ad not
eaten for twenty-four hours, and in sudden weakness he made his way to
one of the rough chairs, and sat down, his face buried in his hands.

Behind him the boy Benjamin, his sudden hot passion over, stood watching
intently,--his face almost uncanny in its lack of childishness.

For a time there was absolute silence, the hush of a death-chamber; then
of a sudden the boy was conscious that the man was looking at him in a
way he had never looked before. Deep down below our consciousness, far
beneath the veneer of civilization, there is an instinct, relic of the
vigilant savage days, that warns us of personal danger. By this instinct
the lad now interpreted the other's gaze, and knew that it meant ill for
him. For some reason which he could not understand, this man, this big
animal, was his mortal enemy; and, in the manner of smaller animals, he
began to consider an avenue of escape.

"Ben," spoke the man, "come here!"

Tom Blair was sober now, and wore a look of determination upon his face
that few had ever seen there before; but to his surprise the boy did not
respond. He waited a moment, and then said sharply:

"Ben, I'm speaking to you. Come here at once!"

For answer there was a tightening of the lad's blue eyes and an added
watchfulness in the incongruously long childish figure; but that was
all.

Another lagging minute passed, wherein the two regarded each other
steadily. The man's eyes dropped first.

"You little devil!" he muttered, and the passion began showing in his
voice. "I believe you knew what I was thinking all the time! Anyway,
you'll know now. You said awhile ago that I was to blame for your mother
being--as she is. You're liable to say that again." A horror greater
than sudden passion was in the deliberate explanation and in the slow
way he rose to his feet. "I'm going to fix you so you can't say it
again, you old-man imp!"

Then a peculiar thing happened. Instead of running away, the boy took a
step forward, and the man paused, scarcely believing his eyes. Another
step forward, and yet another, came the diminutive figure, until almost
within the aggressor's reach; then suddenly, quick as a cat, it veered,
dropped upon all fours to the floor, and head first, scrambling like a
rabbit, disappeared into the open mouth of the dog-kennel.

Too late the man saw the trick, and curses came to his lips,--curses fit
for a fiend, fit for the irresponsible being he was. He himself had
built that k