at the rough table that served as his desk, and
brooding. Lewis walked half the length of the room before Leighton saw
him.

"What are you doing here?"

"What have you been telling Nat?"

The questions were almost simultaneous.

"What have I been telling Natalie?" repeated the Reverend Orme. "Well,
what _have_ I been telling her?"

Lewis fixed his eyes on Leighton's face.

"Are you really going to marry Nat to that--to that old man?"

The Reverend Orme shifted in his chair.

"Lewis," he said, "I don't know that it's any of your business, but it
is probable that Natalie will marry Dom Francisco."

Lewis moved awkwardly from one foot to the other, but his eyes never
shifted.

"Does Mother--Mrs. Leighton know about this? Does mammy? Do they
_agree_?"

"Young man," answered Leighton, angrily, "they know that, as this world
goes, Natalie is a lucky girl. Dom Francisco is the wealthiest man in
the province. Look around you, sir. Whom would you have her marry if not
Dom Francisco? Some pauper, I suppose. Some foundling."

Lewis's cheeks burned red.

"You need not go so far as to marry her to a foundling," he answered,
"but you might be kinder to her than to marry her to--to that old man.
You might choke her to death."

The Reverend Orme leaped from his chair.

"Choke _her_ to death, you--you interloper!" He strode toward Lewis, his
trembling hands held before him.

"Hold on!" cried Lewis, his eyes flaming. "I'm no drunkard--no cowardly
Manoel."

The Reverend Orme stopped in his stride. A ghastly pallor came over his
face.

"Manoel!" he whispered. "What do _you_ know about Manoel?"

Lewis's heart sank low within him. His unbroken silence of years had
been instinctive. Now, when it was too late, he suddenly realized that
it had been the thread that held him to Nadir. He had broken it. Never
more could he and the Reverend Orme sleep beneath the same roof, eat at
the same table. He saw it in the Reverend Orme's face.

Leighton had staggered back to his chair and sat staring vacantly at the
floor. Lewis looked at his head, streaked with white, at his brow,
terribly lined, and at his vacant, staring eyes. He felt a sudden great
pity for his foster-father, but pity had come too late.

"Sir," he said, "I am going away. I shall need some money." He felt no
shame at asking for money. For seven years he had tended Leighton's
goats--tended them so well that in seven years they had increased
sevenfold.

Leig