Gilhooly's course intersected the Baigol highway and he turned into it, roaring defiantly as he sped along. Suddenly he stumbled and fell, and a cry of dismay escaped me.
He had fallen squarely on the exchequer and wrecked it completely!
Kyzicks—yellow coins the size of a gold dollar and worth five times as much—rolled, everywhere about the road, diverging from a heap that lay revealed by the collapsed walls of the building. Flinging forward, I went to my knees and began plunging my hands into the pile.
I believe that just then I was as daft as Gilhooly himself. In those days the glimmer of gold always had a demoralizing effect on me.
As I raked my outspread fingers through the yellow pile I brought up a round, jet-black stone the size of my fist. I regarded it as a bit of chaff in the bin of wealth and hurled it from me down the road. With a loud yell, Gilhooly leaped after it.
Then I became aware of a weird and inexplicable feeling that laid itself like an axe at the root of my professional instinct. What right had I to all this treasure? It belonged to the king of Baigall; he was an unworthy creature, perhaps, but still it belonged to him. What had I been about to do? My heart sickened and I sprang up, spurned the kyzicks with my heel and turned my back.
That was my awakening. In one instant the iron of repentance had pierced my soul. The past rolled its turgid waters in front of me. I shivered and drew back from that wave of evil, covering my eyes to blot it from my sight.
How should I atone for the days that had been? Could I do it by an unflinching rectitude in the days there were to be? Conscience was belaboring me with telling blows. I had not been on intimate terms with my conscience for many years, and to have it thus suddenly overmaster me and drive me into reformation was a mystery beyond my power to explain.
While I stood there consumed with regret and hoping against hope for the future, a voice hailed me from down the road.
"Did you say your name was Munn?"