“To bed now,” whispered the servant. “I’m settin’ up, Miles.” She touched his shoulder gently. “Come. To-morrow’ll do.” He lay down, fully dressed, and ready for misfortune. Dozing through the dark hours, he roused, from time to time, at an imaginary summons. Weariness conquered, however, and when he woke Ella stood watching, from beside a window flooded with sunshine. “He wants to see ye, after breakfast,” she said quietly. “Doctor’s come and gone again. I wouldn’t wake ye, poor dear. No noos. No change, either way.” Again, using a forgotten title of childhood, she compelled him to sit at table: “You must keep up, little Cap’n. Can’t have two sick men.” That new, quiet authority of hers remained a strange comfort, even as he mounted the stairs. His grandfather lay sunken among pillows, his eyes closed, his features pale, gaunt, profoundly calm. Of suffering, of life itself, no more trace appeared than in a carven effigy of patience. Then quite suddenly his eyes opened, roved about the room in feeble search, and, resting on Miles, lighted dully. “Ah, the boy! Come sit by me.” He whispered hoarsely, and with slow effort. “I’ve got my orders, haven’t I? Not long, my boy, not so very long now.” To hear their dread thus put roundly into words, aloud, from the man’s own lips, seemed at first a tragic impropriety. “Oh, grandfather, no!” Miles faltered, without conviction. “Yes.” The old man smiled strangely, placidly. “I knew it. Only a bad cold to start with. I could shake that off--” He stirred impatiently, as if to prove his words, then sank back in resignation. “Heart too weak. I overheard the doctor.” Somehow, for the first time in his life, Miles felt that his grandfather’s frown was rather habitual than unkindly. “Well, it’s no great matter, Miles.” The voice continued, halting and broken, sometimes clear, sometimes a whisper. “So long as you came time enough--all right. Now I want to make my confession. Don’t you be too hard on me.” Crabbed age and youth had lived together, and lived happily, under fixed conditions of authority and deference; and now the old man’s words, or rather something of anxiety in his look, appeared to reverse all their common habits, to set their life-long attitude topsy-turvy. A judge, severe and just, present above the young man’s daily acts, swaying his blindest motives, had imperceptibly become an unknown strength and necessity. To have this strength suddenly fail, this judgment submit to his own, gave Miles a forlorn sense of uncertainty, of loneliness. Independence, that stern, hard-won privilege, was now granted him without warning, thrust violently into his heart. And the same hand which planted this new gift plucked up thoughts and feelings rooted in his childhood. “It’s this sailor, Florio,” said the old man. “He’s been very heavy on my conscience. He lied to me, but I could use it, and so I lied in turn--to you--perhaps the whole neighborhood--At my age--It’s all disgraceful!”