"And in the face of all this, you----"

She nodded again, brightly this time, though her eyes were swimming.

"Yes, my lover--a thousand times, yes! And I knew this would come,
too,--some time; this dreadful thing that has fallen upon us to-day. I
am heart-broken only for you, dear. What will they do to you?"

I told her briefly. They would make me serve the remaining two years
of the original sentence, doubtless with an added penalty for the
broken regulations.

"Dear God--two years!" she gasped, with a quick little sob; and then
she became my brave little girl again. "They will pass, Jimmie, dear,
and they won't seem so terribly long when we remember what we are
waiting for. I'm going with you, you know--as far as they'll let me;
and when things look their blackest you must remember that I'm only
just a little way off; just a little way--and waiting--and waiting----"

She broke down at the last and cried in my arms, and when she could
find her voice again:

"It mustn't be two years, Jimmie; it would kill you, and me, too. They
_must_ pardon you--you who have done no wrong! I'll go down on my
knees to the Governor, and----"

There was something in this to send the blood tingling to my
finger-tips; to rouse the final reserves of manhood.

"Never!" I forbade. "You must never do that, Polly; and you mustn't
let Barrett stir hand or foot in that direction. I shall come out an
ex-convict, if I have to, but never as a pardoned man with the
presumption of guilt fastened upon me for the remainder of my life.
Promise me that you won't do anything like that!"

I don't know whether she promised or not. Cummings was stirring
uneasily in his window and looking at his watch. I led Polly to the
door, kissed her, and put her out into the corridor. The agony, the
keenest agony of all, was over, and I turned to the deputy warden.
"Whenever you are ready," I said.

Barrett was at the train when we went down, as I was sure he would be,
and he seemed strangely excited.

"Give me just a minute with your prisoner, Mr. Cummings," he begged;
and after the deputy warden had amiably turned his back: "I've just had
a telegram from Gifford. The Lawrenceburg lawyers are offering to
compromise. They say that their owners are tired of dragging the
quarrel through the courts, and they offer to buy us out, lock, stock
and barrel, for five million dollars."

"After they've committed every crime in the calendar to smash us