"Serious enough," answered Mark. "But a company of soldiers from the Fort soon settled the rioters. It's an unexpected event connected with the riot that has brought me here this morning. You'll be sorry to hear, Morpeth, that our friend, Mrs. Rayner's husband, has been killed--literally trampled to death by a savage Mahomedan on horseback." "Alfred dead!" gasped Mr. Morpeth, with a look of grief and terror in his eyes. He stumbled in his walk, and but for Mark's strong arm would have fallen forward. His companion regarded him with astonishment. "Yes, Rayner's gone, poor fellow! It's very sad! This sudden bad news will be terrible for his wife. I didn't think you knew him though?" added Mark interrogatively. "I'm just on my way to break the news to her if I can muster up courage. I've been watching by him all night--he passed away at dawn." "God bless you for that," murmured Mr. Morpeth, his face quivering. "Cheveril, there's no need to keep the secret any longer. I was wrong to keep it at all. It was the ruin of him. He was my only son--Alfred." Then in reply to Mark's silent start, he added, "Yes, that was his mother's portrait you and his wife came on that afternoon. The incident struck me at the time. I would I had spoken even then." "Rayner--your son? It's hardly believable," stammered Mark, suddenly recalling the incident of his first evening in Madras, when Rayner in the mail-phaeton had, it seemed to him, almost deliberately set himself to trample down the old man on whose cheek the tears were now running down in sorrow for his loss. "He did not know this, of course--he never knew it?" burst forth Mark, in an almost pleading tone. "Yes, Alfred did know he was my son--but not in time--not till lately," the father acknowledged in a faltering voice. "I should like to tell you all about it, Cheveril. And from you, who have stood by his dying bed, there is much I want to hear." Mark assented, and tightening his arm on Mr. Morpeth's, he led him to a quiet comer of the big station, where they could carry on a conversation without interruption. He would fain have suggested that he should take the old man to the peace of his own library, but he felt his first duty was to her who had been the beloved and sheltered one of Pinkthorpe Rectory, and who was now alone and forlorn in this alien land. In broken words David Morpeth told his tale of many-sided pain. Mark Cheveril's sympathetic heart read its import even more completely than the speaker guessed, though his words were few. After a little silence, he glanced at the clock, saying: "I was on my way to Clive's Road to tell her. Do you think----" "Ah, yes, it is for me to take that duty," said Mr. Morpeth, starting up from the bench where they were sitting. "I've shirked my responsibilities too long. I see it now when it is too late. I shall go to that sweet child whom I have loved for her own sake as my daughter."