rl
scarcely spoke; Deal approved his silence. He felt so intensely for the
lad, realized so strongly what he must be feeling--suffering and
feeling--that conversation on the subject would have been at that early
moment unendurable. But waking during the night, and hearing him
stirring, uneasy, and apparently feverish, he went across to the
hammock.

"You are worrying about it, Carl, and you are not strong enough to stand
worry. Look here--I have forgiven you; I would forgive you twice as
much. Have you no idea why I brought you down here with me?"

"Because you're kind-hearted. And perhaps, too, you thought it would be
lonely," answered Carl.

"No, I'm not kind-hearted, and I never was lonely in my life. I didn't
intend to tell you, but--you _must not_ worry. It is your name, Carl,
and--and your blue eyes. I was fond of Eliza."

"Fond of Leeza--Leeza Brenner? Then why on earth didn't you marry her?"
said Carl, sitting up in his hammock, and trying to see his
step-brother's face in the moonlight that came through the chinks in the
shutters.

Mark's face was in shadow. "She liked some one else better," he said.

"Who?"

"Never mind. But--yes, I will tell you--Graves."

"John Graves? That dunce? No, she didn't."

"As it happens, I know she did. But we won't talk about it. I only told
you to show you why I cared for you."

"_I_ wouldn't care about a girl that didn't care for me," said Carl,
still peering curiously through the checkered darkness. The wizened
young violin-player fancied himself an omnipotent power among women. But
Deal had gone to his bed, and would say no more.

Carl had heard something now which deeply astonished him. He had not
been much troubled about the lost money; it was not in his nature to be
much troubled about money at any time. He was sorry; but what was gone
was gone; why waste thought upon it? This he called philosophy. Mark,
out of regard for Carl's supposed distress, had forbidden conversation
on the subject; but he was not shutting out, as he thought, torrents of
shame, remorse, and self-condemnation. Carl kept silence willingly
enough; but, even if the bar had been removed, he would have had little
to say. During the night his head had ached, and he had had some fever;
but it was more the effect of the fiery, rank liquor pressed upon him by
Schwartz than of remorse. But _now_ he had heard what really interested
and aroused him. Mark in love!--hard-working, steady, dull old Mark