urn it!"

"I didn't intend to," he assured her, gravely. "I did have some notion
of redistributing it fairly among those who need it most; but that was
all."

"But you must have returned it in the end. You could never have been
content to keep it."

"Do you think so?" he rejoined. "I think I could have been quite content
to keep it. But that is past; it is gone, and I couldn't return it if I
wanted to."

"No," she acquiesced; "and that makes it all the harder."

"For you to do what you must do? But you mustn't think of that. I
shouldn't have made restitution in any event. Let me tell you what I
did. I had a weapon, as you have read. I tied it up with the money in a
handkerchief. There was always the chance of their catching me, and I
had made up my mind that my last free act would be to drop the bundle
into the river. So you see you need not hesitate on that score."

"Then you know what it is that I must do?"

"Assuredly. I knew it yesterday, when I saw that you had recognized me.
It was very merciful in you to reprieve me, even for a few hours; but
you will pardon me if I say it was wrong?"

"Wrong!" she burst out. "Is it generous to say that to me? Are you so
indifferent yourself that you think every one else is indifferent, too?"

He smiled under cover of the darkness, and the joy of finding that his
ideal was not going to be shattered was much greater than any thought of
the price he must pay to preserve it. When she paused, he had his
answer ready.

"I know you are not indifferent; you couldn't be. But you must be true
to yourself, at whatever cost. Will you go to Captain Mayfield now?"

She hesitated.

"I thought of doing that, at first," she began, postponing to a more
convenient season the unnerving reflection that she was actually
discussing the ways and means of it with him. "It seemed to be the
simplest thing to do. But then I saw what would happen; that I should be
obliged----"

Again he stopped her with a gesture.

"I understand. We must guard against that at all hazards. You must not
be dragged into it, you know, even remotely."

"How can you think of such things at such a time?" she queried.

"I should be unworthy to stand here talking to you if I didn't think of
them. But since you can't go to Captain Mayfield, what will you do? What
had you thought of doing?"

"I wrote a letter to--to Mr. Galbraith," she confessed.

"And you have not sent it?"

"No. If I had, I shouldn't have sp