was glad to find one.
'Go on,' said Dick, in a slightly less hostile tone: 'tell me the rest, and what it was that induced you to come up here.'
'Surely you can see the rest for yourself? Surely you can put yourself in my place at this point? I own that hearing you were not to be of the party finally induced me to come—I thought you would not hear of it till afterwards; but I came to bid my friends good-bye! to get one more glimpse of a kind of life I had never seen before and shall never see again! for one more week in a pure atmosphere.'
'Oh! not to make up to Miss Bristo, then?'
Blunt though the words were, each one was a self-inflicted stab to the heart of the man that spoke them.
'No!' cried Miles, and his voice was turned suddenly hoarse; 'no, before Heaven!'
'If I believed it was that, I think I should pull this trigger on the spot.'
'It is not,' cried Miles; 'I swear it is not,' he whispered.
And Dick believed him then.
'Why, man,' the bushranger went on, more steadily, 'you have got me under the whip here. Down with the lash and cut me to ribbons the first time you see me playing false. Keep your eye on me; watch me all day; I can do nothing up here without your knowledge; I cannot speak but you will hear what it is I say. As to Miss Bristo, I will not go near her—but this is a small part of the whole. In my whole conduct you will find me behave like—like a changed man. Only let me stay this week out. But one other thing—a thing I would go down on my knees to you for, if that would do any good: don't open their eyes when I am gone. There will be no need to; they will forget me as Miles the squatter if you let them. Then let them. They think well of me because I saved the old man from drowning. Edmonstone, you can let me keep their good opinions if you will. God help me! they are the only good opinions I ever honestly earned, because I got them entirely through that simple, paltry affair at the seaside. Do not rob me of them, now or afterwards. That is all I ask.'
Dick was beginning to waver.
There was an honest ring in Ned Ryan's asseverations; and after all it was just possible that a villain, who had shown a soft side at least once before, might be softened right through by the gracious influence of an English home. Then Sundown, the bushranger, desperado though he had been, had preserved hands unstained by blood; and Sundown the bushranger had saved him, Edmonstone, from death and ruin in the Australian wilds, and Colonel Bristo from drowning. Such acts could not be made light of or forgotten, no matter who was their author.
Dick was relenting, and the other saw it.
'Stay!' said Miles, suddenly. 'You have my word only so far. I can show you a better pledge of good faith if you will let me.'
'Where is it?'
'In my room.'
Edmonstone nodded. Miles left the room, and returned immediately with a paper, which he handed to Edmonstone.
'Why, this is a receipt of passage-money for two!' said Edmonstone, looking up. 'You are not going out alone, then?'
'No,' said Miles. His voice was low. His back was to the window, through which grey dawn was now stealing. It was impossible to see the expression on his face—its outline was all that was visible.
'Who is going with you?'
'My wife!' whispered Miles.
Dick was taken aback, glad, incredulous.
'Your wife!' he said. 'Then you admit that she is your wife? When did you see her?'
'Yesterday.'
'But not until then!' Dick meant to put a question; he did not succeed in his excitement—his tone was affirmative.
'No, not until then,' said Miles quietly; 'because, though I have been watching her as closely as I dared, it was the first chance I got of seeing her without seeing Pound. He thinks she has not seen me since the night in Bushey Park. She must not escape him until the very day of joining me on board the steamer. If she did, he would find her sooner or later; and then he would find me, which is all he is living for. That man would murder me if he got the chance. Do you understand now?'
Dick made no reply, but it all seemed clear and intelligible to him; Pound's hold upon Mrs. Ryan, and the false position in which that fiend placed the woman at the meeting of husband and wife, which accounted for Ryan's misunderstanding and heartless treatment of his wife on that occasion; the reconciliation of husband and wife; their projected departure for America; the necessity of deceiving Pound meanwhile, and getting away without his knowledge. All these things seemed natural enough; and, told in the desperately earnest tones of a strong man humbled, they carried conviction with them. Nor were they pleaded in vain.
The way in which Dick finally put the matter was this:—
'Remember,' he said, 'that it is for my friends' sake as much as for yours; that this is our second treaty; and that if you break one particle of it there are always four men in the house here, and villagers in plenty within a cooee of us.'
'I know all these things,' said Miles, very humbly, 'and will forget none of them.'
And so the interview ended.
When Miles was gone, Dick lifted his gun, which had lain long upon the counterpane, pressed the lever, bent down the barrels, and aimed them at the glimmering window-blind. The early morning light shone right through the gleaming bores—the gun had been empty all the time! Dick felt ashamed of the part that it had played in the
