Purity League indulging in language
quite alien to the Scriptural quotations which were his usual stock in
discourse. Captain Sawyer was puffing a cigar and watching the throng
on the sidewalks as though he were stone deaf.

Burke hurried to the Barton home. There he found a scene of joy which
beggared description. Lorna had recovered and was strong enough to run
to greet him.

"Oh, Mr. Burke, can you ever forgive me for my silliness and ugly
words?" she began, as Mary caught the officer's hand with a welcome
clasp.

"There, there, Miss Lorna, I've nothing to forgive. I'm so happy that
you have come out safe and sound from the dangers of these men,"
answered Burke. "We have trapped the gang, even up to Trubus, and, if
you are strong enough to go down to the station, we will have him sent
with the rest of his crew to the Tombs to await trial."

Old Barton reached for Burke's hand.

"My boy, you have been more than a friend to me on this terrible yet
wonderful day. You could have done no more if you had been my own son."

The excitement and his own tense nerves drove Bobbie to a speech which
he had been pondering and hesitating to make for several weeks. He
blurted it out now, intensely surprised at his own temerity.

"Your own son, Mr. Barton.... Oh, how I wish I were.... And I hope
that I may be some day, if you and some one else are willing ... some
day when I have saved enough to provide the right sort of a home."

He hesitated, and Lorna stepped back. Mary held out her hands, and her
eyes glowed with that glorious dilation which only comes once in a
life-time to one woman's glance for only one man's answering look.

She held out her hands as she approached him.

"Oh, Bob ... as though you had to ask!" was all she said, as the strong
arms caught her in their first embrace. Her face was wet with tears as
Bob drew back from their first kiss.

John Barton was wiping his eyes as Burke looked at him in happy
bewilderment at this curious turn to his fortune.

"My boy, Bob," began the old man softly, "would you take the
responsibility of a wife, earning no more money than a policeman can?"

Bob nodded. "I'd do it and give up everything in the world to make her
happy if it were enough to satisfy her," he asserted.

Barton lifted up a letter which had been lying on the table beside him.
He smiled as he read from it:

"DEAR MR. BARTON:

"The patents have gone through in great shape and they are