d feebly.

"You have bred true, lad. Ever were the Mackays good haters, bitter of
heart and heavy of hand. So I have been all my days, and no man did me
wrong that I did not repay it. But listen, son o' mine: Lying here with
my man's strength gone from me and the shadows on my soul I see more
clearly, as clearly as old Murdoch McGillivray, who is dead, and as you
know had the gift while he lived. And I tell you now that hate and
revenge are the things worth least in life; and, moreover, that the
things worth most in life and much more in death, are love, and work
well done, and a heart clean of bitterness. And so I will tell you
nothing at all."

"Please, father!" the boy pleaded, for as his father had said he had
bred true.

"No and no, I tell you, no!" Adam Mackay refused. "No killing will bring
me back. I will not lay a feud upon you. Blood and blood, and yet more
blood I have seen come of such things. I know you, Angus, bone o' my
bone and flesh o' my flesh as I know my own youth, and of the knowledge
in that one thing I will not trust you. I die, and that is the end of
it, for me and for all of me. Your duty is to the living. And now call
you Jean and Torquil, that I may bid them farewell. And take you my
blessing such as it is; for I feel the darkness closing upon me."

An hour later Adam Mackay was dead. And that day was the last of Angus
Mackay's careless boyhood.

CHAPTER III

ANGUS ASSERTS HIMSELF

Though the death of Adam Mackay made a great local sensation, its cause
remained unexplained. Apparently he had been unarmed, and so it seemed
plain murder. But on the other hand his strange silence was puzzling. He
had been on good terms with most of his neighbors, or at least not on
very bad terms with anybody, save a couple of Indians whom he had caught
stealing and handled roughly. But these Indians had a perfectly good
alibi. There was no clew, no starting point. Nobody knew even which way
Mackay had ridden on the day of his death. And so after a while it was
classed with those mysteries which may be solved by time, by not
otherwise.

Meanwhile, young Angus took up the burden of his responsibilities. So
far as he knew he had no near relatives, and search of his father's
papers confirmed this. He was rather relieved than otherwise. He found
his father's will, and struggling with its verbiage, set it aside to
await the return of the executor Isaac J. Braden, who was absent on a
business trip.