Stephen, his look gradually softened, and when
she had finished, his manner had become again frank, boyish, impetuous
--nay, penitent. He seized Stephen's hand.

"Forgive me, Brice," he cried. "Forgive me. I should have known better.
I--I did you an injustice, and you, Virginia. I was a fool--a scoundrel."
Stephen shook his head.

"No, you were neither," he said. Then upon his face came the smile of one
who has the strength to renounce, all that is dearest to him--that smile
of the unselfish, sweetest of all. It brought tears to Virginia. She was
to see it once again, upon the features of one who bore a cross,
--Abraham Lincoln. Clarence looked, and then he turned away toward the door
to the stairway, as one who walks blindly, in a sorrow.

His hand was on the knob when Virginia seemed to awake. She flew after
him:

"Wait!" she whispered.

Then she raised her eyes, slowly, to Stephen, who was standing motionless
beside his chair.

"Captain Brice!"

"Yes," he answered.

"My father is in the Judge's room," she said.

"Your father!" he exclaimed. "I thought--"

"That he was an officer in the Confederate Army. So he is." Her head went
up as she spoke.

Stephen stared at her, troubled. Suddenly her manner, changed. She took a
step toward him, appealingly.

"Oh, he is not a spy," she cried. "He has given Mr Brinsmade his word
that he came here for no other purpose than to see me. Then he heard that
the Judge was dying--"

"He has given his word to Mr. Brinsmade?

"Yes."

"Then," said Stephen, "what Mr. Brinsmade sanctions is not for me to
question."

She gave him yet another look, a fleeting one which he did not see. Then
she softly opened the door and passed into the room of the dying man.
Stephen followed her. As for Clarence, he stood for a space staring after
them. Then he went noiselessly down the stairs into the street.

CHAPTER XI

LEAD, KINDLY LIGHT

When the Judge opened his eyes for the last time in this world, they fell
first upon the face of his old friend, Colonel Carvel. Twice he tried to
speak his name, and twice he failed. The third time he said it faintly.

"Comyn!"

"Yes, Silas."

"Comyn, what are you doing here?

"I reckon I came to see you, Silas," answered the Colonel.

"To see me die," said the Judge, grimly.

Colonel Carvel's face twitched, and the silence in that little room
seemed to throb.

"Comyn," said the Judge again, "I heard that you had gone South to