"I am going to give up the false that has been thrust upon me, for the good that I have flung away," he answered. "I shall work until I have paid back all my mother's money and my father's money, and my little sister's money. Would to God I could pay them for the aching backs, the stiff fingers, and the tortured souls. I shall try. And if when I have tried, I find that, after all, it has been of no avail, that these debts can never be paid, perhaps I shall come back. Good-bye."
He held out his hand. He felt hers cold in his palm.
"Will you forgive me?" he asked simply,—"I should not have—I should not have cared for you. It was wrong. Forgive me——"
"There is nothing to forgive," she said, quite firmly. He drew away his hand then and hers fell limp at her side.
She stood motionless and watched his figure as it swung up the street.
Her heart bade her lips call out to him. But the million voices of the night bade her heart be still. And then, even as she watched, where he was, there was he not, but only blackness.
THE OLD PROFESSOR