“’Tina’s great-grandson must not hang himself. That would be heredity with a vengeance,” he said, laughing an unnatural laugh. “Only Inez knows it, and my whole life shall be devoted to convincing her of my repentance,” he thought, as he left the stable. There was a grain of comfort in this, and the future did not look quite so dark as he went back to the house and sat down with Tom, who neither moved nor looked up at him as he came in. He, too, was thinking of the future and the past; of Ridgefield and his happy boyhood there; of Mrs. Taylor’s teachings, which, although occasionally emphasized with a box, had lodged in his memory, and were repeating themselves over and over in his brain. But beyond all this was a thought of Alice, who had been so kind to him,—who had defended him against Mrs. Tracy, saying there was no harm in him and she would trust him anywhere. “What would she think of me now, all smirched and stained as I am? Would she speak to me as she did that morning when we gathered the pond lilies and she smoothed my hair?” he thought, and his hand went up to his head to the spot where Alice’s hand had rested so long ago. “I can feel it yet,” he said to himself. “It kept me then from mischief; it shall help me now.” Then he thought of Inez. She was lost to him so far as the life he had hoped for was concerned. He might in time learn to live without her, but he could not live and see her cold and hard towards him as she had been that morning. “I would rather die,” he thought, “than know she would never again look upon me except with hatred and distrust.” Had he been in the stable and seen the halter which had suggested suicidal thoughts to Mark there might have been a tragedy added to that day’s doings. But the halter was out of sight and Tom wrestled with his remorse, which, to do him justice, did not arise alone from the fact that Inez knew and despised him. He was genuinely sorry and could not understand how he had become what he was. In his nature there was enough of hopefulness for a rebound from the depths of despair if he saw a ray of light, and after sitting for more than an hour in perfect silence he arose and going up to Mr. Hilton said, “If we were in a boat that was sinking, we’d get out of it, if we could. Let’s do so now. We have been on the down track and touched the bottom. Let’s try the upward slope. Let us _be_ what the world thinks we are,—honorable, upright men. I have helped to pull you down. I will try to help you up, and maybe——I don’t think I ought to take His name on my lips, but you know whom I mean, and He, perhaps, will help us. I used to learn a lot about Him in the Sunday School in Ridgefield, and it is coming back to me now. What do you say? Shall we strike hands on a new deal? No one knows but ourselves and Inez. She will not tell. We shall carry the burden of our secret always, but maybe it will grow lighter in time.”