hand Dyck offered him. Presently Dyck turned to old Christopher with a
kindly laugh.

"Well, old friend! You, too, come to see the stag set loose again?
You're not many, that's sure." A grim, hard look came into his face, but
both hands went out and caught the old man's shoulders affectionately.
"This is no day for you to be waiting at prison's gates, Christopher; but
there are two men who believe in me--two in all the world. It isn't the
killing," he added after a moment's silence--"it isn't the killing that
hurts so. If it's true that I killed Erris Boyne, what hurts most is the
reason why I killed him."

"One way or another--does it matter now?" asked Christopher gently.

"Is it that you think nothing matters since I've paid the price, sunk
myself in shame, lost my friends, and come out with not a penny left?"
asked Dyck. "But yes," he added with a smile, wry and twisted, "yes, I
have a little left!"

He drew from his pocket four small pieces of gold, and gazed ironically
at them in his palm.

"Look at them!" He held out his hand, so that the two men could see the
little coins. "Those were taken from me when I entered prison. They've
been in the hands of the head of the jail ever since. They give them to
me now--all that's left of what I was."

"No, not all, sir," declared Michael. "There's something left from
Playmore--there's ninety pounds, and it's in my pocket. It was got from
the sale of your sporting-kit. There was the boat upon the lake, the