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Show I . -- HALLIE ERMINBE RIVES- IW' OH AFTER XVI. ' The Awakening. If- The man whose part the lawyer had i taken had yielded to his touch almost Pr (la-odly as the girl disappeared. The ' keen, plcasurublo tang of danger which I had leaped in hia blood when he faced M. ihc enmity of tho crowded Btrcct tho Mi- reckless zest with which ho would havo t met any odds and any outcome with 1 tho same smile, and gone down if need m- be lighting like the tiger in tho .iu"C'0 j.1 had been piercod through by that E look from the balcony. His poise for a B mizzling moment had been shaken, his f ' self-command overthrown. Fooling a wl dull sense of anger at the curious cm- W J barrassmont npon him, he wont slowly rM through tho office to tho dosk, and with K 1 ' his back to tho room lit a cigar. H Tho action whs half mechanical, but i 'A ; to the mon gathered at tho windows, f us they got down from the chairs on (' which thoy had been standing, inter-anted inter-anted spectators of tho proceedings out- I side, it seemed a nose of gratuitous in- t solenco. Tom Folder, entering, saw it with something of resentment. , "That was a closo squeak," he said, gr "Do you rcnlizo that? In fivo minutes more "you'd havo boon handled a sight worse than you handled 3rour man, let B. ino toil youf" I Tho man of no memories smiled, tho i same smile that had infuriated tho bar- K difficult to smile now. "Ts it possible," ho asked, "that B through an unlucky error T havo R trounced tho local archbishop?" i Fclder looked at horn narrowly. Be- I; ', neath the sarcasm ho distinguished un- BJ. fnmiliaritv. aloofness, a genuine astou- M , ishmcnt. " The appearanco in tho per- M son of Hugh Stires of tho qualities of w norvo and courage had surprised him ' i out of his usual indifference. The "tin- torn gamblor" had fought like a man. A f Ilia present sang-froid was as singular. Had ho been an absoluto stranger in B , the town ho might havo acted and B. ( spoken no differently. Folder's smooth-E smooth-E shaven, earnest face was puzzled as ho answered curtly: V" "You've trounced a man who will I remember it a long time." I. "Ah?" said tho man addressed easi- !' Iv. "He has a bettor memory than I, :; , then!" ml ' ITc gazed over tho heads of the si- ; lent roomful to the simmering street, B, where Devlin, with the aid of a sup-W sup-W porting arm, was staggering into the Be i saloon in which his humiliation had ffc paid. The feeling of embarrassment Lf was passing, the old daring was lifting. t. JFis glance, scanning the room, set it- W cqif on a shabby, blear figure in tho J background, apologetic, yet keenly and 3 pridcfullv interested. A whimsical 11 light whs in his eye. Ho crossed to him and. reaching out his hand, drew J tho violin from under his arm. I 9: "Music hath charms to sootho tho f-avage breast," ho said, and opening I 1 lie door, he tucked the instrument un- I. , d-r his chin and began to play. B. What absoluto contempt of danger, I , what insane prompting possessed him, can scarcely be imagined. As ho stood M there on the threshold with that veiled t smile, he seemed utterly careless of tf 1 ronsequence, beckoning attack, flaunt- PS! ing an egregious impertinence in the faco. of anger and dislike. Fclder iff J looked for a quick end to tho folly, but glj he saw the men in tho street, oven as K they moved forward, waver and pause. I "With almost tho lirsfc note, it had como Ia to them that they were lienring music If , sucli as the squeaking fiddles of the n i dance halls never knew. Those on the H onnosito navement crossed over, and I?; men far down the street stood still to " lisfen. ' fore than the adept's cunnin". that J had at first tingled his'fingers at sight of the instrument, was in Harry San-den-on 's playing. Tho violin had been 9" the single passion which the old Satan IWi Sanderson had carried with him into L the new career. The impulse to "sootho J the savage breast" had been a flare of f, 1 he old character he had been reliving; I I 'but the music, begun in bravado, swept ; -j him almost instantlj beyond its bounds. L He had never "been an indifferent per- . former; now he was playing as he had ! never plaj-ed in his life, with inspira-I inspira-I rion and abandon. There was a diabolic diabol-ic ism in it. He had forgotten the tight, K- the crowd, his own mocking mood. He m had forgotten where ho was. He was BA ' atloat ou a fluctuant tide of melody f, .that was carrying him back back j 7 uto tho far-away past toward all he j had loved and lost; if!. "It's 'Rome, Sweet Home,'" said ' Barney McGinn "no, it's 'Annie Laurie.' No, it's hanged if I know .S what it is!" Mi1 The player himself could not have t told him. Ho was in a kind of tranced T ' dream. The self-niado music was call-, call-, 1 ing .with a sweet insistence to buried 5 k things that was stirring from a long l n sleep. It sent a gulp into the throat of more than one standing moveless in the 1 street. It brought suspicious moisture Tom Folder's eyes. It drew Mrs. f,f Halloran from the kitchen, wiping her J hands on her apron. It called to a girl I j who crouched in tho upper hall with J her miserablo face buried in her hands, i; drew her down the stair to tho ofuce door, her eyes wide with breath 1 ess wonder, hor faco glistoning with feeling. feel-ing. From tho balcony Jessica had witnessed wit-nessed the fight without understanding its meaning. A fascination sho could not gainsay had glued her oj'cs to tho struggle. It was ho it was the faco sho know, seen but onco for a singlo moment in tho hour of hor marriage, but stamped indelibly upon hor memory-. It was no longer smooth-shaven, and it was chaugoa, ovilly changed. But it was tho samel There was recklessness reck-lessness and mockery in it, and yot strength, not weakness. Shunned and despised as he might be tho chief actor, as it seemed to her, in a cheap and desperato bar-room affray, a coarso affair ot fisticuffs in tho public street yet there was something intrepid in his bearing, something splendid in his victory. vic-tory. In spito of the sharp, momentary sense of antagonism that had bruised her inmost fiber, whon tho brutal bulk of his opponent fell sho could havo wept with relief! Then, suddenly, sho had found a look that chained hor own. It had given hor a strango thrill, had both puszled and touched hor. She had dragged hor oyes awa3' with a choking sensation, a sonao of helplessness and capture. "When tho violin sounded, a resistless rush of feeling had swept her to tho lower door, whero sho stood behind be-hind tho spectators, spellbound. In tho man who plaj'od, weird forces woro contending. Tho feel of tho polished pol-ished wood on hiB check, tho odor of rcsinod catgut in his nostrils, woro plucking, plucking at the closed door. A new nolo crept into tho strings. Thoy had spoknn pathos now thoy told of pain. All tho struggle whoso very meaning was forgotten, tho unrequital, tho bafllod quest, tho longing of that last year which had been born of a woman's kiss in a darkened room, never voiced in that lost life, poured forth broken, inarticulate. To Jessica, standing with hands close clasped, it soomed tho agony of remorso for a past fall, tho cr3r of a forlorn soul, knowing itself cast out, appealing to its good angel for pity and pardon. Hugh had often played to her, lightly, carelessly, as he did all things. Sho had deemed it only one of his many clover, amateurish accomplishments. Now it struck her with a pang that there had been in him a deeper sido that she had not guessed. Since hor wedding day sho had thought of her marriago as a loathed bond, from which his false pretense had absolved her. Now a doubt of hor own position assailed as-sailed hor. Had loneliness and outlawry driven him into the career that had made him shunned oven in this rough town a course which she, had she been faithful to her vow "for better, for worse," might have turned to his redemption? God forgave, but sho had her eyelids. For Harry Sanderson tho music was tho imprisoned memory, crying out strongly in the first tonguo it had found. But tho ear was alien, tho mind know of no by-patch of understanding. It was a blind wave, feeling round some under-sea cavern of suffering. Beneath Be-neath the pressure the closed door yielded, though it did not wholly open. The past with its memories remained hidden, but through the rift, 'miraculously 'miracu-lously called by the melody, tho real character that had been tho Reverend nenry Sanderson came forth. Tho perplexed per-plexed phantom that had been moving down tho natural declivity of resurrected resur-rected predisposition, fell away. The slumbering qualities that had stirred uneasily at tho sight of tho faco on tho balcony awoke. Who ho was and had been ho know no more than before; but the new writhing self -consciousness, starting from its sleep, with almost al-most a sense of 6hock, became conscious con-scious of tho gaping crowd, tho dusty street, the red sunset, and of himself at tho end of a vulgar brawl, sawing a violin in silty braggadocio in a hotel doorway. The music faltered and broko off. Tho bow dropped at his feet. Ho picked it up fumblingly and turned back into the oflice. as a man entered from a rear door. The newcomer was Michael Halloran, tho hotel's proprietor, propri-etor, short, thick-set and surly. Asleep in his room, ho had neither seen the fracas nor heard tho playing. He saw instantlj', however, that something unusual un-usual was forward, and. blinking on the threshold, caught sight of the man who was handing tho violin back to its owner. He clenched his fist with a scowl and started toward him. His wife caught his arm. "Oh, Michael, Michael!" she cried. "Say nothing, lad! Ye should havo heard him play!" "Play!" ho exclaimed. "Let him go fiddle to his side-partner, Prender-gast, Prender-gast, and tho other riffraff he's run with the year past!" He turned blackly black-ly to Harry. ''Take yourself from this houso, Hugh Stires;" ho said. "Whether "Wheth-er all's true that's said of you I don't say. but you'll not como here!" Harrj- turned very white. With the spoken name a name how familiar! his eyes had fallen to the ring on his finger tho ring with the initials H. S. A sudden comprehension had darted to his riiind. A scoro of circumstances that had seemed odd stood out now in a baleful light. Tho looks of dislike in the bar-room the attitude of tho street this angry diatribe all smacked of acquaintance, and not alono acquaintance, acquaint-ance, but obloquy. His namo was Hugh Stires! Ho belongod to this very town! And he was a man hated, despised, de-spised, forbidden entranco to an uncouth un-couth hostelry, an unwelcomo visitant oven in a barroom. An hour earlier tho discovery would not havo so appalled him. But tho violin vio-lin music, in the cmcrgoucc of tho roal Harry Sandersou, had, as it were, flushed tho mind of its turgid silt of dovil-may-caro and left it quick and quivering. He turned to Polder and said in a low voice to him, not to tho hotel keeper or to tho roomful: "When I entered this town today, I did uot know my name, or that I had ever set foot in it before. I was struck by a train a month ago, and remember nothing beyond that time. It seems that tho town knows mo bettor than I know myself." Halloran looked about him with a laugh of derision and incrodulit3', but fow ."joined in it. Those who had heard tho playing realized that in somo eorio way tho personality of tho man they haa known had been altored. Before tho painful, shocked intensity of his face, tho law3'cr folt his instant skpp-ticism skpp-ticism fraying. This was little like acting! Ho felt an inclination to hold out his hand, but Eomothing held him back. Harry Sanderson turned quiotly and walked out of tho door. Pavement and street wero n hubbub of excited talk. Tho groups parted aa he came out, and he passed between them with his oyes straight boforo him. As ho turned down tho streot, a fragment frag-ment of quartz, thrown with deliberate and venomous aim, flow from the saloon doonvny. It grazod his head, knocking off his' hat. Tom Fclder had soon tho flying missile, mis-sile, and ho leaped to tho center of the street with rage in his heart. "If I find out who throw that," ho said, "I'll send him up for it, so help me God!" Harry stooped and picked up his hat, and as ho put it on again, turned a moment mo-ment toward tho crowd. Then ho walked on, down tho middlo of tho street, his eyes glaring, his faco white, into tho duskv bluo of the falling twilight. CHAPTER XVH. At tho Turn of tho Trail. The scene in tho hotel offlce had left Jessica in a state of mental distraction in which reason was in ab03rance. In tho confusion she had slipped into tho littlo sitting room unnoticed, feeling a sense almost of physical sickness, to sit in the half-light, listening to tho diminishing noises of the spilling crowd, 6he was wind-swept, storm-tossed, storm-tossed, in tho grip of primal emotions. The surprise had shocked her, and tho strango appeal of tho violin had disturbed dis-turbed her equipoise. Tho significant words of awakening spoken in tho office had como to her distinctly. In their light sho had read tho piteous puzzle of that aze that had held her motionless on tho balcony. Hugh had forgotten tho past all ofit, its crime, its penalty. In forgetting tho past, he had forgotten oven her, his wife! Yet in some mysterious way her face had been familiar to him; it had touched for an instant tho spring of tho befogged memory. As she spurred through tho transient twiliqht past tho selvage of tho town and into tho somber mountain slope, sho struck the horse sharply with her crop. Ho who had entrapped her, who had married her under tho shadow of a criminal act, who had broken hor fu-turo fu-turo with his, when his wholo bright lifo had crashed down in black ruin could such a ono look as he had looked at her? Could he make such music that had wrung her heart? All at once tho horse shied violently, almost unseating her. A man was .ly-I .ly-I ing by tho Bido of tho road, tossing and muttering to himself. Sho forced tho unwilling animal closer, and, leaning lean-ing from the saddle, saw who it was. In a moment she was off and beside tho prostrate form, a spasm of dread clutching at her throat at tho eight of the nerveless limbs, tho chalky palor of the brow, tho fever spots in tne cheeks. A wave of pitj' swept over her. Ho was ill and alone; he could not bo left there ho must havo shelter. Sho looked fearfully about her. What could she do? In that town, whose intolerance intoler-ance and disliko she had 6een so actively ac-tively demonstrated, was thero no one who would care for him 7 Sho turned her head, listening to a nearing sound footsteps wero plodding up the road. Sho called, and presently a pedestrian emerged from the half-dark and came toward her. Ho bent over tho form sho showed him. "It's Stires," ho said with a chuckle. "I heard he'd como back." Tho chuckle turned into a cough, and ho shook his head. "This is sad! You could never believo how I've labored with the boy, but" ho turned out.his hands "you soe there is temptation. It is his unhappy weakness." Jessica remembered tho yellow, smirking faco now. Sho had passed him on the day Tom Felder had walked with her from tho Mountain Valley house, and tho lawyer had told her ho lived in the cabin just below the Knob, whero she so ofton sat. She felt a quiver of repulsion. "Ho is not m intoxicated," she said pcilrlK- "TTn ir ill. Win Irnnw liim. then?" "Know himl" he echoed, and laughed a dry, cackling laugh. "I ought to. And I guess ho knows me." He Bhook the inert arm. "Get up, Hugh," ho said. "It's Prendergast! " There flashed through her mind tho phrase of tho surly hotel keeper, "His side-partner, Prendergast!" Could it be? Had Hugh really lived in tho cabin on which sho has so often peered down during those past weeks? And with this chosen crony! Sho touched Prendergast 'b nrm. "Ho is ill. I say," sho repealed. "He must be cared for at once. Your cabin is on the hillside, isnt it?" "His cabin," he corrected. "A rough place, but it has sheltered us both, i am but guide, philosopher and friend. ' She bit hor Hps. "Lift him on my horse," sho said. Sho stooped and put her bauds under the twitching shoulders. shoul-ders. "I will help you. I am quito strong." "With her aid he lifted tho swaying form on to the saddle and supported it whilo Jessica led tho way up tho darkening dark-ening road. "Hero is the cut-off," ho said presently. pres-ently. "Ah, yon know it!" for sho had turned into tho side path that led along tho hill, under the gray, snake-liko snake-liko flume tho shortest route to tho grassy shelf on which tho cabin stood. The by-waj' was steep and rugged, and rhododendron clumps caught at her ankles, and onco sho heard a snako slip over tho dry rustle of tho leaves, but sho went on rapidly, dragging at tho bridle, turning back now and then anxiously to urgo tho horse to greater CHAPTER XVI. Tho Awakoulng. CHAPTER XVIL At tho Turn of the Trail. CHAPTER XVTII. Tho Strength of tho Weak. i 6peod. Sho scarcely heard tho offensively offen-sively hone3'od compliments which Prendergast offered to her courago and resource. Hor pulses wero throbbing unsteadily, her mind in a ferment. ( It seemed an eternity tho climbed; in reality it was scarcely twenty minutes min-utes before they reached the grassy knoll and tho cabin whoso crazy swinging swing-ing door stood wido to tho night air. Sho tied tho horse, went in and, at Prendergast 'a direction, found matches and lit a candle. The bare, two-room interior it revealed was unkempt and disordered. TCougli bunks, a table and a couple of hewn chairs were almost its only furniture. Tho window was broken and tho roof admitted sun and rain. Prendergast laid tho man thoy had brought on ono of the bunks and throw over him a shabby blanket. "ATy dear young lady," ho said, "you aro a good Samaritan. How shall wo thank 3'ou, urv poor friend hero and I?" Jessica had taken mone3r from her pocket and now sho held it out to him. Mie must havo a doctor," sho said. "You must fetch ono." Tho yellow C3'es fastened on the bill, oven whilo his gesture protested. "You shame me!" ho exclaimed. "And j'ot you aro right; it is for him." Ho Joldod it and put it into his pocket. "As soon as I havo built a fire, I will go for our local medico. Ho will not alwa3's como at the call of the luckless miner. All aro not so charitable aa you." He untied her horso and extended a hand, but sho mounted without hia help. "Ho will thank vou one da3' this friend of mine." he said, "far better than I can do." "It is not at all necessary to tell him," she replied, frigidly. "The sick aro alwa3-s to bo helped, in cver3" circumstance. cir-cumstance. " Sho gave her horso the rein as sho snoko and turned him up the steep path that climbed back of the cabin, past tho Knob, and so by a narrow trail to tho mountain road. Emmet Prendergast stood listening to tho dulling hoofbeats a moment, and then re-ontered tho cabin. The man on the bunk had lifted to a sitting position, po-sition, his 03'es wero open, dazed and "That's right," the older man said. "You ro coming round. How does it feel to be back in tho old shebang? Can't guess how 3"ou got here, can you 7 You wero towed on horseback by a beauty, Hughoy, my boy a tip-staving tip-staving beauty! I'll tell you about it in tho morning, if vou 're good." Tho man he addressed made no answer an-swer his oyes woro on tho other, industrious in-dustrious and bewilderod. "I heard about tho row," went on Prendergast. "Thoy didn't think it was in you, and neither did I." He looked at him cunningly. "Neither did Moreau. oh, oh? You're a clever ono, Hugh, but tho lost memory racket won't stand you in anything. You hadn't any call to get scared in the first place I don't tell all I know!" Ho shoved tho candlo nearer on the table. "There's a queer look in your face, Hugh!" he said, with a clumsy attempt at kindness. ''That rock they throw must have hurt you. Feel sort of dizzy, eh 7 Never mind, I'll show you a sight for soro oyes. You went off without your share of the last ewag, but I'vo s'aved it for you. Prendergast wouldn't cheat a pal!" From a cranny in tho clay-chinked wall ho took a chamois skin bag. It contained a quantit3' of gold dust and small nuggcsls, which ho poured into a miner's scales on tho table and proceeded pro-ceeded to divide into two portions. This accomplished, he emptied ono of tho portions onto a papor and pushed it out. "That's yours," ho Baid. Harry's eyes wero on his with a piercing intensity now, as though they looked through him to a vast distance beyond. Ho was staring through a gra3' mist, at something far off, but insignificant, in-significant, that eluded his direct vision. The board table, tho yellow gold, tho flickering candlelight recalled something horrifying, in somo other world, in some other life, millions of ages ago. Ho lurched to his foot, overturning tho table. The gold dust rattled to the floor. "Your deal!" he said. Then with a vague laugh, ho fell sidewiso upon tho bunk. Emmet Prendergast stared at him with a look of amazement on his yellow face. "He's crazy as a chicken 1" ho said. He sat watching him for a while, then roso and kindled a fire on the un-swept un-swept hearth. From a litter of cans and dented utensils in a corner ho proceeded pro-ceeded to cook himself supper, after which he carefully brushed up the scat-tcred scat-tcred gold dust and returned it to its hiding place. Lastly he rummaged on a shelf and found a phial; this proved to bo ompt3', however, and he set it on the tabic. "I guess you'll do well enough without with-out any painkiller," he said to himself. him-self. "Doctors aro expensive. A113 way, I'll bo back by midnight." Ho throw more wood on tho fire, blew out tho candlo, and, closing tho door behind him, set off down the trial to tho town whero a faro bank soon acquired ac-quired tho bill Jessica had given him, CHAPTER XVTII. Tho Strength of tho Weak. It was pitch dark when Jessica readied the sanitorium, though sho went like a whirlwind, tho chill damp smell of the dewy balsams in her nostrils, nos-trils, tho dust rising ghostlike behind the rapid hoofs. She found David Stires anxious and pcovish over her latc( coming. Sitting beside him as he ate his supper, sup-per, and readiug to htm afterward, she had little timo for coherent thought; all tho while she was maintaining her self-control with an effort. Since sho had ridden away that afternoon sin' folt as if 3rears, had gone over hor with all their changes. Sho was oppressed with a new sense of fate, of power beyond be-yond and stronger than herself, and nor mind was enveloped in a haze of futurUy. She felt a relief when the old man grew tired and wns wheeled to ins bedroom. Loft alono. her reflections returned. She began to bo tortured. Sho tried to read tho printed characters swam beyond be-yond her comprehension. At length sho drew a hood over her head and stolo out on to the wido porch. It was only nine o'clock, and along tho gravel paths that wound among tho shrubbery a few dim forms were strolling stroll-ing sho caught the scent of a cigar and tho sound of a woman 's laugh. Tho air was crisp and bracing, with a promise prom-ise of frost aud painted leaves. She gazed down across the dark gulches to- I ward tho town, a straggling design pricked in blinking j'ollow points. Ilalf-way Ilalf-way between, folded in the darkness, lay the green shelf and the cabin to which her thought recurred with v kind of compulsion. Her C3'cs searched tho darkues-anxiously. darkues-anxiously. He had seemed dangerous ly ill; ho might die, perhaps. If ho did, whiit would it bo for her, his wife, but freedom from a galling bond? She thought of tho violin phaying. Had that been but the soul 's swan-song, the last cry of his stained and desolate spirit before it passed from this world that knew its temptation and its fall? If she could onl3' know what the doctor Ml jiuu amu; Thero wns no moon, but the stnrs wero glowing like tiu3 green-gilt coals, and tho 3-cllow road lay plain and clear. With a sudden determination she drew her light clonk closely about her, stepped down, sped across the grass to a footpath, and so to the road. As she ran on down the curving 6tretch under the trees, moving like a hastening, gTay phantom through a pur-plo pur-plo world of shadows, the crackling slip of bank paper that lay in her bosom seemed to burn her flesh. She was stealing steal-ing away to gaze upon the outcast who had shamed and humbled her going, sho knew not why, with burning cheeks and hammering heart. Sho slipped through tho side trail to tho cabin with a choking sensation. Sho stole to the window and peered in in tho firelight she could see the form on the bunk, tossing and muttering. Otherwise Other-wise tho place was empty. Sho lifted tho latch softly and entered. Tho strained anxiet3' of Jessica's look relaxed as sho gazed about her. Sho saw the phial on tho table tho doctor had been thero, then. If ho wero in serious caso, Prendergast would be with him. She threw back her hood, drew ono of the chairs to tho side of tho bunk and sat down, her eyes fixed on his face. The weakness and'helpless-ness and'helpless-ness of his posture struck through and through her. Two sides of her were struggling in a chaotic combat for mas-too'- "I hate- youl I hate you!" she said under her breath, clenching her cold hand. "I must bate 3-011! You stole my lovo and put it under 3'our feet! You havo disgraced 1113' present and ruined my future! What if you havo forgotten 3rour past 3'our crimo? Does that mako 3'ou the less guilty, or me the less wretched?" But withal a silent voice within her gave tho lie to hor vehemence. Somo element of her character that had been rigid and intact was crumbling down. An old, sweet something, that a dreadful dread-ful mill had ground and crushed and annihilated, an-nihilated, was rising wholo and undo-filed, undo-filed, superior to any petty distinction, regardless of all that lifted combative in her inheritage, not to bo gainsaid or denied. Sho leaned closer, listening to the incoherent in-coherent words and broken phrases borne on the turbid channels of fever. But she could not link them together into meaning. Only ono namo he spoko clearly over and over again tho namo Hugh Stires ropeated with tho dreary monot.0113' of a child conning a lesson. Sho noted tho mark across his brow. Beforo her marriage, in her blindness, sho had used to wonder what it was like. It was not in the least disfiguring it gave a touch of the extraordinary. It was so small sho did not wonder that in that ecstatic moment of her bride's kiss sho had not seen it. Slowly, half fearfully, she stretched out hor hand and laid it on his. As if at tho touch the mutterings ceased. Tho eyes opened, and a confused, troubled look crept into them. Then they closed again, and tho look faded out into a peace that remained. Jessica dropped to her knees aud buried her faco in the blanket, burning and chilling with an indescribable seu-sation seu-sation of mingled pain and pleasure. She scarcely knevr vlmt she was thinking. think-ing. It seemed to her that hia very vcaknes3 and helplessness voiced again tho something that had sounded in the music of his violin, vhen tho buried, forgotten past had cried out its pain and shamo and plea, half unconsciously to her! A thrill ran through her, the sense of moral power of the weak over tho strong, of tho feminine over the masculine. ' A rising flush stained hor cheeks. : "With a. sudden impulse, and with a guilty backward glanco, she bent and touched her lips to his forehead. She drew back quickly, her face flooded flood-ed with color, caught her breath, then, drawing her hood over her head, wen t swiftly to the door and was swallow up iu the darkness. j (Continued Next "Week.) j |