“And shall we see him?” Mrs. Thornton asked again tensely.

“Why, I do not know,” Madison replied; “but at least we shall see his niece, Miss Vail, and it is with her in any case that we would have to discuss the plan, for the Patriarch, you know, is deaf and dumb and blind.”

“You know them, don’t you?” Thornton inquired.

Madison smiled, a little strangely, a little deprecatingly.

“If one can speak of ‘knowing’ such as they—­yes,” he answered.  “When I came two weeks ago, the Patriarch was not wholly blind, and he was very kind to me.  I learned to love the gentle soul of the man, and in a way, skeptical though I was, I felt his power—­but I never realized until this afternoon how stupendous, how immeasurable it was.”

“Let us go to the cottage, then,” said Thornton.  “Naida, dear, let me help you; it is quite a little distance and—­”

She put out her hands in a happy, intimate way to hold him off.

“You can’t realize it, Robert, can you?  That dear, practical business head of yours makes it even harder for you than it is for me—­and I can hardly realize it myself.  But I am cured, dear, and I’m well and strong, and I don’t need any help—­why, Robert, I am going to help you now, instead of always being a source of worry and anxiety to you.  Come, let us go.”

“If you will walk slowly,” suggested Madison, “I’ll speak to the little Holmes boy and his parents, and bring them with us.”

He moved away as he spoke—­in the direction of a racking cough, that rose above the confused, murmuring, whispering, shaken voices on every hand; and in a little knot of people he was, for a moment, pressed close against Pale Face Harry.

“All right,” whispered Pale Face Harry, “it’s in your pocket now—­but, say, no more runs like that for me, I’m all in.  I thought sure I was cured myself—­I hadn’t coughed for—­”

“Never mind about that now,” said Madison rapidly.  “I want the crowd kept away from the doors of the bank vault if they show any tendency to get too close, though I don’t think that’ll happen—­they’re too numbed and scared yet.  But you know the game.  Keep the awe going and the ’holy ground’ signs up.  Anybody that steps across that stretch between the trees and the cottage on and after the present date of writing does it with bowed head and his shoes off—­get the idea?”

Pale Face Harry grinned.

“That’s easy,” he said.  “Anything’d steer ’em now—­they’re like sheep.  Leave it to me to keep the soft pedal on.”

With a nod, Madison turned away, the tense expression on his face assumed again—­and presently he was talking to Mr. and Mrs. Holmes, and patting the boy’s head in a clumsy, overwrought way.

“I—­I don’t dar’st to go,” said Mrs. Holmes, clutching wildly at the boy, still sobbing, still beyond control of herself.

“But Mrs. Thornton is going,” said Madison gently, “and I know your gratitude is no less than hers—­it couldn’t be less with this little lad restored to you.  I am sure you want to show it—­don’t you?”