nd it was her plain duty to do as Bernard van Cannan
had besought, and not go until she could place Roddy in his father's
hands with the full story of his persecutions.

"Tell me about it, Roddy," she said quietly, as they walked away.
"Don't hide anything. You know that I love you and that your father
has trusted you to my care."

"Yes," he assented eagerly; "but how did you know about my real mammie
being dead?" His natural resilience had already helped him to surmount
the terror just past, and he was almost himself again. "I wanted to
tell you, but I had promised mamma not to tell any one."

It was as Christine had supposed. She explained her finding of the
tombstone and the yellow rose, but not the rest of her terrible
conclusions.

"I put it there," he said shyly. "She always loved yellow and red
flowers. I was keeping the other two for her and Carol in the
graveyard."

Christine squeezed the warm little hand, but continued her questions
steadily.

"What happened after you had been to the outhouse?"

"Mamma was waiting for me on the stoep. She said she wanted me to come
with her to see Mrs. Saxby." He added, with the sudden memory of
surprise: "But we _didn't_ see Mrs. Saxby. I wonder where she was."

The same wonder seized Christine. Where could the unhappy, distraught
creature have been hiding while the trial of Roddy was in process?

"What happened then?"

"We just went into the sitting-room, and Mr. Saxby got the box and the
knobkerries and his revolver, and mamma said, 'Now, Roddy, there is a
snake in that box, and I want you to prove you are not a coward like
last night by taking off the lid.'" He shuddered violently. "But I
couldn't. Oh, Miss Chaine, am I a coward?" he pleaded.

"No, darling; you are _not_," she said emphatically. "Nobody in their
senses would touch a box with a snake in it. It was very wrong to ask
you to."

He looked at her gratefully.

"Then you opened the window. Oh, how glad I felt! It was just like as
if God had sent you, for my heart felt as if it was calling out to you
all the time. Perhaps you heard it and that made you come?"

"I did, Roddy," she said earnestly, "I ran all the way from the
outhouse, because I felt you were in need of me."

They were nearly home when they saw Saltire and his boys close beside
their path. Roddy was urgent to stop and talk, but Christine made the
fact that heavy rain-drops were beginning to fall an excuse for
hur