eady with the truth?' asked Armstrong. Paul looked at him like
a dumb thing in a trap, but said never a word. 'Very well,' The gray
man's hands shook and his voice, and his face was of the colour of gray
paper. 'Go to the back-kitchen and strip.'

Paul, dry-eyed, gloomy, and desperate, walked before, and his father
followed. The girls clung to each other. There had been no such scene as
this in the house for years. The tawse had hung idle even for Paul for
many and many a day. Armstrong took the instrument of justice from its
hook, and laid it on the table He took off his coat, and rolled up his
left shirt-sleeve. He was left-handed. The arm he bared was corded and
puny. It shook as if he had the palsy. His wife had a sudden pity for
him, and ran at him with a gush of tears.

'William,' she said, 'don't break your heart for the young vil'in; he
isn't worth it Oh, God! I wish he was no child o' mine.'

She dropped into a chair and cried. Armstrong passed out of the kitchen.
The girls listened, and Dick, chalky white, with his mouth open, as Paul
had seen him on his way through. They heard the swish, swish, swish of
the tawse, and not another sound but hard breathing for a full minute;
then Paul began to groan, and then to shriek.

'Now,' panted Armstrong, 'shall I have the truth?'

There was no answer, and he fell to again; but Paul turned and caught
his arm, and after an ineffectual struggle, the old man dropped the
tawse and walked into the kitchen. Paul dressed and sat on the table,
quivering all over. He sat there for hours, and nobody approached him
until at last the servant, with frightened eyes, came to make ready for
dinner; then he got up and went to his old refuge in the lumber-room.
One of his sisters brought him food after the family dinner-hour, but he
refused it passionately.

'Oh, Paul,' she said, clinging to him till he shook her from his
writhing shoulders, 'why don't you confess?'

'Confess what? snarled Paul. 'Confess I was born into a family of fools
and nincompoops? That's all I've got to confess.'

He was left to himself all day, and at night he went un-chidden to the
larder, and helped himself to bread and cheese. He took a jug to the
pump, and coming back, ate his meal, standing amongst his people like an
outlaw.

'Well, Paul,' said his father, 'are ye in the mind to make a clean
breast of it?'

'No,' said Paul, 'I'm not.'

The defiance fell like a thunderbolt, and eyes changed with e