thin him, rose in surging insistence. Instant remorse
attacked him, as an oak is attacked by fierce winter storms. He saw
the boy's angelic face grow the color of death; saw Molly the Merry
gather him up. Then a stab of jealousy cut his heart like a knife. He
bent over with set jaws.

"Give him to me," he cried. "He's mine!"

Molly surrendered the child with reluctance, but terror and fright
were depicted upon Bobbie's face.

"Jinnie! Lafe! Peggy!" he screamed. "He'll hurt me! The black man's
goin' to kill me! Jinnie, pretty Jinnie----"

The passionate voice grew faint and ceased. Then the loving little
heart burst in the boyish bosom, and Bobbie's angels bore away his
young soul to another world where blindness is not,--where his
uplifted being would understand that the stars he'd loved,--the stars
he'd gathered in his small, unseeing head,--were but a reflection of
those in God's firmament. With one final quiver he straightened out in
his father's arms and was silent. All his loves and sorrows were in
the eternal yesterdays, and to-day had delivered him into the charge
of Lafe's angels.

Jinnie was crying hysterically, and her father's dying curse upon her
uncle leapt into her mind. She was clinging to the cobbler, and both
had moved to Peg, where the woman sat as if turned to stone.

Not a person in the courtroom stirred. In consternation the jury sat
in their chairs like graven images, taking in the freshly wrought
tragedy with tense expressions. The judge, too, leaned forward in his
chair, watching.

Jordan Morse faced the room, with its silent, observant crowd,
pressing to his breast the dead body of his child. Then he turned to
Lafe, white, twitching, and suffering.

"I shot Maudlin Bates," he said, haltingly; then turning to the jury
he continued: "The cobbler's an innocent man----"

A menacing groan fell from a hundred lips at his words.

He deliberately took from his hip pocket a revolver, lifted the weapon
and finished:

"I'm--I'm sorry, Jinnie, I'm----"

Then came the sharp, short bark of the gun, and the bullet found a
path to his brain. He staggered, frantically clutching the slender
body of Bobbie closer--and toppled over.

CHAPTER XLVIII

FOR BOBBIE'S SAKE

Lafe's homecoming was one of solemn rejoicing. The only shadow hanging
over the happy family was the absence of Blind Bobbie, who now lay by
the side of his dead father.

After the first greetings, Lafe took his boy baby