ve when I married her. He is alive today, a wanderer. He
learned of things and sent me a letter; it found me at the Infield
Conference the day before I came home that time to see my baby. Since
that day it has seemed to me that I would suffer the eternity of the
damned rather than that that stain should mar my child's life, and in
the blackness of my heart I have believed that it wouldn't if it weren't
known. I have kept him quiet; I have hushed up the truth. I have paid
him money, leaving it for him where he wrote me to leave it. I have gone
hungry and ragged to satisfy him. I have begged my living of a friend. I
have drained the life of the woman I love. And yet he is never content.
And I have betrayed even _him_. For he forbade me to see his wife ever
again, or even to know the child I had begotten, and I have gone to
them, in secret, by night. I have sinned not alone against God, but
against the devil. I have sinned against--_everything_!"

* * *

The fire which had swept him on left him now of a sudden, his arms hung
down at his sides, his head drooped. It was Mate Snow who broke the
silence, falling back a step, as if he had been struck.

"God forgive me," he said in awe. "And _I_ have kept you here. _You_! To
preach the word of God to these people. God forgive me!"

"I think Mista God laugh, yes."

Yen Sin wasn't laughing himself; he was looking at his collars. Mate
Snow shrugged his shoulders fiercely, impatient of the interruption.

"I have kept you here," he pursued bitterly, "for the good of my own
soul, which would have liked to drive you away. I have kept you here,
even when you wanted to go away--"

"Little mousie want to go away. Little cat say, 'no--no.'" Yen Sin's
head turned slowly and he spoke on to the bit of yellow silk, his words
clear and powerless as a voice in a dream. "No--no, Mousie, stay with
little cat. Good little cat. Like see little mousie jump. Little cat!"

Mate Snow wheeled on him, and I saw a queer sight on his face for an
instant; the gray wrinkles of age. My cousin Duncan was there, constable
of Urkey village, and he saw it too and came a step out of his corner.
It was all over in a wink; Mate Snow lifted his shoulders with a sigh,
as much as to say: "You can see how far gone the poor fellow is."

The Chinaman, careless of the little by-play, went on.

"Mista Sam Kow nice China fella. Mista Minista go to Mista Sam Kow in
Infield, washy colla. Mista Yen Sin lite a letta to