But again Richard shook his head, shuddering inwardly at the thought that the old woman might recognize him and be tempted by the standing reward for escaped prisoners to give him again into captivity. He would find some other way, he said, and talked of the fishing in the Sound. When the old man's pipe was smoked out they went to bed, and in spite of that haunting scene beside the wind-swept graves, Richard slept profoundly through the night hours. Waking before the old couple in the gray morning, he crept down from the loft, and raking together the coals upon the hearth, he breakfasted on the remains of last night's supper, then stole out into the wet and sombre world. How sweet it was to breathe the early air and feel the earth beneath his feet, and have the weeds and underbrush rap him about the knees as he pushed away to the interior! The fisherman's hut was a league behind him when he saw the east redden with the rising sun, for the besom of the storm had swept the heavens clear. What a wonderful light threaded the woods and glorified the tree-tops, sparkling and changing with every motion of the boughs! Often he had seen it among his native Carolina hills, this opaline opening of the morn, but never before with such a thrill of appreciation, such a rush of exquisite joy. "Good morning, Joscelyn; I am a free man to-day." And he bowed as though he had been in a ball-room, and picking a bit of blossom that nodded at him, he stuck it jauntily in his ragged coat. If it had not been for that dead face playing hide-and-seek always among the bushes about him, he could have whistled as he walked. Now and then he sighted houses and cultivated fields, but he kept to the woods; not until he reached the sea on the other side of the island would he venture to show his face at a door. There were wild grapes in the thickets and sweet beach mass to eat; and a little past noon he found a late melon in the weeds of a fence corner, and feasted like a lord.