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“I found it–the easier, quick way in; a year ago I found it.”

“Was it near the other entrance?”

Grassette shook his head. “A mile away.”

“If the man is alive–and we think he is–you are the only person that can save him. I have telegraphed the Government. They do not promise, but they will reprieve, and save your life if you find the man.”

“Alive or dead?”

“Alive or dead, for the act would be the same. I have an order to take you to the Gulch, if you will go; and I am sure that you will have your life if you do it. I will promise–ah, yes, Grassette, but it shall be so! Public opinion will demand it. You will do it?”

“To go free–altogether?“

“Well, but if your life is saved, Grassette?”

The dark face flushed, then grew almost repulsive again in its sullenness.

“Life–and this, in prison, shut in year after year! To do always what some one else wills, to be a slave to a warder! To have men like that over me that have been a boss of men–wasn’t it that drove me to kill?–to be treated like dirt! And to go on with this, while outside there is free life, and to go where you will at your own price–no! What do I care for life? What is it to me! To live like this–ah, I would break my head against these stone walls, I would choke myself with my own hands! If I stayed here, I would kill again–I would kill–kill!”

“Then to go free altogether–that would be the wish of all the world, if you save this man’s life, if it can be saved. Will you not take the chance? We all have to die some time or other, Grassette, some sooner, some later; and when you go, will you not want to take to God in your hands a life saved for a life taken? Have you forgotten God, Grassette? We used to remember Him in the Church of St. Francis down there at home.”

There was a moment’s silence, in which Grassette’s head was thrust forward, his eyes staring into space. The old Seigneur had touched a vulnerable corner in his nature.

Presently he said in a low voice: “To be free altogether!… What is his name? Who is he?”

“His name is Bignold,” the Governor answered. He turned to the Sheriff inquiringly. “That is it, is it not?” he asked, in English, again.

“James Tarran Bignold,” answered the Sheriff.

The effect of these words upon Grassette was remarkable. His body appeared to stiffen, his face became rigid, he stared at the Governor blankly, appalled; the color left his face, and his mouth opened with a curious and revolting grimace. The others drew back, startled, and watched him.

“Sang de Dieu!” he murmured at last, with a sudden gesture of misery and rage.

Then the Governor understood: he remembered that the name just given by the Sheriff and himself was the name of the Englishman who had carried off Grassette’s wife years ago. He stepped forward and was about to speak, but changed his mind. He would leave it all to Grassette; he would not let the Sheriff know the truth, unless Grassette himself disclosed the situation. He looked at Grassette with a look of poignant pity and interest combined. In his own placid life he had never had any tragic happening, his blood had run coolly, his days had been blessed by an urbane fate; such scenes as this were but a spectacle to him; there was no answering chord of human suffering in his own breast to make him realize what Grassette was undergoing now; but he had read widely, he had been an acute observer of the world and its happenings, and he had a natural human sympathy which had made many a man and woman eternally grateful to him.

What would Grassette do? It was a problem which had no precedent, and the solution would be a revelation of the human mind and heart. What would the man do?