e--lay
there rigid and feverish, staring at the night. Sylvie, at Bella's side,
slept no better. Her imagination went over and over the story of Ham
Rutherford's crime. She saw the little dark bookshop, the professor's
thin, sneering face, the hideous anger of the cripple, the blow, the
dead body, Rutherford's arrest. And when her brain was sick, it would
turn for relief to the noble story of Hugh's self-sacrifice, only to be
balked by a sense of unreality. What the detective had told, briefly
and dryly, lived in her mind convincingly; but Hugh's romance, that had
glowed on his tongue, now lay lifeless on her fancy. Back her mind would
go to the bookshop, the gibing professor, the heavy paper-cutter.

In the dawn she heard Bella get up with a deep-shaken sigh and go about
her preparations for breakfast. But it was noon before the two men left.

CHAPTER VIII

Hugh came up from his hiding-place like a man risen from the dead. They
helped him to his chair before the fire; they poured coffee down him,
rubbed his blue, stiff hands. He sat looking up pitifully, his eyes
turning from one to the other of them like those of a beaten hound. All
the masterfulness, all the bombast, had been crushed out of him; even
the splendor of his flaring hazel eyes was dimmed--they were hollow,
hopeless, old. For a long time he did not speak, only drank the coffee
and submitted himself meekly to their ministrations; then at last he
touched Sylvie with a trembling hand.

"Sylvie," he whispered brokenly.

"Hugh, dear, you're safe now; please speak; please laugh; you frighten
me more than anything--why is he so silent, Pete? Bella, tell me what's
wrong?"

"He's been crouching there on the damp, cold ground for hours," said
Bella, "not knowing what might happen." Her voice trembled; she passed a
hand as shaking as her voice across Hugh's bent head. "You're safe now.
You're safe now," she murmured.

Hugh's teeth chattered, and he bent closer to the fire.

"Ugh--it was cold down there," he said, "like a grave! Sylvie, come
here." Just an echo of his old imperious fashion it was--though the
look was that of a beggar for alms. "Give me those warm little hands of
yours." She knelt close to him, rubbed his hands in hers, looking up at
Pete with a tremulous mouth that asked for advice.

"He'll be all right in a minute," said Pete. "You talk to him, Sylvie."

"Yes, you talk--you talk. Do you remember how I talked to you when you
were a