iamonds; and the second, that both Maude Tracy and Jerrie Crawford were
at the point of death, which made Harold's sudden departure all the more
heinous in the eyes of his enemies; for what but conscious guilt could
have prompted him to leave his sister, who, it was said, was calling for
him with every breath, and charging him with having taken the diamonds?
Now, this was false; for although Jerrie's fever had increased rapidly
during the night, and her babbling was something terrible to hear, there
was in it no accusation of Harold, although she was constantly talking
to him, and asking for the diamonds and the bag.

'It is a pity he ever told her about them,' the doctor said, as twice
each day, morning and night, for four successive days, he came and
looked upon her fever-stained cheeks, and counted her rapid pulse, and
took her temperature, and listened to her strange talk; and then, with a
shake of his head, drove over to Tracy Park and stood by poor little
Maude's couch, and looked into her death-white face, and counted her
faint heartbeats, and tried in vain to find some word of encouragement
for the stricken man, who looked about as much like death as the young
girl so dear to him. And every morning, on his way from the cottage to
Tracy Park, the doctor saw under the pines two young men, Tom and Dick,
seated upon the iron bench each whittling a bit of pine, which one was
unconsciously fashioning into a cross and the other into a grave-stone.

Tom had found Dick there working at his cross, and, after a simple
good-morning, had sat down beside him and whittled in silence upon
another bit of wood until the doctor appeared on his way to Tracy Park.
Then the whittling ceased, and both young men arose, and, going forward,
asked how Jerrie was.

'Pretty bad. Hal oughtn't to have gone, though I told him there was no
danger. We must telegraph if she gets worse,' was the reply, as the
doctor rode on.

Tom and Dick separated, and saw no more of each other until the next
morning, when they went again, and whittled in silence under the pines
until the doctor came in sight, when the same questions were asked and
answered as on the previous day.

Billy never joined them, but sat under the butternut tree where Jerrie
had refused him, for hours and hours watching the sluggish river, and
wondering what the world would be to him if Jerrie were not in it. Had
Billy been with Tom and Dick, he could not have whittled as they did,