position and well-known motives of
philanthropy? Can it be that I have resided with you, off and on, for
ten years past without your ever realizing the fond yearnings of my
heart? Mrs. Guffy, I shall make her the heiress to my millions; I
shall marry her off to some Eastern nabob, and thus attain to that high
position in society I am so well fitted to adorn--sure, and what else
were you expecting, Mrs. Guffy?"

"A loikely story," with a sniff of disbelief. "They tell me she 's old
Gillis's daughter over to Bethune."

"They tell you, do they?" a sudden gleam of anger darkening his gray
eyes. "Who tell you?"

"Sure, Bob, an' thet 's nuthin' ter git mad about, so fur as I kin see.
The story is in iverybody's mouth. It wus thim sojers what brought ye
in thet tould most ov it, but the lieutenant,--Brant of the Seventh
Cavalry, no less,--who took dinner here afore he wint back after the
dead bodies, give me her name."

"Brant of the Seventh?" He faced her fairly now, his face again
haggard and gray, all the slight gleam of fun gone out of it. "Was
that the lad's name?"

"Sure, and didn't ye know him?"

"No; I noticed the '7' on his hat, of course, but never asked any
questions, for his face was strange. I didn't know. The name, when
you just spoke it, struck me rather queer. I--I used to know a Brant
in the Seventh, but he was much older; it was not this man."

She answered something, lingering for a moment at the door, but he made
no response, and she passed out silently, leaving him staring moodily
through the open window, his eyes appearing glazed and sightless.

Glencaid, like most mining towns of its class, was dull and dead enough
during the hours of daylight. It was not until after darkness fell
that it awoke from its somnolence, when the scattered miners came
swarming down from out the surrounding hills and turned into a noisy,
restless playground the single narrow, irregular street. Then it
suddenly became a mad commixture of Babel and hell. At this hour
nothing living moved within range of the watcher's vision except a
vagrant dog; the heat haze hung along the near-by slopes, while a
little spiral of dust rose lazily from the deserted road. But Hampton
had no eyes for this dreary prospect; with contracted brows he was
viewing again that which he had confidently believed to have been
buried long ago. Finally, he stepped quickly across the little room,
and, standing quietly within the open doo