He silently thanked Heaven that had sent him there so opportunely to hear the conversation that was not intended for his ears. He lingered, hoping to hear more, but the lowering storm-clouds suddenly poured out a torrent of rain, and Jack, muttering a curse on the elements, arose and shut the cabin door. Donald Kayne, drenched to the skin, staggered away from the place, buffeted by the mad elements, but almost unconscious of it all in the excitement of his mind. He was thinking profoundly of all that he had heard, and muttered fiercely again: "I will tear down every stone at Gray Gables but what I will find my darling, and give her poor bones decent burial, so that at last she may rest in peace in her lonely grave." Heedless of the warring elements, and with his heart on fire with pain, he trudged on toward his hotel, not caring to claim the hospitality of Gray Gables in his present drenched condition. The secret he had just heard had given a new, remorseful impetus to his thoughts. They were painfully divided between Pepita dead and Nita living. What connection was there between the two women, and what wrong had Nita suffered at the hands of the old miser and Meg? Therein lay a mystery he longed to fathom. A great revulsion had come over him. He had persecuted Nita and avowed himself her enemy. He realized now that he had wronged an innocent, helpless girl by his cruelty and hasty judgment. How nobly she had behaved toward him. To no one had she confided the story of her imprisonment at Fortune's Bay; no one dreamed but that it was Jack Dineheart who had saved her life and brought her home. By her silence when revenge was in her power she had nobly punished her foe. "May Heaven help me to atone and win her pardon," he prayed. And at the earliest hour permissible on the morrow he went to the prison. To the last hour of his life he never forgot the thrill of pain at his heart when he first beheld Nita sitting in that dejected attitude with her dark head bowed so wearily, and her small hands folded in her lap. The serpent-ring still gleamed on her wasted finger; but it woke no anger in him now, only intense emotion. She rose mechanically at his entrance, but no smile lit up the sadness of her great dark eyes. She knew him only as her foe; she believed that he had come to exult over her misery. But just as he had knelt to her a year ago Donald Kayne knelt now, and bending his proud head, kissed the hem of her gray gown. "Nita--Miss Farnham--I crave your pardon for the past," he murmured humbly. She was so taken by surprise she could only stare at him with parted lips, from which there came no speech, and he continued: "I deserve no pity from you, I know, but my heart is torn with remorse for my fault, and the desire of my life is to prove my repentance for my sin. I hope, too, that I may be able to serve you in your undeserved trouble. Will you--can you pardon the past, and be my friend?"