“Thank you ever and ever so much, fellows. It’s better that I do not go. The world forgets good deeds quickly. It never forgets bad ones. Mine were bad. I was a jailbird once. No one who ever knew it will ever forget it. My appearance in New York would bring shame to my sister and her children, if she has any. God alone knows how I long to see them! The news of who and what I was would spread among their friends--even their new friends--and they would be shunned and made miserable because of me. No, it’s my punishment. I must not go.” Amesbury had again assumed his good-natured, whimsical attitude when they went below to breakfast, and chaffed and joked the boys as usual. Presently Ahmik appeared, to accompany them to the railway station. “Come back hunt some more,” Ahmik invited, as the train rolled into the station. “Miss you very much.” “We owe you so much,” said Paul, as he shook Amesbury’s hand. “I don’t know what we’d have done if you hadn’t picked us up.” “I’ll never be forgettin’ you, an’ how rare kind you were,” declared Dan. “You chaps owe me nothing,” insisted Amesbury. “The debt’s all the other way. You earned your keep, made some money for me, and made a few weeks of my life very pleasant.” Paul and Dan ran to the platform of the rear car as the train drew out of the station, and had a last fleeting glimpse of Amesbury standing there gazing after them, a look of wistful longing in his eyes. CHAPTER XXI BAD NEWS AND GOOD When John Densmore returned home after meeting Remington, he broke the news of Paul’s supposed death to the boy’s mother as gently as he could. She sat dry-eyed and mute, staring at him during the recital as though not fully comprehending the purport of his words. Densmore drew her to him and kissed her forehead. “Mother! Mother!” he soothed, “bear up! It’s a dreadful calamity, but we shall have to bear it!” She fainted in his arms, and for several weeks was very ill. Even when she was again able to be about she was constantly under the care of a physician, and trained nurses remained with her night and day. The shock had left her in a state of nervous melancholia. She had always deprecated Remington’s proclivities for hunting and out-of-door sports. Now she felt very bitterly toward him, repeatedly asserting that he was directly responsible for Paul’s loss, at the same time upbraiding herself unceasingly for having permitted Paul to take part in the expedition.