re is! Here, Dick! Dinner at once, and some wine!"

Trent was taken to see his room, the boy talking all the time, and later
on dinner was served and the boy did the honours, chaffing and talking
lightly. But later on when they sat outside, smoking furiously to keep
off the mosquitoes and watching the fireflies dart in and out amongst
the trees, the boy was silent. Then he leaned over and laid his hand on
Trent's arm.

"Tell me all about it--do," he begged.

Trent was startled, touched, and suddenly filled with a desire for
sympathy such as he had never before in his life experienced. He
hesitated, but it was only for a moment.

"I never thought to tell any one," he said slowly, "I think I'd like
to!"

And he did. He told his whole story. He did not spare himself. He spoke
of the days of his earlier partnership with Monty, and he admitted the
apparent brutality of his treatment of him on more than one occasion.
He spoke of Ernestine too--of his strange fancy for the photograph
of Monty's little girl, a fancy which later on when he met her became
almost immediately the dominant passion of his life. Then he spoke of
the coming of Francis, of the awakening of Ernestine's suspicions,
and of that desperate moment when he risked everything on her faith in
him--and lost. There was little else to tell and afterwards there was
a silence. But presently the boy's hand fell upon his arm almost
caressingly and he leaned over through the darkness.

"Women are such idiots," the boy declared, with all the vigour and
certainty of long experience. "If only Aunt Ernestine had known you half
as well as I do, she would have been quite content to have trusted you
and to have believed that what you did was for the best. But I say,
Trent, you ought to have waited for it. After she had seen her father
and talked with him she must have understood you better. I shall write
to her."

But Trent shook his head.

"No," he said sternly, "it is too late now. That moment taught me all I
wanted to know. It was her love I wanted, Fred, and--that--no use hoping
for that, or she would have trusted me. After all I was half a madman
ever to have expected it--a rough, coarse chap like me, with only a
smattering of polite ways! It was madness! Some day I shall get over it!
We'll chuck work for a bit, soon, Fred, and go for some lions. That'll
give us something to think about at any rate."

But the lions which Trent might have shot lived in peace,