“We’ve often wondered, sir,” added Old Matt, “how you’ve stood it here, an educated man like you. I reckon, though, there’s somethin’ deep under it all, keepin’ you up; somethin’ that ignorant folks, without no education, like us, can’t understand.” The old scholar could have cried aloud, but he was forced to sit dumb while the other continued, “You’re goin’ won’t make no difference, though, with what you’ve done. This neighborhood won’t never go back to what it was before you come. It can’t with all you’ve taught us, and with Sammy stayin’ here to keep it up. It’ll be mighty hard, though, to have you go; it sure will, Mr. Howitt.” Looking up, the shepherd said quietly, “I expect to live here until the end if you will let me. But I fear you will not want me to stay when you know what I’ve come to tell you this evening.” The mountaineer straightened his huge form as he returned, “Dad, there ain’t nothin’ on earth or in hell could change what we think of you, and we don’t want to hear nothin’ about you that you don’t like to tell us. We ain’t a carin’ what sent you to the hills. We’re takin’ you for what you are. And there ain’t nothin’ can change that.” “Not even if it should be the grave under the pine yonder?” asked the other in a low voice. Old Matt looked at him in a half frightened way, as though, without knowing why, he feared what the shepherd would say next. Mr. Howitt felt the look and hesitated. He was like one on a desperate mission in the heart of an enemy’s country, feeling his way. Was the strong man’s passion really tame? Or was his fury only sleeping, waiting to destroy the one who should wake it? Who could tell? The old scholar looked away to Dewey Bald for strength. “Mr. Matthews,” he said, “you once told me a story. It was here on this porch when I first came to you. It was a sad tale of a great crime. To-night I know the other side of that story. I’ve come to tell you.” At the strange words, Aunt Mollie’s face turned as white as her apron. Old Matt grasped the arms of his chair, as though he would crush the wood, as he said shortly, “Go on.” At the tone of his voice, the old shepherd’s heart sank. CHAPTER XLI. THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY. With a prayer in his heart for the boy who lay dying in that strange underground chamber, the artist’s father began. “It is the story, Mr. Matthews, of a man and his only son, the last of their family. With them will perish—has perished one of the oldest and proudest names in our country. “From his childhood this man was taught the honored traditions of his people, and, thus trained in pride of ancestry, grew up to believe that the supreme things of life are what his kind call education, refinement, and culture. In his shallow egotism, he came to measure all life by the standards of his people.