She looked at him when she had ended, and Gilbert could not help seeing that the telling of it had hurt her almost as much as it had hurt him. And how it had stung him! Martin starving in a mining camp while he spent his money on roses and theater tickets for Rosalie Lane! Martin, sick, poor, and struggling to make a home for the woman he loved, while he--the man he had made--spent all upon his own pleasures and ambitions! He was aghast at the far-reaching power of his fault. He had selfishly neglected a man away off in the Klondyke, and had hurt a frail little woman at his door, whom every instinct of his manhood called upon him to protect. His sorrowful-eyed accuser was looking at him, in the eager hope that he might deny the charge. But he did not attempt the smallest palliation. He scorned to make the paltry plea that, at the eleventh hour, he had paid the debt of so many years' standing. As if he could ever pay Martin! "I must, at least, thank you for your candor," he said at last, a little unsteadily. Her eyes grew dark with disappointment. Her suspicions had been only too well founded, then! She spoke no word of blame, there was no righteous indignation in her face, only a cutting disappointment; and there Gilbert felt the greater sting. He had not offended her personally, it seemed; he had merely fallen wofully short of her standard. There was no more to be said. He bade her a courteous good-evening, and she turned slowly and passed up the hill, while he followed the path down the stream. One of old Hughie Cameron's philosophic remarks, which he had heard one evening on the milk-stand, was sounding in his ears: "The Almighty would be laying his bounds about every one of us--the bounds of His righteous laws. We may be dodging them on one side, oh, yes; but they will be catching us up on the other." The girl climbed slowly up the bank. Her head was bent, and could Gilbert have seen her face he would not have been quite so sure that his shortcoming was to her such an entirely impersonal affair. With her usual self-effacement, she made a brave attempt to put aside her grief. She had promised to spend this last evening with Arabella, and she must be cheerful and comforting. As she neared Mrs. Munn's house, Davy and Tim were sitting on the sidewalk before the gate, talking so volubly that they did not notice her approach. "Yessir," Mr. Munn was saying, in a voice muffled by a mouthful of chewing-gum, "they're goin' to do that thing--what d'ye call it when two folks that's sparkin' run away?" "Elope," said the orphan, from the depths of a profound experience of the world. "Yes, elope. Don't you ever tell, Tim; but I bet that's what Jeannie an' me'll do some day; only I wish she wasn't such an awful girl to laugh!" He sighed deeply, and the orphan grunted disgustedly. "Aw, g'wan, ye silly duck! Say! le's set up all night an' watch. They'll be goin' 'fore daylight, I bet----"