"I should like to say a word to him in private," responded Pike. "Then you'd better not wait to say it. I'll tell him of your wish. It's all safe. Why, Pike, if the police themselves came they wouldn't trouble to touch you now." "I shouldn't much care if they did," said the man. "_I_ haven't cared for a long while; but there were the others, you know." "Yes," said Mr. Hillary. "Look here," said Pike; "no need to tell him particulars; leave them till I'm gone. I don't know that I'd like _him_ to look me in the face, knowing them." "As you will," said Mr. Hillary, falling in with the wish more readily than he might have done for anyone but a dying man. He had patients out of Calne, beyond Hartledon, and called in returning. It was a snowy day; and as the surgeon was winding towards the house, past the lodge, with a quick step, he saw a white figure marching across the park. It was Lord Hartledon. He had been caught in the storm, and came up laughing. "Umbrellas are at a premium," observed Mr. Hillary, with the freedom long intimacy had sanctioned. "It didn't snow when I came out," said Hartledon, shaking himself, and making light of the matter. "Were you coming to honour me with a morning call?" "I was and I wasn't," returned the surgeon. "I've no time for morning calls, unless they are professional ones; but I wanted to say a word to you. Have you a mind for a further walk in the snow?" "As far as you like." "There's a patient of mine drawing very near the time when doctors can do no more for him. He has expressed a wish to see you, and I undertook to convey the request." "I'll go, of course," said Val, all his kindliness on the alert. "Who is it?" "A black sheep," answered the surgeon. "I don't know whether that will make any difference?" "It ought not," said Val rather warmly. "Black sheep have more need of help than white ones, when it comes to the last. I suppose it's a poacher wanting to clear his conscience." "It's Pike," said Hillary. "Pike! What can he want with me? Is he no better?" "He'll never be better in this world; and to speak the truth, I think it's time he left it. He'll be happier, poor fellow, let's hope, in another than he has been in this. Has it ever struck you, Lord Hartledon, that there was something strange about Pike, and his manner of coming here?" "Very strange indeed." "Well, Pike is not Pike, but another man--which I suppose you will say is Irish. But that he is so ill, and it would not be worth while for the law to take him, he might be in mortal fear of your seeing him, lest you betrayed him. He wanted you not to be informed until the last hour. I told him there was no fear." "I would not betray any living man, whatever his crime, for the whole world," returned Lord Hartledon; his voice so earnest as to amount to pain. And the surgeon looked at him; but there rose up in his remembrance how _he_ had been avoiding betrayal for years. "Who is he?" "Willy Gum."