidote. He knew that Dicky
loved Juliet, knew it from his own lips. "The woman I love--the woman I
love--" How often had the low-spoken words recurred to his memory! And
Dicky was not happy. He had watched him narrowly ever since that night.
Dicky was not really hopeful for the winning of his heart's desire. He
had said there were many obstacles. What they were, Robin co