It's breaking her tender heart to see me misery staring her in the face, and I'll put it out of her sight." "Is it Ruth ?" asked the judge.
Sandy assented with bowed head.
The judge got up and stood before the fire.
"Didn't you know," he began as kindly as he could put it, "that you were not in her--that is, that she was not of your--" Sandy lifted blazing eyes, hot with the passion of youth.
"If she'd been in heaven and I'd been in hell, I'd have stretched out my arms to her still!" Something in his eyes, in his voice, in his intensity, brought the judge to his side.
"How long has this thing been going on ?" he asked seriously.
"Four years!" "Before you came here ?" "Yes." "You followed her here ?" "Yes." Whereupon the judge gave vent to the one profane word in his vocabulary.
Then Sandy, having confided so far, made a clean breast of it, breaking down at the end when he tried to describe Ruth's goodness and the sorrow his misery had caused her.
When it was over the judge had hold of his hand and was bestowing large, indiscriminate pats upon his head and shoulders.
"It's hard luck, Sandy; hard luck.

But you must brace up, boy.
Everybody wants something in the world he can't get.

We all go under, sooner or later, with some wish ungratified.

Now I've always wanted--" he pressed his fingers on his lips for a moment, then went on--"the one thing I've wanted was a son.

It seemed to me there was nothing else in the world would make up to me for that lack.