"Dr. King, if I tell him just what you've said; that you think you made a mistake, and you think I am not to be trusted;--if I tell him myself, and he consents to let me keep him, will you interfere?" William reflected heavily. "He won't consent," he said; "he'll know I wouldn't say a thing like that without reason. But if he does, I shall be silent." There was a despairing finality in his words. They were at her own gate now; she leaned her head down on it, and he heard a pitiful sound. William King's lips were dry, and when he spoke the effort made his throat ache. What he said was only the repetition of his duty as he saw it. "I'd rather lose my right hand than make you suffer. But I've no choice. I've no choice!" And when she did not answer, he added his ultimatum. "I'll have to tell Dr. Lavendar on Sunday, unless you will just let me settle it all for you by saying that you don't want David any long--" _"Not want David!"_ "I mean, that you've decided you won't keep him any longer. I'll find a good home for him, Mrs. Richie," he ended in a shaking voice. She gave him one look of terror; then opened the gate and shut it quickly in his face, drawing the bolt with trembling fingers. As she flew up the path, he saw her for an instant as she crossed a patch of moonlight; then the darkness hid her. CHAPTER XXX It was incredible to David as he thought it over afterwards, but he actually slept away that wonderful night on the railroad! When he climbed on to the shutting-up shelf behind red and green striped curtains, nothing had been further from his mind than sleep. It was his intention to sit bolt upright and watch the lamps swinging in the aisle, to crane his neck over the top of the curtains and look out of the small hinged window at the smoke all thick with sparks from the locomotive engine, and at the mountains with the stars hanging over them, and--at the Horseshoe Curve! But instead of seeing all these wonders that he and Dr. Lavendar had talked about for the last few weeks, no sooner had he been lifted into his berth than, in a flash, the darkness changed to bright daylight. Yes; the dull, common, every-night affair of sleep, had interfered with all his plans. He did not speak of his disappointment the next morning, as he dressed--somehow--in the jostling, swaying little enclosure where the washstands were; but he thought about it, resentfully. Sleep! "When I'm a man, I'll never sleep," he assured himself; then cheered up as he realized that absence from Sarah had brought at least one opportunity of manhood--he would not have to wash behind his ears! But he brooded over his helplessness to make up for that other loss. He was so silent at breakfast in the station that Dr. Lavendar thought he did not like his food. "You can have something else, David. What do you want?" "Ice-cream," David said, instantly alert.