"But surely, Mr. Lavirotte," said the merchant, "anything I may have said or done would not be a sufficient excuse for your committing so terrible a crime as making away with an old man who had never done you any serious injury. I may have said violent, unjustifiable things; I own I have. But I said them in heat and in ignorance. You can understand that I spoke under tremendous excitement, and in the belief that you had, without provocation, assailed my son, and that you had, for no reason known to me, promised me aid in my great trial and forsaken me in the moment of peril." "Then, sir, am I to assume that you hold me at my word, and that you believe when I attacked your son I was suffering under extreme excitement and not responsible for my actions?" "I believe what you say." "And that when I promised to help you out of the money I made certain I was about to receive, I was sincere?" "That," said the old man, with some hesitancy, "is a question I am not yet qualified to answer." "Will you, sir, say that you are now as open to believe I was in good faith when I promised to help you as you were to believe I had committed an unprovoked assault upon your son when you came in here?" "I see no reason why I should not say so." "Then, sir, we may take it that we have arrived at the end of what might have been a fatal talk. Let us put an end to any further chances of fatality thus." He cocked the revolver, placed the butt of the weapon on the floor, held the barrel in his left hand, and placing the heel of his right foot on the hammer, he tore it out from its place, and flung the weapon on the table, saying: "Now, sir, a child may play with it in safety." The old man rose up in supreme relief, and said: "I have often thought hard things of you. I shall never think them again. When I came in I believed I had matters all my own way, and that I should shoot you like a dog. I had the merciless intention of shooting you as you were. You then got the upper hand of me and had me at your mercy. I cannot now but believe all you have told me. Will you shake hands?" "Very gladly indeed," said Lavirotte, with the tears in his eyes. "This is one of the happiest moments of my life. Now it is only fair I should tell you upon what I grounded my hopes of being able to help you." Lavirotte told James O'Donnell the whole history of the treasure and St. Prisca's Tower. When it was over, the old man said: "Why, in the name of goodness, did you not get twenty men to dig instead of risking both your lives in such a silly way?" "We did not wish that anyone beyond ourselves should know. We did not want to share our good luck with the Crown." "There was no need to share your luck with the Crown. The law of Treasure Trove has lately been altered." "Good Heavens!" cried Lavirotte. "To think it is so, and that poor old Crawford should have lived all his life and died the death he did, without knowing this!" CHAPTER XII.