"Thank you, my boy!" His voice broke on the words. "When even a square and clean man gets to my age he begins to realize that the world is a bigger creditor of his than he had figured in the past," he went on, after a pause. "In the last few months I have had some bills presented to me that have found me a miserable bankrupt in spite of what my vault holds. You know what my debts are. Linus Lane was right when he told me that my kind of currency couldn't pay those debts. The dead have gone, leaving me their debtor; the living hold me their debtor still. My boy, when I realize what I owe and how useless that stuff is in there"--he shook his hand at the open door of the vault--"I loathe my money! You know what I owe to one child, and you have brought me word that I can never pay her. You know just as well what I owe to another child--I have taken from her most of her faith and love and happiness. Thank God, I can pay that debt in part, and I know the human heart well enough now to understand that I shall be paying the greater part." He left Wade abruptly, and walked to the window and looked down into the street. He beckoned to the young man without turning his head. Wade, coming to his side, saw Elva Barrett's pony phaeton. "I told my creditor to come here, and you see she is prompt," said Barrett, with a wistful smile. "She has accepted what I offer in settlement of my debt, and I offer you my hand, and tell you, with all the earnestness of my soul, that since I have come to realize values I approve my creditor's judgment. I have agreed to pay promptly on demand. Don't keep her waiting." He pushed his "collateral" out into the corridor, and shut the door behind him. Wade ran down the stairway, his hat in his hand, and came upon the sidewalk into the glare of the June sunshine. She was there! The silk of the phaeton's parasol strained a soft and tender light upon her face, and her glorious eyes received him, coming towards her, as though into an embrace. He swayed a little as he crossed the sidewalk, for his eyes swam. And before he reached her he turned and cast one look back at the great building behind him. He seemed to want to reassure himself about something--to see solid bricks and stone--to convince himself that it was not a fairy palace in which he had so amazingly and suddenly found the full fruition of all his hopes. "What have they been doing to you in the ogres' den, Dwight, boy?" she asked, a ripple of laughter in her voice. "I--I don't know!" he stammered. "It all happened so suddenly. Take me away, sweetheart, where I can see a tree. I want to find my bearings once more!" The pony trotted away demurely--so demurely that the girl surrendered one hand to him, and he held it tight-clutched between them, wordless, a mist in his eyes. "Then it did astonish you, after all?" she ventured, breaking the silence. For reply he pressed her hand. She was first to speak again.