Honor ran across Figueroa Street between flashing headlights on automobiles, and her heart was soft within her. _Poor_ old Cartie! How he must have grieved and reproached himself, and how seriously he must have taken it, to tell his mother! Fancy not forgiving people! Her stepfather had marked a passage for her in her pocket "R. L. S."... "The man who cannot forgive any mortal thing is a green hand in life," Stevenson had said. Honor believed him. She could even forgive James King, poor, proud, miserable James King, for failing Jimsy. It was because he cared so much. As she started up her own walk some one called to her from the steps of the King house. "That you, Honor?" "Yes, Doctor! I just came home to-day. How are you?" She ran over to shake hands with him. "Is Mr. King very sick?" "He's dying." "Oh, Doctor _Deering_!" "Yes. No mistake about it this time. Wants to see you. Old nigger woman told him you were home. Will you come now?" "Of course." She followed him into the house and up the long, shabbily carpeted stairs. She had never seen a dying person and she began to shiver. As if he read her thought the doctor spoke. "Isn't going to die while you're here. Not for a week--perhaps two weeks. But he'll never be up again." His voice was gruff and his brow was furrowed. He had been with Jeanie King when Jimsy was born and when she died, and he had cherished and scorned James King for long years. There was a chair beside the bed and Honor seated herself there in silence. Presently the sick man opened his eyes and his worn and ravaged look of his son caught at her heart. "So," he said somberly, "you came home." "Yes, Mr. King. I came because Jimsy was in trouble, and to-morrow I'm going to him." His eyes widened and slow, difficult color came into his sharply boned face. "You're going ... to Mexico?" "Yes; alone." The color crept up and up until it reached the graying hair, crisply waved, like Jimsy's. "No King woman ever ... held harder ... than that!" he gasped. "You're a good girl, Honor Carmody. They knew ... what to ... name you, didn't they?" She leaned nearer, holding her hand so that the rays of the night light fell on the ring. "Didn't you know I'd 'hold hard' when you let Jimsy give me this?" He hauled himself up on an elbow and stared at it with tragic eyes. "Jeanie wore it five years.... My mother wore it thirty.... Honor Carmody, you're a good girl.... You make me ... ashamed.... Tell the boy that ... I'm sorry ... that letter. Bring him back ... in time...." He fell back, limp, gasping, and the doctor signaled to the girl to go. As she was slipping through the door the sick man spoke again, querulously. "Damn that mocking-bird ... make somebody shoot him!... There was one singing when Jimsy was born ... and when Jeanie went ... and this one now, mocking, mocking...."