nderstand. But the boy was relentless.

"Why," said he, "my father was a friend of Mr. Lowndes and Mr. Mathews.
I have seen them here drinking with him. And in town. And he ran away?"

"I do not know where he went," said I, which was the truth.

He said nothing, but hid his face in his arms over the rail of the
bower. At length he looked up at me fiercely.

"If you ever tell this, I will kill you," he cried. "Do you hear?"

That made me angry.

"Yes, I hear," I said. "But I am not afraid of you."

He was at me in an instant, knocking me to the floor, so that the breath
went out of me, and was pounding me vigorously ere I recovered from the
shock and astonishment of it and began to defend myself. He was taller
than I, and wiry, but not so rugged. Yet there was a look about him
that was far beyond his strength. A look that meant, NEVER SAY DIE.
Curiously, even as I fought desperately I compared him with that other
lad I had known, Andy Jackson. And this one, though not so powerful,
frightened me the more in his relentlessness.

Perhaps we should have been fighting still had not some one pulled us
apart, and when my vision cleared I saw Nick, struggling and kicking,
held tightly in the hands of the clergyman. And it was all that
gentleman could do to hold him. I am sure it was quite five minutes
before he forced the lad, exhausted, on to the seat. And then there
was a defiance about his nostrils that showed he was undefeated. The
clergyman, still holding him with one hand, took out his handkerchief
with the other and wiped his brow.

I expected a scolding and a sermon. To my amazement the clergyman said
quietly:--

"Now what was the trouble, David?"

"I'll not be the one to tell it, sir," I said, and trembled at my
temerity.

The parson looked at me queerly.

"Then you are in the right of it," he said. "It is as I thought; I'll
not expect Nicholas to tell me."

"I will tell you, sir," said Nicholas. "He was in the house with my
father when--when he ran away. And I said that if he ever spoke of it to
any one, I would kill him."

For a while the clergyman was silent, gazing with a strange tenderness
at the lad, whose face was averted.

"And you, David?" he said presently.

"I--I never mean to tell, sir. But I was not to be frightened."

"Quite right, my lad," said the clergyman, so kindly that it sent a
strange thrill through me. Nicholas looked up quickly.

"You won't tell?" he said.

"No," I said.