"Not in my eyes," said Bulstrode, stoutly. "--which I can never clear." Bulstrode made a dismissing gesture. "I should want the chap out there to know the truth." "The truth," caught his hearer, and the other as quickly interrupted: "To know under what circumstances I left my people." "No, that is unnecessary," said Bulstrode, firmly. "Nobody has any right to your past. I don't know his. That's the beauty of the plains--the freshness of them. It's a new start--a clean page." Still the guest hesitated. "I don't believe it's worth while. You see, I've batted about now so much alone, with nobody near me but the lowest sort; I've given in so long, with no care to do better, that I haven't any confidence in myself. I don't want you to see me fail, sir,--I don't want to go back on you." Bulstrode had heard very understandingly part of the man's word, part of his excuse for his weakness. "That's it," he said, musingly. "Butting about alone. It's that--loneliness--that's responsible for so many things." Looking up brightly as his friend whose derelict dangerous vessel, so near to port and repair, was heading for the wide seas again, Bulstrode wondered: "If such a thing could be that some friend, not too uncongenial, could be found to go with you and stand as it were by you--some friend who knew--who comprehended----" Waring laughed. "I haven't such a one." "Yes," said the older gentleman, "you have, and he will stand by you. I'll go West with you myself to-morrow--on Christmas day. I need a change. I want to get away for a little time." Waring drew back a step, for Bulstrode had risen. Cold Anglo-Saxon as he was, the unprecedented miracle this gentleman presented made him seem almost lunatic. He stared blankly. "It's simpler than it looks." Bulstrode attempted conventionally to shear it of a little of its eccentricity. "There's every reason why I should look after my property out there. I've never seen it at all." "I'm not worth such a goodness," Waring faltered, earnestly,--"not worth it." "You will be." "Don't hope it." "I believe it," smiled the gentleman; "and at all events I'll stand by you till you are--if you'll say the word." Waring, whose lips were trembling, repeated vaguely, "The _word_?" "Well," replied Bulstrode, "you might say those--they're as good any--will you stand by _me_----?" Making the first hearty spontaneous gesture he had shown, the young man seized the other's outstretched hand. "Yes," he breathed; "by Heaven! I will!" It was past midnight when Bulstrode, pushing open the curtains of his bedroom, looked out on the frozen world of Washington Square, where of tree and arch not an outline was visible under the disguising snow; and above, in the sky swept clear of clouds by the strongest of winds, rode the round full disk of the Christmas moon.