CHAPTER X.

Garrison eyed him coldly, and was about to pass when Crimmins barred his way.

“I suppose when you gets up in the world, it ain't your way to know folks you knew before, is it?” he asked gently. “But Dan Crimmins has a heart, an' it ain't his way to shake friends, even if they has money. It ain't Crimmins' way.”

“Take your hand off my shoulder,” said Garrison steadily.

The other's black brows met, but he smiled genially.

“It don't go, Bud. No, no.” He shook his head. “Try that on those who don't know you. I know you. You're Billy Garrison; I'm Dan Crimmins. Now, if you want me to blow in an' tell the major who you are, just say so. I'm obligin'. It's Crimmins' way. But if you want to help an old friend who's down an' out, just say so. I'm waitin'.”

Garrison eyed him. Crimmins? Crimmins? The name was part of his dream. What had he been to this man? What did this man know?

“Take a walk down the pike,” suggested the other easily. “It ain't often you have the pleasure of seein' an old friend, an' the excitement is a little too much for you. I know how it is,” he added sympathetically. He was closely watching Garrison's face.

Garrison mechanically agreed, wondering.

“It's this way,” began Crimmins, once the shelter of the pike was gained. “I'm Billy Crimmins' brother—the chap who trains for Major Calvert. Now, I was down an' out—I guess you know why—an' so I wrote him askin' for a little help. An' he wouldn't give it. He's what you might call a lovin', confidin', tender young brother. But he mentioned in his letter that Bob Waterbury was here, and he asked why I had left his service. Some things don't get into the papers down here, an' it's just as well. You know why I left Waterbury. Waterbury——!”

Here Crimmins carefully selected a variety of adjectives with which to decorate the turfman. He also spoke freely about the other's ancestors, and concluded with voicing certain dark convictions regarding Mr. Waterbury's future.

Garrison listened blankly. “What's all this to me?” he asked sharply. “I don't know you nor Mr. Waterbury.”

“Hell you don't!” rapped out Crimmins. “Quit that game. I may have done things against you, but I've paid for them. You can't touch me on that count, but I can touch you, for I know you ain't the major's nephew—no more than the Sheik of Umpooba. I'm ashamed of you. Tryin' on a game like that with your old trainer, who knows you—”

Garrison caught him fiercely by the arm. His old trainer! Then he was Billy Garrison. Memory was fighting furiously. He was on fire. “Billy Garrison, Billy Garrison, Billy Garrison,” he repeated over and over, shaking Crimmins like a reed. “Go on, go on, go on,” he panted. “Tell me what you know about me. Go on, go on. Am I Garrison? Am I? Am I?”

Then, holding the other as in a vise, the thoughts that had been writhing in his mind for so long came hurtling forth. At last here was some one who knew him. His old trainer. What better friend could he need?

He panted in his frenzy. The words came tripping over one another, smothering, choking. And Crimmins with set face listened; listened as Garrison went over past events; events since that memorable morning he had awakened in the hospital with the world a blank and the past a blur. He told all—all; like a little child babbling at his mother's knee.

“Why did I leave the track? Why? Why?” he finished in a whirlwind of passion. “What happened? Tell me. Say I'm honest. Say it, Crimmins; say it. Help me to get back. I can ride—ride like glory. I'll win for you—anything. Anything to get me out of this hell of deceit, nonentity namelessness. Help me to square myself. I'll make a name nobody'll be ashamed of—” His words faded away. Passion left him weak and quivering.

Crimmins judicially cleared his throat. There was a queer light in his eyes.

“It ain't Dan Crimmins' way to go back on a friend,” he began, laying a hand on Garrison's shoulder. “You don't remember nothing, all on account of that bingle you got on the head. But it was Crimmins that made you, Bud. Sweated over you like a father. It was Crimmins who got you out of many a tight place, when you wouldn't listen to his advice. I ain't saying it wasn't right to skip out after you'd thrown every race and the Carter; after poisoning Sis—”

“Then—I—was—not—honest?” asked Garrison. He was horribly quiet.

“Emphatic'ly no,” said Crimmins sadly. He shook his head. “And you don't remember how you came to Dan Crimmins the night you skipped out and you says: 'Dan, Dan, my only friend, tried and true, I'm broke.' Just like that you says it. And Dan says, without waitin' for you to ask; he says: 'Billy, you and me have been pals for fifteen years; pals man and boy. A friend is a friend, and a man who's broke don't want sympathy—he needs money. Here's three thousand dollars—all I've got. I was going to buy a home for the old mother, but friendship in need comes before all. It's yours. Take it. Don't say a word. Crimmins has a heart, and it's Dan Crimmins' way. He may suffer for it, but it's his way.' That's what he says.”

“Go on,” whispered Garrison. His eyes were very wide and vacant.

Crimmins spat carefully, as if to stimulate his imagination.

“No, no, you don't remember,” he mused sadly. “Now you're tooting along with the high rollers. But I ain't kickin'. It's Crimmins' way never to give his hand in the dark, but when he does give it—for life, my boy, for life. But I was thinkin' of the wife and kids you left up in Long Island; left to face the music. Of course I stood their friend as best I could—”

“Then—I'm married?” asked Garrison slowly. He laughed—a laugh that caused the righteous Crimmins to wince. The latter carefully wiped his eyes with a handkerchief that had once been white.

“Boy, boy!” he said, in great agony of mind. “To think you've gone and forgot the sacred bond of matrimony! I thought at least you would have remembered that. But I says to your wife, I says: 'Billy will come back. He ain't the kind to leave you an' the kids go to the poorhouse, all for the want of a little gumption. He'll come back and face the charges—”

“What charges?” Garrison did not recognize his own voice.

“Why, poisoning Sis. It's a jail offense,” exclaimed Crimmins.

“Indeed,” commented Garrison.

Again he laughed and again the righteous Crimmins winced. Garrison's gray eyes had the glint of sun shining on ice. His mouth looked as it had many a time when he fought neck-and-neck down the stretch, snatching victory by sheer, condensed, bulldog grit. Crimmins knew of old what that mouth portended, and he spoke hurriedly.

“Don't do anything rash, Bud. Bygones is bygones, and, as the Bible says: 'Circumstances alters cases,' and—”

“Then this is how I stand,” cut in Garrison steadily, unheeding the advice. He counted the dishonorable tally on his fingers. “I'm a horse-poisoner, a thief, a welcher. I've deserted my wife and family. I owe you—how much?”

“Five thousand,” said Crimmins deprecatingly, adding on the two just to show he had no hard feelings.

“Good,” said Garrison. He bit his knuckles; bit until the blood came. “Good,” he said again. He was silent.

“I ain't in a hurry,” put in Crimmins magnanimously. “But you can pay it easy. The major—”

“Is a gentleman,” finished Garrison, eyes narrowed. “A gentleman whom I've wronged—treated like—” He clenched his hands. Words were of no avail.

“That's all right,” argued the other persuasively. “What's the use of gettin' flossy over it now? Ain't you known all along, when you put the game up on him, that you wasn't his nephew; that you were doin' him dirt?”

“Shut up,” blazed Garrison savagely. “I know—what I've done. Fouled those I'm not fit to grovel to. I thought I was honest—in a way. Now I know I'm the scum I am—”

“You don't mean to say you're goin' to welch again?” asked the horrified Crimmins. “Goin' to tell the major—”

“Just that, Crimmins. Tell them what I am. Tell Waterbury, and face that charge for poisoning his horse. I may have been what you say, but I'm not that now. I'm not,” he reiterated passionately, daring contradiction. “I've sneaked long enough. Now I'm done with it—”

“See here,” inserted Crimmins, dangerously reasonable, “your little white-washing game may be all right to you, but where does Dan Crimmins come in and sit down? It ain't his way to be left standing. You splittin' to the major and Waterbury? They'll mash your face off! And where's my five thousand, eh? Where is it if you throw over the bank?”

“Damn your five thousand!” shrilled Garrison, passion throwing him. “What's your debt to what I owe? What's money? You say you're my friend. You say you have been. Yet you come here to blackmail me—yes, that's the word I used, and the one I mean. Blackmail. You want me to continue living a lie so that I may stop your mouth with money. You say I'm married. But do you wish me to go back to my wife and children, to try to square myself before God and them? Do you wish me to face Waterbury, and take what's coming to me? No, you don't, you don't. You lie if you say you do. It's yourself—yourself you're thinking of. I'm to be your jackal. That's your friendship, but I say if that's friendship, Crimmins, then to the devil with it, and may God send me hatred instead!” He choked with the sheer smother of his passion.

Crimmins was breathing heavily. Then passion marked him for the thing he was. Garrison saw confronting him not the unctuous, plausible friend, but a hunted animal, with fear and venom showing in his narrowed eyes. And, curiously enough, he noticed for the first time that the prison pallor was strong on Crimmins' face, and that the hair above his outstanding ears was clipped to the roots.

Then Crimmins spoke; through his teeth, and very slowly: “So you'll go to Waterbury, eh?” And he nodded the words home. “You—little cur, you—you little misbegotten bottle of bile! What are you and your hypocrisies to me? You don't know me, you don't know me.” He laughed, and Garrison felt repulsion fingering his heart. Then the former trainer shot out a clawing, ravenous hand. “I want that money—want it quick!” he spat, taking a step forward. “You want hatred, eh? Well, hatred you'll have, boy. Hatred that I've always given you, you miserable, puling, lily-livered spawn of a—”

Garrison blotted out the insult to his mother's memory with his knuckles. “And that's for your friendship,” he said, smashing home a right cross.

Crimmins arose very slowly from the white road, and even thought of flicking some of the fine dust from his coat. He was smiling. The moon was very bright. Crimmins glanced up and down the deserted pike. From the distant town a bell chimed the hour of eight. He had twenty pounds the better of the weights, but he was taking no chances. For Garrison, all his wealth of hard-earned fistic education roused, was waiting; waiting with the infinite patience of the wounded cougar.

Crimmins looked up and down the road again. Then he came in, a black-jack clenched until the veins in his hand ridged out purple and taut as did those in his neck. A muscle was beating in his wooden cheek. He struck savagely. Garrison side-stepped, and his fist clacked under Crimmins' chin. Neither spoke. Again Crimmins came in.

A great splatter of hoof-beats came from down the pike, sounding like the vomitings of a Gatling gun. A horse streaked its way toward them. Crimmins darted into the underbrush bordering the pike. The horse came fast. It flashed past Garrison. Its rider was swaying in the saddle; swaying with white, tense face and sawing hands. The eyes were fixed straight ahead, vacant. A broken saddle-girth flapped raggedly. Garrison recognized the fact that it was a runaway, with Sue Desha up.

Another horse followed, throwing space furiously. It was a big bay gelding. As it drew abreast of Garrison, standing motionless in the white road, it shied. Its rider rocketed over its head, thudded on the ground, heaved once or twice, and then lay very still. The horse swept on. As it passed, Garrison swung beside it, caught its pace for an instant, and then eased himself into the saddle. Then he bent over and rode as only he could ride. It was a runaway handicap. Sue's life was the stake, and the odds were against him.

It was Waterbury who was lying unconscious on the lonely Logan Pike; Waterbury who had been thrown as the bay gelding strove desperately to overhaul the flying runaway filly.

Sue had gone for an evening ride. She wished to be alone. It had been impossible to lose the ubiquitous Mr. Waterbury, but this evening The Rogue had evinced premonitory symptoms of a distemper, and the greatly exercised colonel had induced the turfman to ride over and have a look at him. This left Sue absolutely unfettered, the first occasion in a week.

She was of the kind who fought out trouble silently, but not placidly. She must have something to contend against; something on which to work out the distemper of a heart and mind not in harmony. She must experience physical exhaustion before resignation came. In learning a lesson she could not remain inactive. She must walk, walk, up and down, up an down, until its moral or text was beaten into her mentality with her echoing footsteps.

On this occasion she was in the humor to dare the impossible; dare through sheer irritability of heart—not mind. And so she saddled Lethe—an unregenerate pinto of the Southern Trail, whose concealed devilishness forcibly reminded one of Balzac's famous description: “A clenched fist hidden in an empty sleeve.”

She had been forbidden to ride the pinto ever since the day it was brought home to her with irrefutable emphasis that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. It was more of a parabola she described, when, bucked off, her head smashed the ground, but the simile serves.

But she would ride Lethe to-night. The other horses were too comfortable. They served to irritate the bandit passions, not to subdue them. She panted for some one, something, to break to her will.

Lethe felt that there was a passion that night riding her; a passion that far surpassed her own. Womanlike, she decided to arbitrate. She would wait until this all-powerful passion burned itself out; then she could afford to safely agitate her own. It would not have grown less in the necessary interim. So, much to Sue's surprise, the filly was as gentle as the proverbial lamb.

As she turned for home, Waterbury rode out of the deepening shadows behind her. He had left the colonel at his breeding-farm. Waterbury and Sue rode in silence. The girl was giving all her attention to her thoughts. What was left over was devoted to the insistent mouth of Lethe, who ever and anon tested the grip on her bridle-rein; ascertaining whether or not there were any symptoms of relaxation or abstraction.

It is human nature to grow tired of being good. Waterbury's better nature had been in the ascendancy for over a week. He thought he could afford to draw on this surplus balance to his credit. He was riding very close to Sue. He had encroached, inch by inch, but her oblivion had not been inclination, as Waterbury fancied. He edged nearer. As she did not heed the steal, he took it for a grant. We fit facts to our inclination. The animal arose mightily in him. In stooping to avoid an overhanging branch he brushed against her. The contact set him aflame. He was hungrily eyeing her profile. Then in a second, he had crushed her head to his shoulder, and was fiercely kissing her again and again—lips, hair, eyes; eyes, hair, lips.

“There!” he panted, releasing her. He laughed foolishly, biting his nails. His mouth felt as if roofed with sand-paper. His face was white, but not as white as hers.

She was silent. Then she drew a handkerchief from her sleeve and very carefully wiped her lips. She was absolutely silent, but a pulse was beating—beating in her slim throat. The action, her silence, inflamed Waterbury. He made to crush her waist with his ravenous arm. Then, for the first time, she turned slowly, and her narrowed eyes met his. He saw, even in the gloom. Again he laughed, but the onrushing blood purpled his neck.

Desperation came to help him brave those eyes—came and failed. He talked, declaimed, avowed—grew brutally frank. Finally he spoke of the mortgage he held, and waited, breathing heavily, for the answer. There was none.

“I suppose it's some one else, eh?” he rapped out, red showing in the brown of his eyes.

Silence. He savagely cut the gelding across the ears, and then checked its answering, maddened leap. The red deepened in Sue's cheek—two red spots, the flag of courage.

“It's this nephew of Major Calvert's,” added Waterbury. He lost the last shred of common decency he could lay claim to; it was caught up and whirled away in the tempest of his passion. “I saw him to-day, on my way to the track. He didn't see me. When I knew him his name was Garrison—Billy Garrison. I discharged him for dishonesty. I suppose he sneaked home to a confiding uncle when the world had kicked him out. I suppose they think he's all right, same as you do. But he's a thief. A common, low-down—”

The girl turned swiftly, and her little gauntlet caught Waterbury full across the mouth.

“You lie!” she whispered, very softly, her face white and quivering, her eyes black with passion.

And then Lethe saw her opportunity. Sensed it in the momentary relaxing of the bridle-rein. She whipped the bit into her fierce, even, white teeth, and with a snort shot down the pike.

And then Waterbury's better self gained supremacy; contrition, self-hatred rushing in like a fierce tidal wave and swamping the last vestige of animalism. He spurred blindly after the fast-disappearing filly.

Garrison rode one of the best races of his life that night. It was a trial of stamina and nerve. Lethe was primarily a sprinter, and the gelding, raised to his greatest effort by the genius of his rider, outfought her, outstayed her. As he flew down the moon-swept road, bright as at any noontime, Garrison knew success would be his, providing Sue kept her seat, her nerve, and the saddle from twisting.

Inch by inch the white, shadow-flecked space between the gelding and the filly was eaten up. On, on, with only the tempest of their speed and the flying hoofs for audience. On, on, until now the gelding had poked his nose past the filly's flying hocks.

Garrison knew horses. He called on the gelding for a supreme effort, and the gelding answered impressively. He hunched himself, shot past the filly. Twenty yards' gain, twenty yards to the fore, and then Garrison turned easily in the saddle. “All right, Miss Desha, let her come,” he sang out cheerfully.

And the filly came, came hard; came with all the bitterness of being outstripped by a clumsy gelding whom she had beaten time and again. As she caught the latter's slowed pace, as her wicked nose drew alongside of the other's withers, Garrison shot out a hand, clamped an iron clutch on the spume-smeared bit, swung the gelding across the filly's right of way; then, with his right hand, choked the fight from her widespread nostrils.

And then, womanlike, Sue fainted, and Garrison was just in time to ease her through his arms to the ground. The two horses, thoroughly blown, placidly settled down to nibble the grass by the wayside.

Sue lay there, her wealth of hair clouding Garrison's shoulder. He watched consciousness return, the flutter of her breath. The perfume of her skin was in his nostrils, his mouth; stealing away his honor. He held her close. She shivered.

He fought to keep from kissing her as she lay there unarmed. Then her throat pulsed; her eyes opened. Garrison kissed her again and again; gripping her as a drowning man grips at a passing straw.

With a great heave and a passionate cry she flung him from her. She rose unsteadily to her feet. He stood, shame engulfing him. Then she caught her breath hard.

“Oh!” she said softly, “it's—it's you!” She laughed tremulously. “I—I thought it was Mr. Waterbury.”

Relief, longing was in the voice. She made a pleading motion with her arms—a child longing for its mother's neck. He did not see, heed. He was nervously running his hand through his hair, face flaming. Silence.

“Mr. Waterbury was thrown. I took his mount,” he blurted out, at length. “Are you hurt?”

She shook her head without replying; biting her lips. She was devouring him with her eyes; eyes dark with passion. The memory of that moment in his arms was seething within her. Why—why had she not known! They looked at each other; eye to eye; soul to soul. Neither spoke.

She shivered, though the night was warm.

“Why did you call me Miss Desha?” she asked, at length.

“Because,” he said feebly—his nature was true to his Southern name. He was fighting self like the girl—“I'm going away,” he added. It had to come with a rush or not at all. And it must come. He heaved his chest as a swimmer seeks to breast the waves. “I'm not worthy of you. I'm a—a beast,” he said. “I lied to you; lied when I said I was not Garrison. I am Billy Garrison. I did not know that I was. I know now. Know——”

“I knew you were,” said the girl simply. “Why did you try to hide it? Shame?”

“No.” In sharp staccato sentences he told her of his lapse of memory. “It was not because I was a thief; because I was kicked from the turf; because I was a horse-poisoner—”

“Then—it's true?” she asked.

“That I'm a—beast?” he asked grimly. “Yes, it's true. You doubt me, don't you? You think I knew my identity, my crimes all along, and that I was afraid. Say you doubt me.”

“I believe you,” she said quietly.

“Thank you,” he replied as quietly.

“And—you think it necessary, imperative that you go away?” There was an unuttered sob in her voice, though she sought to choke it back.

“I do.” He laughed a little—the laugh that had caused the righteous Dan Crimmins to wince.

She made a passionate gesture with her hand. “Billy,” she said, and stopped, eyes flaming.

“You were right to break the engagement,” he said slowly, eyes on the ground. “I suppose Mr. Waterbury told you who I was, and—and, of course, you could only act as you did.”

She was silent, her face quivering.

“And you think that of me? You would think it of me? No, from the first I knew you were Garrison—”

“Forgive me,” he inserted.

“I broke the engagement,” she added, “because conditions were changed—with me. My condition was no longer what it was when the engagement was made—” She checked herself with an effort.

“I think I understand—now,” he said, and admiration was in his eyes; “I know the track. I should.” He was speaking lifelessly, eyes on the ground. “And I understand that you do not know—all.”

“All?”

“Um-m-m.” He looked up and faced her eyes, head held high. “I am an adventurer,” he said slowly. “A scoundrel, an impostor. I am not—Major Calvert's nephew.” And he watched her eyes; watched unflinchingly as they changed and changed again. But he would not look away.

“I—I think I will sit down, if you don't mind,” she whispered, hand at throat. She seated herself, as one in a maze, on a log by the wayside. She looked up, a twisted little smile on her lips, as he stood above her. “Won't—won't you sit down and tell—tell me all?”

He obeyed automatically, not striving to fathom the great charity of her silence. And then he told all—all. Even as he had told that very good trainer and righteous friend, Dan Crimmins. His voice was perfectly lifeless. And the girl listened, lips clenched on teeth.

“And—and that's all,” he whispered. “God knows it's enough—too much.” He drew himself away as some unclean thing.

“All that, all that, and you only a boy,” whispered the girl, half to herself. “You must not tell the major. You must not,” she cried fiercely.

“I must,” he whispered. “I will.”

“You must not. You won't. You must go away, go away. Wipe the slate clean,” she added tensely. “You must not tell the major. It must be broken to him gently, by degrees. Boy, boy, don't you know what it is to love; to have your heart twisted, broken, trampled? You must not tell him. It would kill. I—know.” She crushed her hands in her lap.

“I'm a coward if I run,” he said.

“A murderer if you stay,” she answered. “And Mr. Waterbury—he will flay you—keep you in the mire. I know. No, you must go, you must go. Must have a chance for regeneration.”

“You are very kind—very kind. You do not say you loathe me.” He arose abruptly, clenching his hands above his head in silent agony.

“No, I do not,” she whispered, leaning forward, hands gripping the log, eyes burning up into his face. “I do not. Because I can't. I can't. Because I love you, love you, love you. Boy, boy, can't you see? Won't you see? I love you—”

“Don't,” he cried sharply, as if in physical agony. “You don't know what you say—”

“I do, I do. I love you, love you,” she stormed. Passion, long stamped down, had arisen in all its might. The surging intensity of her nature was at white heat. It had broken all bonds, swept everything aside in its mad rush. “Take me with you. Take me with you—anywhere,” she panted passionately. She arose and caught him swiftly by the arm, forcing up her flaming face to his. “I don't care what you are—I know what you will be. I've loved you from the first. I lied when I ever said I hated you. I'll help you to make a new start. Oh, so hard! Try me. Try me. Take me with you. You are all I have. I can't give you up. I won't! Take me, take me. Do, do, do!” Her head thrown back, she forced a hungry arm about his neck and strove to drag his lips to hers.

He caught both wrists and eyed her. She was panting, but her eyes met his unwaveringly, gloriously unashamed. He fought for every word. “Don't—tempt—me—Sue. Good God, girl! you don't know how I love you. You can't. Loved you from that night in the train. Now I know who you were, what you are to me—everything. Help me to think of you, not of myself. You must guard yourself. I'm tired of fighting—I can't——”

“It's the girl up North?”

He drew back. He had forgotten. He turned away, head bowed. Both were fighting—fighting against love—everything. Then Sue drew a great breath and commenced to shiver.

“I was wrong. You must go to her,” she whispered. “She has the right of way. She has the right of way. Go, go,” she blazed, passion slipping up again. “Go before I forget honor; forget everything but that I love.”

Garrison turned. She never forgot the look his face held; never forgot the tone of his voice.

“I go. Good-by, Sue. I go to the girl up North. You are above me in every way—infinitely above me. Yes, the girl up North. I had forgotten. She is my wife. And I have children.”

He swung on his heel and blindly flung himself upon the waiting gelding.

Sue stood motionless.

That night Garrison left for New York; left with the memory of Sue standing there on the moonlit pike, that look in her eyes; that look of dazed horror which he strove blindly to shut out. He did not return to Calvert House; not because he remembered the girl's advice and was acting upon it. His mind had no room for the past. Every blood-vessel was striving to grapple with the present. He was numb with agony. It seemed as if his brain had been beaten with sticks; beaten to a pulp. That last scene with Sue had uprooted every fiber of his being. He writhed when he thought of it. But one thought possessed him. To get away, get away, get away; out of it all; anyhow, anywhere.

He was like a raw recruit who has been lying on the firing-line, suffering the agonies of apprehension, of imagination; experiencing the proximity of death in cold blood, without the heat of action to render him oblivious.

Garrison had been on the firing-line for so long that his nerve was frayed to ribbons. Now the blow had fallen at last. The exposure had come, and a fierce frenzy possessed him to complete the work begun. He craved physical combat. And when he thought of Sue he felt like a murderer fleeing from the scene of his crime; striving, with distance, to blot out the memory of his victim. That was all he thought of. That, and to get away—to flee from himself. Afterward, analysis of actions would come. At present, only action; only action.

It was five miles to the Cottonton depot, reached by a road that branched off from the Logan Pike about half a mile above the spot where Waterbury had been thrown. He remembered that there was a through train at ten-fifteen. He would have time if he rode hard. With head bowed, shoulders hunched, he bent over the gelding. He had no recollection of that ride.

But the long, weary journey North was one he had full recollection of. He was forced to remain partially inactive, though he paced from smoking to observation-car time and time again. He could not remain still. The first great fury of the storm had passed. It had swept him up, weak and nerveless, on the beach of retrospect; among the wreck of past hopes; the flotsam and jetsam of what might have been.

He had time for self-analysis, for remorse, for the fierce probings of conscience. One minute he regretted that he had run away without confessing to the major; the next, remembering Sue's advice, he was glad. He tried to shut out the girl's picture from his heart. Impossible. She was the picture; all else was but frame. He knew that he had lost her irrevocably. What must she think of him? How she must utterly despise him!

On the second day doubt came to Garrison, and with it a ray of hope. For the first time the possibility suggested itself that Dan Crimmins, from the deep well of his lively imagination, might have concocted Mrs. Garrison and offspring. Crimmins had said he had always hated him. And he had acted like a villain. He looked like one; like a felon, but newly jail-freed. Might he not have invented the statement through sheer ill will? Realizing that Garrison's memory was a blank, might he not have sought to rivet the blackmailing fetters upon him by this new bolt?

Thus Garrison reasoned, and outlined two schemes. First, he would find his wife if wife there were. He could not love her, for love must have a beginning, and it feeds on the past. He had neither. But he would be loyal to her; loyal as Crimmins said she had been loyal to him. Then he would face whatever charges were against him, and seek restoration from the jockey club, though it took his lifetime. And he would seek some way of wiping out, or at least diminishing, the stain he had left behind him in Virginia.

On the other hand, if Crimmins had lied—Garrison's jaw came out and his eyes snapped. Then he would scrape himself morally clean, and fight and fight for honorable recognition from the world. He would prove that a “has-been” can come back. He would brand the negative as a lie. And then—Sue. Perhaps—perhaps.

Those were the two roads. Which would he traverse? Whichever it was, though his heart, his entire being, lay with the latter, he would follow the pointing finger of honor; follow it to the end, no matter what it might cost, or where it might lead. Love had restored to him the appreciation of man's birthright; the birthright without which nothing is won in this world or the next. He had gained self-respect. At present it was but the thought. He would fight to make it reality; fight to keep it.

And that night as the train was leaping out of the darkness toward the lights of the great city, racing toward its haven, rushing like a falling comet, some one blundered. The world called it a disaster; the official statement, an accident, an open switch; the press called it an outrage. Pessimism called it fate—stern mother of the unsavory. Optimism called it Providence. At all events, the train jammed shut like a closing telescope. Undiluted Hades was very prevalent for over an hour. There were groans, screams, prayers—all the jargon of those about to precipitately return from whence they came. It was not a pleasant scene. Ghouls were there. But mercy, charity, and great courage were also there. And Garrison was there.

Fate, the unsavory, had been with him. He had been thrown clear at the first crash; thrown through his sleeping-berth window. Physically he was not very presentable. But he fought a good fight against the flames and the general chaos.

One of the forward cars was a caldron of flame. A baby's cry swung out from among the roar and smart of the living hell. There was a frantic father and a demented mother. Both had to be thrown and pounded into submission; held by sheer weight and muscle.

There were brave men there that night, but there was no sense in giving two lives for one. Death was reaping more than enough. They would try to save the “kid,” but it looked hopeless. Was it a girl? Yes, and an only child? She must be pinned under a seat. The fire would be about opening up on her. Sure—sure they would see what could be done. Anyway, the roof was due to smash down. But they'd see. But there were lots of others who needed a hand; others who were not pinned under seats with the flames hungry for them.

But Garrison had swung on to a near-by horse-cart, jammed into rubber boots, coats, and helmet, tying a wet towel over nose and mouth. And as some stared, some cursed, and some cheered feebly, he smashed his way through the smother of flame to the choking screams of the child.

The roof fell in. A great crash and a spouting fire of flame. An eternity, and then he emerged like one of the three prophets from the fiery furnace. Only he was not a Shadrach, Meshach, or Abednego. He was not fashioned from providential asbestos. He was vulnerable. They carried him to a near-by house. His head had been wonderfully smashed by the falling roof. His eyebrows and hair were left behind in the smother of flame. He was fire-licked from toe to heel. He was raving. But the child was safe. And that wreck and that rescue went down in history.

For weeks Garrison was in the hospital. It was very like the rehearsal of a past performance. He was completely out of his head. It was all very like the months he put in at Bellevue in the long ago, before he had experienced the hunger-cancer and compromised with honesty.

And again there came nights when doctors shook their heads and nurses looked grave; nights when it was understood that before another dawn had come creeping through the windows little Billy Garrison would have crossed the Big Divide; nights when the shibboleths of a dead-and-gone life were even fluttering on his lips; nights when names but not identities fought with one another for existence; fought for birth, for supremacy, and “Sue” always won; nights when he sat up in bed as he had sat up in Bellevue long ago, and with tense hands and blazing eyes fought out victory on the stretch. Horrible, horrible nights; surcharged with the frenzy and unreality of a nightmare.

And one of his audience who seldom left the narrow cot was a man who had come to look for a friend among the wreck victims; come and found him not. He had chanced to pass Garrison's cot. And he had remained.

Came a night at last when stamina and hope and grit won the long, long fight. The crisis was turned. The demons, defeated, who had been fighting among themselves for the possession of Garrison's mind, reluctantly gave it back to him. And, moreover, they gave it back—intact. The part they had stolen that night in the Hoffman House was replaced.

This restoration the doctors subsequently called by a very learned and mysterious name. They gave an esoteric explanation redounding greatly to the credit of the general medical and surgical world. It was something to the effect that the initial blow Garrison had received had forced a piece of bone against the brain in such a manner as to defy mere man's surgery. This had caused the lapse of memory.

Then had come the second blow that night of the wreck. Where man had failed, nature had stepped in and operated successfully. Her methods had been crude, but effective. The unscientific blow on the head had restored the dislodged bone to its proper place. The medical world was highly pleased over this manifestation of nature's surgical skill, and appeared to think that she had operated under its direction. And nature never denied it.

As Garrison opened his eyes, dazed, weak as water, memory, full, complete, rushed into action. His brain recalled everything—everything from the period it is given man to remember down to the present. It was all so clear, so perfect, so workmanlike. The long-halted clock of memory was ticking away merrily, perfectly, and not one hour was missing from its dial. The thread of his severed life was joined—joined in such a manner that no hitch or knot was apparent.

To use a third simile, the former blank, utterly fearsome space, was filled—filled with clear writing, without blotch or blemish. And on the space was not recorded one deed he had dreaded to see. There were mistakes, weaknesses—but not dishonor. For a moment he could not grasp the full meaning of the blessing. He could only sense that he had indeed been blessed above his deserts.

And then as Garrison understood what it all meant to him; understood the chief fact that he had not deserted wife and children; that Sue might be won, he crushed his face to the pillow and cried—cried like a little child.

And a big man, sitting in the shelter of a screen, hitched his chair nearer the cot, and laid both hands on Garrison's. He did not speak, but there was a wonderful light in his eyes—steady, clear gray eyes.

“Kid,” he said. “Kid.”

Garrison turned swiftly. His hand gripped the other's.

“Jimmie Drake,” he whispered. For the first time the blood came to his face.

Two months had gone in; two months of slow recuperation, regeneration for Garrison. He was just beginning to look at life from the standpoint of unremitting toil and endeavor. It is the only satisfactory standpoint. From it we see life in its true proportions. Neither distorted through the blue glasses of pessimism—but another name for the failure of misapplication—nor through the wonderful rose-colored glasses of the dreamer. He was patiently going back over his past life; returning to the point where he had deserted the clearly defined path of honor and duty for the flowery fields of unbridled license.

It was no easy task he had set himself, but he did not falter by the wayside. Three great stimulants he had—health, the thought of Sue Desha, and the practical assistance of Jimmie Drake.

It was a month, dating from the memorable meeting with the turfman, before Garrison was able to leave the hospital. When he did, it was to take up his life at Drake's Long Island breeding-farm and racing-stable; for in the interim Drake had passed from book-making stage to that of owner. He ran a first-class string of mounts, and he signed Garrison to ride for him during the ensuing season.

It was the first chance for regeneration, and it had been timidly asked and gladly granted; asked and granted during one of the long nights in the hospital when Garrison was struggling for strength and faith. It had been the first time he had been permitted to talk for any great length.

“Thank you,” he said, on the granting of his request, which he more than thought would be refused. His eyes voiced where his lips were dumb. “I haven't gone back, Jimmie, but it's good of you to give me a chance on my say-so. I'll bear it in mind. And—and it's good of you, Jimmie, to—to come and sit with me. I—I appreciate it all, and I don't see why you should do it.”

Drake laughed awkwardly.

“It's the least I could do, kid. The favor ain't on my side, it's on yours. Anyway, what use is a friend if he ain't there when you need him? It was luck I found you here. I thought you had disappeared for keeps. Remember that day you cut me on Broadway? I ought to have followed you, but I was sore—”

“But I—I didn't mean to cut you, Jimmie. I didn't know you. I want to tell you all about that—about everything. I'm just beginning to know now that I'm living. I've been buried alive. Honest!”

“I always thought there was something back of your absent treatment. What was it?” Drake hitched his chair nearer and focused all his powers of concentration. “What was it, kid? Out with it. And if I can be of any help you know you have only to put it there.” He held out a large hand.

And then slowly, haltingly, but lucidly, dispassionately, events following in sequence, Garrison told everything; concealing nothing. Nor did he try to gloss over or strive to nullify his own dishonorable actions. He told everything, and the turfman, chin in hand, eyes riveted on the narrator, listened absorbed.

“Gee!” Jimmie Drake whispered at last, “it sounds like a fairy-story. It don't sound real.” Then he suddenly crashed a fist into his open palm. “I see, I see,” he snapped, striving to control his excitement. “Then you don't know. You can't know.”

“Know what?” Garrison sat bolt upright in his narrow cot, his heart pounding.

“Why—why about Crimmins, about Waterbury, about Sis—everything,” exclaimed Drake. “It was all in the Eastern papers. You were in Bellevue then. I thought you knew. Don't you know, kid, that it was proven that Crimmins poisoned Sis? Hold on, keep quiet. Yes, it was Crimmins. Now, don't get excited. Yes, I'll tell you all. Give me time. Why, kid, you were as clean as the wind that dried your first shirt. Sure, sure. We all knew it—then. And we thought you did—”

“Tell me, tell me.” Garrison's lip was quivering; his face gray with excitement.

Drake ran on forcefully, succinctly, his hand gripping Garrison's.

“Well, we'll take it up from that day of the Carter Handicap. Remember? When you and Waterbury had it out? Now, I had suspected that Dan Crimmins had been plunging against his stable for some time. I had got on to some bets he had put through with the aid of his dirty commissioners. That's why I stood up for you against Waterbury. I knew he was square. I knew he didn't throw the race, and, as for you—well, I said to myself: 'That ain't like the kid.' I knew the evidence against you, but it was hard to believe, kid. And I believed you when you said you hadn't made a cent on the race, but instead had lost all you had, I believed that. But I knew Crimmins had made a pile. I found that out. And I believed he drugged you, kid.

“Now, when you tell me you were fighting consumption it clears a lot of space for me that has been dark. I knew you were doped half the time, but I thought you were going the pace with the pipe, though I'll admit I couldn't fathom what drug you were taking. But now I know Crimmins fed you dope while pretending to hand you nerve food. I know it. I know he bet against his stable time and ag'in and won every race you were accused of throwing. I tracked things pretty clear that day after I left you.

“Well, I went to Waterbury and laid the charge against the trainer; giving him a chance to square himself before I made trouble higher up. Well, Waterbury was mad. Said he had no hand in it, and I believed him. The upshot of it was that he faced Crimmins. Now, Crimmins had been blowing himself on the pile he had made, and he was nasty. Instead of denying it and putting the proving of the game up to me, he took the bit in his mouth at something Waterbury said.

“I don't know all the facts. They came out in the paper afterward. But Crimmins and Waterbury had a scrap, and the trainer was fired. He was fired when you went to the stable to say good-by to Sis. He was packing what things he had there, but when he saw you weren't on, he kept it mum. I believe then he was planning to do away with Sis, and you offered a nice easy get-away for him. He hated you. First, because you turned down the crooked deal he offered you, for it was he who was beating the bookies, and he wanted a pal. Secondly, he thought you had split about the dope, and he laid his discharge to you. And he hated Waterbury. He could square you both at one shot. He poisoned Sis when you'd gone.

“Every one believed you guilty, for they didn't know the row Crimmins and Waterbury had. But Waterbury suspected. He and Crimmins had it out. He caught him on Broadway, a day or two later, and Crimmins walloped him over the head with a blackjack. Waterbury went to the hospital, and came next to dying. Crimmins went to jail. I guess he was down and out, all right, when, as you say, he heard from his brother that Waterbury was at Cottonton. I believe he went there to square him, but ran across you instead, and thought he could have a good blackmailing game on the side. That wife game was a plot to catch you, kid. He didn't think you'd dare to come North. When you told him about your lapse of memory, then he knew he was safe. You knew nothing of his showdown.”

Garrison covered his face with his hands. Only he knew the great, the mighty obsession that was slowly withdrawing itself from his heart. It was all so wonderful; all so incredible. Long contact with misfortune had sapped the natural resiliency of his character. It had been subjected to so much pressure that it had become flaccid. The pressure removed, it would be some time before the heart could act upon the message of good tidings the brain had conveyed to it. For a long time he remained silent. And Drake respected his silence to the letter. Then Garrison uncovered his eyes.

“I can't believe it. I can't believe it,” he whispered, wide-eyed. “It is too good to be true. It means too much. You're sure you're right, Jimmie? It means I'm proven clean, proven square. It means reinstatement on the turf. Means—everything.”

“All that, kid,” said Drake. “I thought you knew.”

Garrison hugged his knees in a paroxysm of silent joy.

“But—Waterbury?” he puzzled at length. “He knew I had been exonerated. And yet—yet he must have said something to the contrary to Miss Desha. She knew all along that I was Garrison; knew when I didn't know myself. But she thought me square. But Waterbury must have said something. I can never forget her saying when I confessed: 'It's true, then.' I can never forget that, and the look in her eyes.”

“Aye, Waterbury,” mused Drake soberly. He eyed Garrison. “You know he's dead,” he said simply. He nodded confirmation as the other stared, white-faced. “Died this morning after he was thrown. Fractured skull. I had word. Some right-meaning chap says somewhere something about saying nothing but good of the dead, kid. If Waterbury tried to queer you, it was through jealousy. I understand he cared something for Miss Desha. He had his good points, like every man. Think of them, kid, not the bad ones. I guess the bookkeeper up above will credit us with all the times we've tried to do the square, even if we petered out before we'd made good. Trying counts something, kid. Don't forget that.”

“Yes, he had his good points,” whispered Garrison. “I don't forget, Jimmie. I don't forget that he has a cleaner bill of moral health than I have. I was an impostor. That I can't forget; cannot wipe out.”

“I was coming to that,” Drake scratched his grizzled head elaborately. “I didn't say anything when you were unwinding that yarn, kid, but it sounded mighty tangled to me.”

“How?”

“How? Why, we ain't living in fairy-books to-day. It's straight hard life. And there ain't any fools, as far as I can see, who are allowed to take up air and space. I've heard of Major Calvert, and his brains were all there the last time I heard of him—”

“What do you mean?” Garrison bored his eyes into Drake's.

“Why, I mean, kid, that blood is thicker than water, and leave it to a woman to see through a stone wall. I don't believe you could palm yourself off to the major and his wife as their nephew. It's not reasonable nohow. I don't believe any one could fool any family.”

“But I did!” Garrison was staring blankly. “I did, Jimmie! Remember I had the cooked-up proofs. Remember that they had never seen the real nephew—”

“Oh, shucks! What's the odds? Blood's blood. You don't mean to say a man wouldn't know his own sister's child? Living in the house with him? Wouldn't there be some likeness, some family trait, some characteristic? Are folks any different from horses? No, no, it might happen in stories, but not life, not life.”

Garrison shook his head wearily. “I can't follow you, Jimmie. You like to argue for the sake of arguing. I don't understand. They did believe me. Isn't that enough? Why—why——” His face blanched at the thought. “You don't mean to say that they knew I was an imposter? Knew all along? You—can't mean that, Jimmie?”

“I may,” said Drake shortly. “But, see here, kid, you'll admit it would be impossible for two people to have that birthmark on them; the identical mark in the identical spot. You'll admit that. Now, wouldn't it be impossible?”

“Improbable, but not impossible.” Suddenly Garrison had commenced to breathe heavily, his hands clenching.

Drake cocked his head on one side and closed an eye. He eyed Garrison steadily. “Kid, it seems to me that you've only been fooling yourself. I believe you're Major Calvert's nephew. That's straight.”

For a long time Garrison stared at him unwinkingly. Then he laughed wildly.

“Oh, you're good, Jimmie. No, no. Don't tempt me. You forget; forget two great things. I know my mother's name was Loring, not Calvert. And my father's name was Garrison, not Dagget.”

“Um-m-m,” mused Drake, knitting brows. “You don't say? But, see here, kid, didn't you say that this Dagget's mother was only Major Calvert's half-sister? How about that, eh? Then her name would be different from his. How about that? How do you know Loring mightn't fit it? Answer me that.”

“I never thought of that,” whispered Garrison. “If you only are right, Jimmie! If you only are, what it would mean? But my father, my father,” he cried weakly. “My father. There's no getting around that, Jimmie. His name was Garrison. My name is Garrison. There's no dodging that. You can't change that into Dagget.”

“How do you know?” argued Drake, slowly, pertinaciously. “This here is my idea, and I ain't willing to give it up without a fight. How do you know but your father might have changed his name? I've known less likelier things to happen. You know he was good blood gone wrong. How do you know he mightn't have changed it so as not disgrace his family, eh? Changed it after he married your mother, and she stood for it so as not to disgrace her family. You were a kid when she died, and you weren't present, you say. How do you know but she mightn't have wanted to tell you a whole lot, eh? A whole lot your father wouldn't tell you because he never cared for you. No, the more I think of it the more I'm certain that you're Major Calvert's nephew. You're the only logical answer. That mark of the spur and the other incidents is good enough for me.”

“Don't tempt me, Jimmie, don't tempt me,” pleaded Garrison again. “You don't know what it all means. I may be his nephew. I may be—God grant I am! But I must be honest. I must be honest.”

“Well, I'm going to hunt up that lawyer, Snark,” affirmed Drake finally. “I won't rest until I see this thing through. Snark may have known all along you were the rightful heir, and merely put up a job to get a pile out of you when you came into the estate. Or he may have been honest in his dishonesty; may not have known. But I'm going to rustle round after him. Maybe there's proofs he holds. What about Major Calvert? Are you going to write him?”

Garrison considered. “No—no,” he said at length. “No, if—if by any chance I am his nephew—you see how I want to believe you, Jimmie, God knows how much—then I'll tell him afterward. Afterward when—I'm clean. I want to lie low; to square myself in my own sight and man's. I want to make another name for myself, Jimmie. I want to start all over and shame no man. If by any chance I am William C. Dagget, then—then I want to be worthy of that name. And I owe everything to Garrison. I'm going to clean that name. It meant something once—and it'll mean something again.”

“I believe you, kid.”

Subsequently, Drake fulfilled his word concerning the “rustling round” after that eminent lawyer, Theobald D. Snark. His efforts met with failure. Probably the eminent lawyer's business had increased so enormously that he had been compelled to vacate the niche he held in the Nassau Street bookcase. But Drake had not given up the fight.

Meanwhile Garrison had commenced his life of regeneration at the turfman's Long Island stable. He was to ride Speedaway in the coming Carter Handicap. The event that had seen him go down, down to oblivion one year ago might herald the reascendency of his star. He had vowed it would. And so in grim silence he prepared for his farewell appearance in that great seriocomic tragedy of life called “Making Good.”

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