He must be desperately
wounded. His eyes grow dim. He must be dying again.

He sleeps and is once more gently awakened by the sea--so fond now, so
terrible last night.

He sits upright in the yawl, wet, sore, and yet whole in limb. He
gathers his scattered faculties. He finds a handkerchief and ties up
his face. He muses.

"I am the sole survivor! I, Robert Chalmers, of New York City, am the
sole survivor, and nobody shall know even that. Corkey--let me
see--Corkey and a boy--they must be at the bottom of Georgian Bay!"

He muses again. His face hurts him once more. He sees a cabin at a
distance. He finds he has money in plenty. To heal his wounds will be
easy. He must be greatly changed if his feelings may be credited. Two
of his teeth are broken, and harass his curious tongue.

What plotter, cunning in exploits, could so well plan an honorable
discharge from the bitterness of life in Chicago?

"Sing on, you birds! Fly off to Cuba! I am as free!"

The man is startled by his own voice. It sounds as if some one else
were talking. Yet this surprise only increases his joy.

"Free! Free! Free!" The word has a complete charm. It is like the
shimmer of the waters. All this expanse of hammered silver is free!

"I am as free!" exclaims Robert Chalmers, of New York City.

And again starting at the sound of his own voice, he seeks the cabin of
a hospitable trapper, where his wounds healing without surgical
attention, may disguise him all the better.

CHAPTER II

A COMPLETE DISGUISE

David Lockwin has undertaken that Robert Chalmers shall have no
trouble. It was David Lockwin, in theory, who suffered all the ills of
life. In this theory David Lockwin has seriously erred. Robert
Chalmers must bear burdens.

The first burden is a broken nose and a facial appearance strangely
inferior to the look of David Lockwin, the orator. Robert Chalmers
need not disguise himself. He will never be identified. That broken
nose is a distortion that no detective could fathom. Those scarlet
fimbrications under the skin proclaim the toper. Those missing teeth
complete a picture which men do not admire.

David Lockwin was courted. Robert Chalmers is shunned. It wounds a
personal vanity that in David Lockwin's philosophy had not existed. It
is the ideal of disguises, but it does not make Robert Chambers happy.

Why, too, should Robert Chalmers desire so many appurtenances of life
that were in Da