"Good boy!" he said. "Excellent boy! He knows no more than he is told. His hands are clean, and he has friends upon the winning side who will not see him lose a chance, should a chance turn up. Be satisfied. Keep your hands clean if you like, boy. We understand one another." He laughed again and turned away; and, much as I dreaded and disliked him, there was something in the indomitable nature of the man which wrung from me a meed of admiration. Could the best of men have recovered more quickly from despair? Could the best of men, their plans failing, have begun to spin fresh webs with equal patience? Could the most courageous and faithful of those who have tried to work the world's bettering, have faced the downfall of their hopes with stouter hearts, with more genuine resignation? Bad as he was, he had courage and endurance beyond the common. He came back to me when he had gone a few paces. "Do you know where my sword is?" he asked in a matter-of-fact tone, as one might ask a question of an old comrade. I found it cast aside behind the door. He took it from me, grumbling over a nick in the edge, which he had caused by some desperate blow when he was seized. He fastened it on with an oath. I could not look at the sword without remembering how nearly he had taken my life with it. The recollection did not trouble him in the slightest. "Now farewell!" he said carelessly, "I am going to turn over a new leaf, and begin returning good for evil. Do you go to your friends and do your work, and I will go to my friends and do mine." Then with a nod he walked briskly away, and I heard him climb the ladder and depart. What was he going to do? I was so deeply amazed by the interview that I did not understand. I had thought him a wicked man, but I had not conceived the hardness of his nature. As I stood alone looking round the vault, I could hardly believe that I had met and spoken to my father, and told him I was his son--and this was all! I could hardly believe that he had gone away with this knowledge, unmoved and unrepentant; alike unwarned by the Providence which had used me to thwart his schemes, and untouched by the beneficence which had thrice held him back from the crime of killing me--ay, proof even against the long-suffering which had plucked him from the abyss and given him one more chance of repentance. I found Master Bertie in the stables waiting for me with some impatience. Of which, upon the whole, I was glad. For I had no wish to be closely questioned, and the account I gave him of the interview might at another time have seemed disjointed and incoherent. He listened to it, however, without remark; and his next words made it clear that he had other matters in his mind. "I do not know what to do about fetching the Duchess over," he said. "This news seems to be true, and she ought to be here." "Certainly," I agreed.