nd so saying, Mr. Snark gravely
tilted the black bottle ceilingward.

The following evening, as the shadows were lengthening, Garrison and
the eminent lawyer pulled into the neat little station of Cottonton. The
good-by to Gotham had been said. It had not been difficult for Garrison
to say good-by. He was bidding farewell to a life and a city that had
been detestable in the short year he had known it. The lifetime spent in
it had been forgotten. But with it all he had said good-by to honor.
On the long train trip he had been smothering his conscience, feebly
awakened by the approaching meeting, the touch of new clothes, and the
prospect of a consistently full stomach. He even forgot to cough once or
twice.

But the conscience was only feebly awakened. The eminent lawyer had
judged his client right. For as one is never miserly until one has
acquired wealth, so Garrison was loath to vacate the bed of roses now
that he had felt how exceedingly pleasant it was. To go back to rags
and the hunger cancer and homelessness would be hard; very hard even if
honor stood at the other end.

"There they are--the major and his wife," whispered Snark, gripping
his arm and nodding out of the window to where a tall, clean-shaven,
white-haired man and a lady who looked the thoroughbred stood anxiously
scanning the windows of the cars. Drawn up at the curb behind them was
a smart two-seated phaeton, with a pair of clean-limbed bays. The driver
was not a negro, as is usually the case in the South, but a tight-faced
little man, who looked the typical London cockney that he was.

Garrison never remembered how he got through his introduction to his
"uncle" and "aunt." His home-coming was a dream. The sense of shame was
choking him as Major Calvert seized both hands in a stone-crushed grip
and looked down upon him, steadily, kindly, for a long time.

And then Mrs. Calvert, a dear, middle-aged lady, had her arms about
Garrison's neck and was saying over and over again in the impulsive
Southern fashion: "I'm so glad to see you, dear. You've your mother's
own eyes. You know she and I were chums."

Garrison had choked, and if the eminent lawyer's wonderful vocabulary
and eloquent manner had not just then intervened, Garrison then and
there would have wilted and confessed everything. If only, he told
himself fiercely, Major Calvert and his wife had not been so courteous,
so trustful, so simple, so transparently honorable, incapable of
creditin