McAllister followed the keeper down the narrow gangway that ran around the prison. In the stone corridor below a great iron stove glowed red-hot, and its fumes rose and mingled with the tainted air that floated out from every cell. Above him rose tier on tier, illuminated only by the gray light which filtered through a grimy window at one end of the prison. The arrangement of cells, the "bridges" that joined the tiers, and the murky atmosphere, heightened the resemblance to the "'tween decks" of an enormous slaver, bearing them all away to some distant port of servitude. "Get up there, Jake! Here's a bunkie for you." McAllister bent his head and entered. He was standing beside a two-story cot bed, in a compartment about six by eight feet square. A faint light came from a narrow, horizontal slit in the rear wall. A faucet with tin basin completed the contents of the room. On the top bunk lay a man's soiled coat and waistcoat, the feet of the owner being discernible below. The keeper locked the door and departed, while the occupant of the berth, rolling lazily over, peered up at the new-comer; then he sprang from the cot. "Mr. McAllister!" he whispered hoarsely. It was Wilkins--the old Wilkins, in spite of a new light-brown beard. For a few moments neither spoke. "Sorry to see you 'ere, sir," said Wilkins at length, in his old respectful tones. "Won't you sit down, sir?" McAllister seated himself upon the bed automatically. "You here, Wilkins?" he managed to say. Wilkins laughed rather bitterly. "I've been in stir a good part of the time since I left you, sir; an' two weeks ago I pleaded guilty to larceny and was sentenced to one year more. But I'm glad to see you lookin' so well, if you'll pardon me, sir." "I'm sorry for you, Wilkins," the master managed to reply. "I hope my severity in that matter of the pin did not bring you to this!" Wilkins hesitated for a moment. "It ain't your fault, sir. I was born crooked, I fancy, sir. It's all right. You've got troubles of your own. Only--you'll excuse me, sir--I never suspected anything when I was in your service." McAllister did not grasp the meaning of this remark; he only felt relief that Wilkins apparently bore him no ill-will. Very few of his friends would have followed up a theft of that sort. They expected their men to steal their pins. "Mebbe I might 'elp you. Wot's the charge, sir?" With his former valet as a sympathetic listener, McAllister poured out his whole story, omitting nothing, and, as he finished, leaned forward, searching eagerly the other's face. "Now, what shall I do? What shall I do, Wilkins?" The latter coughed deprecatingly. "You'll pardon me, but that'll never go, sir! You'll have to get somethin' better than that, sir. The jury will never believe it." McAllister sprang to his feet, in so doing knocking his head against the iron support of the upper cot. "How dare you, Wilkins! What do you mean?"