I had to laugh, and then I apologized. "There is a good deal of truth in what you say," said I. "The actor struts, and just as you do, to impress the unthinking. But let us drop it. I'm sorry I offended you. But, really, I don't like your interference." "It is not an interference. I am an old servant of that family. Look here!" He snatched his hand from the lamp-post and folded his arms. "What do you intend shall be the outcome?" "I don't know--I don't see--" "Don't see the end," he interposed. "But don't you think that the end of everything ought to be kept well in view?" "Yes, I do. But sometimes a beginning is so delightful that we are afraid to look toward the end. But I realize my own selfishness, and I acknowledge to you that in spite of what you may term the immoral atmosphere of a player's life--I confess, or, rather, I affirm, that in my blood there is a strong current of good old English puritanism; and I will swear to you that I would cut my own throat rather than to bring disgrace upon that family." He put his mighty hands upon my shoulders, and, turning my face to the light, he looked hard into my eyes. "No man could say more, Mr. Belford. But what are you going to do?" "I am going to stay away from--from her." "When, Mr. Belford; when will you begin to stay away?" "I have promised to go fox-hunting day after to-morrow." "And after that?" "I will not go to the house." He took my hand, and I forgot that he was a stilted and officious negro. "Good-night, Mr. Belford." He turned away, but faced about and said: "I am going to a cabin on the hillside--to pray for you. Good-night." CHAPTER XIV. OLD JOE VARK. The town was going to bed; the late moon was rising, and in the magnolia gardens there seemed to waver a bright and shadowy silence--a night when every sound was afar off, a half mysterious echo--the closing of a window shutter, the subdued footfall of a thief, the indistinct notes of an old song lagging in the soft and lazy air. I walked about the courthouse, its pillars classic in the shadow, its gilded cupola gaudy in the light. I did not turn to my habitation across the square, to sniff the lifeless atmosphere and the sickish paint of the opera house; I bent my way to the river where the moon was free. And upon a rotting yawl I sat down to think, shoulder to shoulder with the ghost of a dead commerce. Far across the stream a mud scow fretted and fluttered like a duck in distress, making just enough of noise to cry "silence" in the ear of night.