lar, threw him, and spoke, and the
well-trained animal succumbed before his voice. "Charge!" thundered the
young man, and the dog obeyed, although still bristling and growling.
James hurriedly caught up his leash and fastened him to the staple, then
he opened the inner office door, and spoke quickly and reassuringly to
Clemency, who was huddled behind it shaking with fear. "He is all
right. I have fastened him," he said. "Don't worry. Now I must go and
help your uncle."

"He didn't bite you?"

"Oh, no, he knew me the minute I spoke. Sit down here by the fire and
don't be frightened; that's a good little girl."

With that James was out by the other door and in the drive beside
Gordon, who was still assiduously applying water to the red throat of
the prostrate man. "It is beginning to slack up a little," he said
hoarsely. "Here, give me the cotton, and see if you can't get a drop of
brandy between his teeth. They are clinched, but just now he moved a
little. He may be able to swallow. Aaron, put the team into the wagon,
and get a mattress and some blankets from the storeroom. Hurry, he may
come to himself any minute, and he must not stay here any longer than
necessary." Gordon was working fiercely as he spoke, and James took the
cork from the brandy flask, and attempted to force a little between the
man's clinched teeth. Aaron hurried into the stable and lit another
lantern, and went about executing his orders. James, kneeling over the
prostrate man, attempting to minister to him, saw the face fully in the
glare of the lantern. The unconscious face did not look as evil as he
remembered it. He even had a doubt if it were the face of the man who
had that evening stood at his horse's head, and so terrified Clemency.
Then he became convinced that it was the same. There could be no
mistaking the features, which were unusually regular and handsome, but
with a strange peculiarity of lines. It seemed to James that, even while
the man was unconscious, all his features presented slightly upturned
lines as of bitter derision, intersected with downward lines of
melancholy. All these lines were very delicate, but they served to give
expression. He looked like a man who had suffered and made others suffer
for his sufferings, with a cruel enjoyment at the spectacle. It was a
strange face, but not an evil one. However, after James had succeeded in
forcing a few drops of brandy, which were met with convulsive
swallowing, between the ma