an held up his hand.

"There is a little more," he said, and continued:

Should he doubt this, bid him look closely into the lad's face, and ask
him, after he has scrutinized it, what image it evokes. Should he still
doubt thereafter, thinking the likeness to which he has been singularly
blind to be no more than accidental, bid them strip the lad's right
foot. It bears a mark that I think should convince him. For the rest,
honoured sir, I beg you to keep all information touching his parentage
from the boy himself, wherein I have weighty ends to serve. Within a
few days of your receipt of this letter, I look to have the honour of
waiting upon you. In the meanwhile, honoured sir, believe that while I
am, I am your obedient servant,

JOSEPH ASHBURN

Across the narrow table the two men's glances met--Hogan's full of
concern and pity, Crispin's charged with amazement and horror. A little
while they sat thus, then Crispin rose slowly to his feet, and with
steps uncertain as a drunkard's he crossed to the window. He pushed it
open, and let the icy wind upon his face and head, unconscious of its
sting. Moments passed, during which the knight went over the last few
months of his turbulent life since his first meeting at Perth with
Kenneth Stewart. He recalled how strangely and unaccountably he had been
drawn to the boy when first he beheld him in the castle yard, and how,
owing to a feeling for which he could not account, since the lad's
character had little that might commend him to such a man as Crispin, he
had contrived that Kenneth should serve in his company.

He recalled how at first--aye, and often afterwards even--he had sought
to win the boy's affection, despite the fact that there was naught
in the boy that he truly admired, and much that he despised. Was
it possible that these his feelings were dictated by Nature to his
unconscious mind? It must indeed be so, and the written words of Joseph
Ashburn to Colonel Pride were true. Kenneth was indeed his son; the
conviction was upon him. He conjured up the lad's face, and a cry of
discovery escaped him. How blind he had been not to have seen before the
likeness of Alice--his poor, butchered girl-wife of eighteen years ago.
How dull never before to have realized that that likeness it was had
drawn him to the boy.

He was calm by now, and in his calm he sought to analyse his thoughts,
and he was shocked to find that they were not joyous. He yearned--as he
had yearned