Sir Gordon's voice sounded strange, and something wonderfully like a sob was heard. Then, for some time they paced on round and round the square, glancing at the illumined window-blind, both longing to be back in the pleasant little room. And now the same feeling that had troubled Bayle seemed to have made its way into Sir Gordon's breast. The little home, with its tokens of feminine taste and traces of mother and daughter everywhere, had grown to be so delightful an oasis in his desert life that he looked with dismay at the chance of losing it for ever. He knew nothing yet, but that home seemed to be gliding away. He had not heard the letter read, but a strange horror of what it might contain made him shudder for what he knew; and as the future began to paint terrors without end, he suddenly nipped the arm of his silent, thoughtful companion. "There! there!" he said, "we are thinking about ourselves, man." "No," said Bayle, in a deep, sad voice, "I was thinking about them." "It's my belief," said Sir Gordon, half angrily, "that you have gone on all these years past thinking about them. But come! We must act. Tell me about the letter. Do you say he wrote to you?" "Yes." "But why to you? He must have hated you with all his heart." "I believe he did," replied Bayle. "Even my love for his child was a grievance to him." "And yet he wrote to you, enclosing the letter to his wife." "I suppose he felt that I should not forsake them in their distress; and that whatever changes might have taken place my whereabouts would be known--a clergyman being easily traced. See!" He took another letter from his pocket, and stopped beneath a gas-lamp. "No, no, I cannot read it by this light; tell me what he says," exclaimed Sir Gordon. "The letter is directed to me at King's Castor, and above the direction Hallam has written, `If Rev Christie Bayle has left King's Castor, the postal authorities are requested to find his address from the Clerical Directory.' The people at Castor of course knew my address, and sent it on." "Yes, I see. Well, well, what does he say?" Bayle read, in a calm, clear voice, the following letter: "Prison, Nulla Nulla,-- "Port Jackson, Australia,-- "December 9th, 18--. "Sir,-- "You and I were never friends, and in my trouble perhaps you were harder on me than you need have been. But I always believed you to be a true gentleman, and that you liked my wife and child. I can trust no one else but a clergyman, being a convict; but your profession must make you ready, like our chaplain here, to hear all our troubles, so I write to ask you to help me by placing the letter enclosed in my wife's hands, and in none other's. It is for her sight alone. "I cannot offer to reward you for doing me this service, but I ask you to do a good turn to a suffering man, who has gone through a deal since you saw him.