of all, and bring thence some token of pity! For one instant my passion
seemed to beat against the silent heavens, then to fall back bruised and
bleeding.

Out of the darkness came not so much as a wind whisper or the twinkle of
a star.

Was Atherley right after all?




CHAPTER II

THE STRANGER'S GOSPEL


From the short unsatisfying slumber which sometimes follows a night of
insomnia I was awakened by the laughter and shouts of children. When I
looked out I saw brooding above the hollow a still gray day, in whose
light the woodlands of the park were all in sombre brown, and the trout
stream between its sedgy banks glided dark and lustreless.

On the lawn, still wet with dew, and crossed by the shadows of the bare
elms, Atherley's little sons, Harold and Denis, were playing with a very
unlovely but much-beloved mongrel called Tip. They had bought him with
their own pocket-money from a tinker who was ill-using him, and then
claimed for him the hospitality of their parents; so, though Atherley
often spoke of the dog as a disgrace to the household, he remained a
member thereof, and received, from a family incapable of being uncivil,