“Look!” she exclaimed in a low voice. “Is it not Mr. Macneillie?” Ralph’s heart beat fast as he glanced at the approaching figure. Had their incessant thought of him conjured up a sort of vision of the actor? Or was it indeed himself? Nearer approach answered the question plainly enough. It was undoubtedly Macneillie, but there was something in his ghastly face which struck terror into the boy’s heart, it reminded him of that awful shadow of death which he had seen stealing over his father on that last never-to-be-forgotten day. Apparently quite unconscious of their presence, Macneillie passed by, but in a minute Ralph, to the amazement of Fraulein Ellerbeck and Evereld, had rushed back and overtaken him. “I beg your pardon,” he said, panting a little; “but I am the boy you saved the other day in St. James’ Park. And--and please will you take this knife as a remembrance.” He thrust into Macneillie’s hand a little old-fashioned silver fruit knife which had belonged to his father. The actor evidently dragged himself back with an effort to the world of realities. He looked in a puzzled way at the boy and at the embossed handle of the knife. “You are very good,” he said in a perplexed tone. “Yes, yes, I remember you now--you and your boat. But I don’t like to take your knife away from you.” “But, indeed, I never use it; I always eat peel and all,” said Ralph with an earnestness which brought a smile to Macneillie’s face. “We went to see you as _Hamlet_, and you were splendid! Please take it. You don’t know how awfully I like you.” Macneillie’s eyes gave him a kindly glance and his cold fingers closed over the boy’s small hot hand in a hearty grip. “Then I will certainly use it,” he said. “It shall travel in my pocket for the rest of my life. But only on condition that you take this. Don’t get into mischief with it.” And with a smile he put into his hand a clasp-knife, and while Ralph was still lost in admiration of the longest and sharpest blade he had ever seen, Macneillie passed rapidly on and disappeared among the trees. “Oh, Ralph, how delightful!” cried Evereld, as the boy rejoined them. “How could you be so brave as to go up and speak to him?” “I’m awfully glad he took the fruit knife,” said Ralph. “But I wish he hadn’t given me this. It’s such a beauty and I had done nothing for him.” “Perhaps you had,” said Fraulein Ellerbeck, thoughtfully. “The unseen and unrealised help is often the most real help of all.” CHAPTER V “_The recognition of his rights therefore, the justice he requires of our hands or our thoughts, is the recognition of that which the person, in his inmost nature, really is; and as sympathy alone can discover that which really is in matters of feeling and thought, true justice is in its essence a finer knowledge through love._” “_Appreciations,_” Walter Pater.