With a prayer in his heart for the boy who lay dying in that strange underground chamber, the artist's father began.

"It is the story, Mr. Matthews, of a man and his only son, the last of their family. With them will perish--has perished one of the oldest and proudest names in our country.

"From his childhood this man was taught the honored traditions of his people, and, thus trained in pride of ancestry, grew up to believe that the supreme things of life are what his kind call education, refinement, and culture. In his shallow egotism, he came to measure all life by the standards of his people.

"It was in keeping with this that the man should enter the pulpit of the church of his ancestors, and it was due very largely, no doubt, to the same ancestral influence that he became what the world calls a successful minister of the gospel. But Christianity to him was but little more than culture, and his place in the church merely an opportunity to add to the honor of his name. Soon after leaving the seminary, he married. The crowning moment of his life was when his first born--a boy--was laid in his arms. The second child was a girl; there were no more.

"For ten years before her death the wife was an invalid. The little girl, too, was never strong, and six months after they buried the mother the daughter was laid beside her.

"You, sir, can understand how the father lavished every care upon his son. The first offspring of the parents' love, the sole survivor of his home, and the last to bear the name of a family centuries old, he was the only hope of the proud man's ambition.

"The boy was a beautiful child, a delicate, sensitive soul in a body of uncommon physical grace and strength, and the proud father loved to think of him as the flower of long ages of culture and refinement. The minister, himself, jealously educated his son, and the two grew to be friends, sir, constant companions. This, also, YOU will understand--you and your boy. But with all this the young man did not follow his father in choosing his profession. He--he became an artist."

Old Matt started from his seat. Aunt Mollie uttered an exclamation. But the shepherd, without pausing, continued: "When his schooling was completed the boy came into the Ozarks one summer to spend the season painting. The man had expected to go with his son. For months they had planned the trip together, but at last something prevented, and the father could not go--no, he could not go--" The speaker's voice broke; the big mountaineer was breathing hard; Aunt Mollie was crying.

Presently Mr. Howitt went on. "When the young artist returned to his father, among many sketches of the mountains, he brought one painting that received instant recognition. The people stood before it in crowds when it was exhibited in the art gallery; the papers were extravagant in their praise; the artist became famous; and wealthy patrons came to his studio to sit for their portraits. The picture was of a beautiful girl, standing by a spring, holding out a dripping cup of water."

At this a wild oath burst from the giant. Springing to his feet, he started toward the speaker. Aunt Mollie screamed, "Grant, oh Grant! Think what Dad has done for us." The mountaineer paused.

"Mr. Matthews," said the shepherd, in trembling tones, "for my sake, will you not hear me to the end? for my sake?"

The big man dropped back heavily into his chair. "Go on," he said. But his voice was as the growl of a beast.

"The boy loved your girl, Mr. Matthews. It was as though he had left his soul in the hills. Night and day he heard her calling. The more his work was praised, the more his friends talked of honors and planned his future, the keener was his suffering, and most of all there was the shadow that had come between him and his father, breaking the old comradeship, and causing them to shun each other; though the father never knew why. The poor boy grew morose and despondent, giving way at times to spells of the deepest depression. He tried to lose himself in his work. He fled abroad and lived alone. It seemed a blight had fallen on his soul. The world called him mad. Many times he planned to take his life, but always the hope of meeting her again stopped him.

"At last he returned to this country determined to see her at any cost, and, if possible, gain her forgiveness and his father's consent to their marriage. He came into the hills only to find that the mother of his child had died of a broken heart.

"Then came the end. The artist disappeared, leaving a long, pitiful letter, saying that before the word reached his father, he would be dead. The most careful investigation brought nothing but convincing evidence that the unhappy boy had taken his own life. The artist knew that it would be a thousand times easier for the proud man to think his son dead than for him to know the truth, and he was right. Mr. Matthews, he was right. I cannot tell you of the man's suffering, but he found a little comfort in the reflection that such extravagant praise of his son's work had added to the honor of the family, for the lad's death was held by all to be the result of a disordered mind. There was not a whisper of wrong doing. His life, they said, was without reproach, and even his sad mental condition was held to be evidence of his great genius.

"The minister was weak, sir. He knew something of the intellectual side of his religion and the history of his church, but he knew little, very little, of............