“Martha Dunlap is the kind of woman to be mother of a hero. She was as calm and brave as her son and helped me like a real heroine in keeping the others quiet. We told Lucy it was only a jubilee among the natives and that they were shouting and shooting off firearms in their sport along the highway. God forgive me for the falsehood, but it served to keep our poor girl perfectly calm and she does not even now know to the contrary.” Mr. Dunlap reverently inclined his head when he spoke of that most excusable lie that he had told. “Jack does not get all of his nerve and courage from the Dunlap blood, that is sure! When the surgeon was examining the great gash in his breast, Martha stood at his side and held the basin; her hand never trembled though her tearless face was as white as snow. All the others of us, I fear, were blubbering like babies, I know, anyhow Tom Maxon was whimpering more like a lass than the brave and terrible fighter that he is. When the surgeon gave us the joyful news that the blow of the ax had been stopped by the strong breast bone over our boy’s brave heart, we were all ready to shout with gladness, but Martha then, woman like, broke down and began weeping.” There was rather a suspicious moisture in the eyes of the relator of the scene, as he thought over the occurrences of that night in Haiti. Even though all danger was past and his beloved namesake, Jack Dunlap, was now so far recovered as to be able to walk about, true somewhat paler in complexion and with one arm bound across his breast, but entirely beyond danger from the blow of the desperate Haitian axman. “That fighting devil of an American admiral soon cleared Port au Prince of the insurgents and wished me to take up my residence at the consulate, but I had enough of Haiti, for awhile anyway. So as soon as Jack could safely be moved, and old Brice, whose skull must be made of iron, had come around sufficiently after that smashing blow in the head, to take command of the ‘Adams’ and navigate her to Boston, I bundled everybody belonging to me aboard and sailed for home.” The word home came with a sigh of relief from Mr. Dunlap’s lips as he settled back in his chair. “When we heard of your frightful experience, I had some faint hope that the shock might have restored Mrs. Burton to her normal condition of mind,” said Chapman. “Well, in the first place Lucy learned nothing concerning the affair, and was simply told when she called for Jack that he was not well and would be absent from her for a short time. But even had she received a nervous shock from the harrowing events of that night, the experts in mental disorders inform me that it is most unlikely that any good result could have been produced; that as the primary cause of her dementia is disappointed hope, expectation, and the recoil of the purest and best outpouring of her heart, that the only shock at all probable to bring about the desired change must come from a similar source,” answered Mr. Dunlap.