“Mrs. Minott has just told me the most extraordinary thing, Jack—­ an unbelievable story.  Is she quite sane?”

Jack scanned Peter’s face and read the truth.  Corinne had evidently told him everything.  This was the severest blow of all.

“She supposed you knew, sir;” answered Jack quietly, further concealment now being useless.

“Knew what?” Peter was staring at him with wide-open eyes.

“What she told you, sir,” faltered Jack.

The old man threw up his hands in horror.

“What!  You really mean to tell me, Jack, that Minott has been stealing?”

Jack bent his head and his eyes sought the floor.  He could hardly have been more ashamed had he himself been the culprit.

“God bless my soul!  From whom?”

“The church funds—­he was trustee.  The meeting is to-morrow, and it would all have come out.”

A great light broke over Peter—­as when a window is opened in a darkened room in which one has bees stumbling.

“And you have walked the streets trying to beggar yourself, not to help MacFarlane but to keep Minott out of jail!” Amazement had taken the place of horror.

“He was my friend, sir—­and there are Corinne and the little boy.  It is all over now.  I have the money—­that is, I have got something to raise it on.”

“Who gave it to you?” He was still groping, blinded by the revelations, his gray eyes staring at Jack, his voice trembling, beads of perspiration moistening his forehead.

“Isaac Cohen.  He has given me ten Government bonds.  They are in that drawer behind you.  He overheard what I said to you yesterday about wanting some money, and was waiting for me when I went downstairs.  He gave them to me because he loved you, he said.  I am to give him my ore property as security, although I told him it was of no value.”

Peter made a step forward, stretching out a hand as if to steady himself.  His face grew white then suddenly flushed.  His breath seemed to have left him.

“And Cohen did this!” he gasped—­“and you for Minott!  Why—­why—­”

Jack caught him in his arms, thinking he was about to fall.

“No!  No!  I’m all right,” he cried, patting Jack’s shoulder.  “It’s you!—­you—­you, my splendid boy!  Oh!—­how I love you!”

CHAPTER XXXI

The following morning Jack walked into Arthur Breen’s private office while his uncle was reading his mail, and laid the package containing the ten bonds on his desk.  So far as their borrowing capacity was concerned, he could have walked up the marble steps of any broker’s office or bank on either side of the street—­that is, wherever he was known, and he was still remembered by many of them—­thrust the package through the cashier’s window, and walked down again with a certified check for their face value in his pocket.