The right arm hung stiffened at his side, the left gesticulated wildly, pointing down the path and then to his mouth, out of one side of which came that weird and curious mumbling. Eugene shuddered; whatever else, there could be no _fear_ of this pitiable being--he stepped from behind the tree and moved forward. The figure continued to advance, dragging itself painfully along--as it seemed the left leg alone moving--and the eyes fixed on Eugene’s advancing form had an intense look of agonised appeal. There was no recognition in them, only an unasked question; the mouth mumbled, the man’s left hand alternately pointed down the path, and clutched the breast of his overcoat. It seemed to Eugene that the piteous searching in the eyes must pierce the covering which his buttoned coat formed over the lost bag, and with an involuntary movement he threw it open. The figure staggered, and with an inarticulate cry thrust out its hand for the bag. Eugene drew back--he must have time to think. His Uncle, a dim look of recognition struggling through the film of agonised entreaty, crouched almost double again before him. The drizzling mist shrouded the rest of the world, and these two figures stood alone. A thousand thoughts and feelings surged in the nephew’s mind. Gratified revenge, reluctant pity, and a growing railing at the fates. In a whirl of disgust he found that the thing he had in his heart to do was no longer in his power. Why had he lingered that minute to gloat over his revenge? Why turned his head as he was taking his road _to_ that revenge? A minute sooner, this miserable, crouching, smitten figure, with its dumb, despairing look, and its dumb, despairing voice, would not have been cringing in supplication before him. What had befallen the man, hale a few minutes before, did not trouble him; he was bitterly raging at the failure of his revenge, and disgusted with the stroke of fate which had caused it, tearing from him his fresh start in life. ‘If I could,’--he swung the bag doubtfully in his hand, and felt the gold in his pocket; ‘_if_ I only could,--but I can’t, and there’s an end of it. The old brute--he’s down, and I _can’t_ kick him.’ All feeling of pity for the miserable object before him was swallowed up in an amazing regret. He even cursed the training which caused him to feel the impossibility of that kick. ‘A good many of my late friends would have been on in this piece,’ he thought bitterly, ‘and glad of the chance.’ He plucked the bag from under his coat, and opening it, dropped the stones out one by one.