ned the subject and
asked how was George, and then as they were parting, again asked how it
happened, and was again startled by the words: "Ask your own boy, sir,"
for Thornton, like many an older, stronger, wiser man, accepted
unchallenged the views of his wife. Jim had had his breakfast and was
gone by the time Dwight reached home, but Felicie, in answer to
question, with infinite regret and becoming reluctance owned that Miss
Sanford and other witnesses of the unfortunate affair united in saying
that Monsieur James had, in a moment of boyish petulance perhaps, swung
his jacket full in the face of Monsieur George, never thinking,
doubtless, of the cruel, sharp-edged, metal button that should so nearly
cut out the eye; and then, terrified at the sight of so much blood, was
it not natural that any child should run from the sight and try to
forget, and perhaps _might_ forget, and so deny?

Dwight listened in a daze, spurning the toothsome breakfast set before
him; then, rising, took his cap, left the house without another word
and, hastening thither, found Priscilla Sanford on the veranda at the
Rays'.

As she herself subsequently admitted to her aunt, Priscilla, who had
been bred to the doctrine of original sin and innate propensity for
evil, who had long thought that the major stood sorely in ignorance as
to Jimmy's spiritual needs, and who herself stood solemnly convinced of
the truth of the Thornton story, now conceived it her duty to fully and
unreservedly answer the major's questions. Had she witnessed the affair?
She had in great part, she said, little considering that of the most
essential part, the actual blow or slash, she had seen nothing. Was it
true that his son was--the assailant? Priscilla answered that, though
she was not at that instant where she could herself _see_ the blow, she
an instant later saw everything, and the relative position of the boys
was such that there was no room for doubt it was James who struck. She
heard the scream when near the door and at once ran out. And had not
Jimmy stopped to offer aid or--do anything? No, Jimmy had rushed on as
though bent on overtaking the leaders, as though he never heard what,
much farther away, she had heard distinctly. And then Priscilla owned
that the look of agony in the father's face was such that her resolution
well-nigh failed her.

But, unhappily, not quite. There are possibly no people so possessed
with the devil of meddling in the management o