and in that intense moment of complete silence they could hear the
splash of his life-blood as it dropped from his forehead on to the
polished boards beneath; then he threw up his arms and fell in a
heap to the floor.

They had not been driven to answer. Wherever that great soul had
gone, his ears were no longer open to mortal promise, nor would
any oath from the lip of man avail to smooth his way into the
shadowy unknown.

"Dead!" broke from little Miss Weeks as she flung herself down in
reckless abandonment at his side. She had never known an agitation
beyond some fluttering woman's hope she had stifled as soon as
born, and now she knelt in blood. "Dead!" she again repeated. And
there was no one this time to cry: "You need not be frightened; in
a few minutes he will be himself again." The master might reawaken
to life, but never more the man.

A solemn hush, then a mighty sigh of accumulated emotion swept
from lip to lip, and the crowd of later invaders, already abashed
if not terrified by the unexpected spectacle of suspended
animation which confronted them from the judge's chair, shrank
tumultuously back as little Miss Weeks advanced upon them, holding
out her meagre arms in late defence of the secret to save which
she had just seen a man die.

"Let us do as he wished," she prayed. "I feel myself much to
blame. What right had we to come in here?"

"The fellow was hurt. We were just bringing him home," spoke up a