ion. "But
you won't send me away from you! Promise you won't send me away!"

"Can't promise anything," said Saltash. "Look here! I think there's been
enough of this. You'd better go to bed."

But Toby was clinging fast to his hand. He spoke between quivering lips.
"Please, sir, you said you'd bought me body and soul. You can't mean to
chuck me away--after that! Please, sir, I'll do anything--anything under
the sun--for you. And you--you can kick me--do anything to me--and I'll
never say a word. I'm just yours--for as long as I live. Please,
sir--please, sir--don't send me away! I--I'd rather die than that."

He laid his head suddenly down upon the hand he held so tenaciously and
began to sob, fighting desperately to stifle all sound.

Saltash sat for a few moments in utter silence and immobility. Then,
abruptly, in a tense whisper, he spoke:

"Toby, you little fool, stop it--stop it, do you hear?--and go below!"

The words held a queer urgency. He raised himself as he uttered them,
seeking to free his hand though with all gentleness from the clinging
clasp.

"Get up, boy!" he said. "Get up and go to bed! What? Oh, don't cry! Pull
yourself together! Toby, do you hear?"

Toby lifted a white, strained face. His eyes looked enormous in the dim
light. "Yes, sir. All right, sir," he jerked out, and stumbled trembling
to his feet. "I know I'm a fool, sir. I'm sorry. I can't help it. No one
was ever decent to me--till you came. I--shall just go under now, sir."

"Oh, stop it!" Saltash spoke almost violently. "Can't you see--that's
just what I want to prevent? You don't want to go to the devil, I
suppose?"

Toby made a passionate gesture that was curiously unboylike. "I'd go to
hell and stay there for ever--if you were there!" he said.

"Good God!" said Saltash.

He got up in his sudden fashion and moved away, went to the rail and
stood there for a space with his face to the rippling sheen of water.
Finally he turned and looked at the silent figure waiting beside his
chair, and a very strange smile came over his dark features. He came
back, not without a certain arrogance, and tapped Toby on the shoulder.

"All right," he said. "Stay with me and be damned if you want to! I
daresay it would come to the same thing in the end."

Toby drew himself together with a swift movement. "That means you'll keep
me, sir?"

His eyes, alight and eager, looked up to Saltash with something that was
not far removed from adoration