It was just after sundown, two days later. Charles was at work in a patch of cabbages near the outer fence of the farm, not far from the barn. Presently, happening to look toward the thicket, he saw a man in a gray suit of clothes and a straw hat cautiously emerging. Their eyes met. The man waved a handkerchief and then stood still, partly hidden by the bushes among which he stood. Charles glanced toward the house and, seeing no one, he put down his hoe and walked toward the man. They met in the edge of the thicket and clasped hands.

"You are back already—or did you really go to Atlanta?" he questioned, eagerly.

"Yes, sir. I would have written, Mr. Charles, but—well, I thought it might not be best. You didn\'t say that I might. Yes, sir. I attended to everything the best I could. I was at the train when they got there with the poor fellow, and saw them take him from the Pullman at the station and put him into an ambulance from the sanatorium."

"How did he look? How did he seem to stand the trip?" Charles asked, anxiously.

"I couldn\'t tell, sir. I couldn\'t see his face. The police kept the crowd back, but the old woman—his mother—looked worried, and I thought the doctor from here did also, and the nurse that came along. I think they gave him a stimulant. I know I saw a bottle and a glass in the doctor\'s hand. They drove slowly, and so I had no trouble keeping up with them afoot. I saw them drive into the grounds of Doctor Elliot\'s sanatorium, and I felt relieved. I would have telegraphed you, but did not know how to reach you here in the country."

"Well, that was two days ago," Charles said. "Have you heard anything more?"

"They operated last night, sir. I was there early this morning. I went into the grounds, hoping to get information, but a guard stopped me at the door and refused to tell me anything. I was trying to persuade him, sir—I know how to deal with such persons, as a rule—but this fellow, although I showed him some money, refused to talk at all. I was greatly worried till Mrs. Keith chanced along and saw me. She recognized me, sir, and she ran out and grabbed my hand. She wanted me to go into the public sitting-room, but I refused. Oh, she was crowding me with questions; they came so fast, sir, that she wouldn\'t let me get a word in! However, she was so—I may say so gay, sir, that I began to think she had good news. Finally, Mr. Charles, she told me that the operation was done, and most successfully. In fact, sir, she says Doctor Elliot says her son\'s recovery is almost assured, though it was a narrow escape."

"That is good news, Mike—wonderful news!" Charles exclaimed. "It will make some people very happy."

"The young lady especially, I presume, sir?"

"Yes, her most of all, Mike."

"Well, I think she need not worry any more about the poor fellow. I am sure, from all I hear down there, that he will soon be on his feet. That old lady, Mrs. Keith, fairly hung on to me, Mr. Charles. I can hold my own with the average man in a shady deal of this sort, but not a woman out of her head with gratitude and curiosity combined. Why, sir, I thought once that she\'d have me arrested to force me to tell her who sent the money. It was only by lying straight out that I got away from her clutches. I told her, I did, sir, that I\'d go down-town and ask permission to let the cat out of the bag and return. That was the only thing that saved me. I\'d have been there yet but for that little trick."

"So she doesn\'t know that, anyway?" Charles said.

"No, sir, she hasn\'t the slightest idea. She tried to make me say that I did it, but of course I couldn\'t allow that, sir. So I simply stuck to it that I\'d been sent by some one else—a friend, a well-wisher and—you know what you said to tell her."

"And what are your present plans?" Charles asked.

"I must return home, sir. I want to stop in New York and see my mother, and then go back to Boston. I have been away as long as I can manage it now, sir."

"You have been of great service to me, Mike," Charles said. It was growing darker now. The twilight was thickening, the yellow glow in the western sky above the mountain-tops was fading away. They strolled down a path toward the house. "Yes, Mike," Charles continued, "no man on earth could have done me such a valuable service. If you hadn\'t come that poor fellow would have died and half a dozen persons would have been stricken down with grief and overwhelmed with disgrace."

"And the young lady—the beautiful young lady, sir—you say she would have suffered most of all?"

"Yes, most of all, Mike. But you mustn\'t go away with the thought that—that there is anything of a serious nature between me and her, for there isn\'t. No one else here knows the truth, but I have told her—given her to understand—that something is hanging over me which will forever keep us apart. She belongs to an old and honorable family, Mike, and I am what you see me now in these old clothes; I am a servant and can never be anything else. So you are going back? Well, I want you, if you can, to see Mason in New York and thank him for sending you to me; and as for the people at home—"

"I was going to ask what I might do in regard to them, Mr. Charles," Michael said, suddenly, as Charles paused. "Your brother and your uncle, who lives with us now, will not ask questions, but the missis—she will. She is sure to, the first opportunity."

"You think—" Again Charles lost his way to satisfactory expression.

"Yes, sir. You see, she has always questioned me on my return from New York, to find out if I have heard anything. She will want to know this time, too, sir, and I confess that it will be hard to fool her. She looks one so straight in the face, you know, sir, and the truth is she loves you as if you were her own brother, sir. Nothing wins a woman\'s heart like being tender to her child, and she knows how you loved the little lady, sir. Pardon me, Mr. Charles, for making a suggestion. The missis can be trusted where you are concerned. She\'d die rather than betray your interests. Would you mind if I frankly told her ............