“You have life before you, too, Mr. Tyler.  You are not so very old.  You’re not much more than seventy.”

“I’m seventy-two.  But come, let me see if I can get up with your help.  I want you to take me home, so you can go for Sydney.  He’s a good boy, you say, one I can trust?” The old man looked in Roy’s face closely as the latter bent over him.

“Sydney is the best fellow that ever lived,” replied Roy soberly.  “He’s been a staff to my mother ever since father died, and has almost taken his place to us children.”

“Yes, yes.  I’ve heard that what your father did for him years ago was like bread cast upon the waters that’s coming back after many days.  Let me see, how old are you?”

“Fifteen.  I tell you what, Mr. Tyler.  The girls are down under the bridge.  Wait a minute till I call down to them to send Syd over as soon as he comes.  Then I’ll go home with you and needn’t leave you.”

“All right.  You’re very good to me, Roy Pell.”  The miser sank back on the grass, while Roy hurried to the edge of the bluff and making a trumpet of his hands, called down: 

“Eva!  Jess!”

“Yes, are you all right, Roy?” came back the answer in Eva’s tones.

“All O. K., but Mr. Tyler’s a little done up.  I’m going home with him.  And he wants you to send Syd over as soon as he gets back.  It’s some business matter, quite important, and we may both be late for tea.  Don’t wait.  Do you understand?”

“Yes, all right.  We’ll go to meet Syd now.  Shall we send the doctor, too?”

Roy thought a minute.

“Yes.  I think you’d better,” he called down.

“I told them to send the doctor to your house,” he reported to Mr. Tyler.  He half expected the latter to raise a protest, but he didn’t.

“All right,” he said feebly.  “He’ll do for one of the witnesses.  Now.”

Roy bent down so that the old man might lean on his shoulder.  He put one arm about his back to steady him, and thus supported he was able to move slowly along the cinder path beside the track.

“What did you attempt to walk across the trestle for, Mr. Tyler?” asked Roy.

“I made up my mind suddenly to go to town,” was the answer.  “There wasn’t time to go around by the turnpike.  I thought I could get across before the train came.  I’ve seen boys go over it.”

“But you’re not a boy,” rejoined Roy, with a smile.

“No.  I’m not a boy,” and Roy could feel a shudder pass through the arm that was resting on his shoulder.

Mr. Tyler lived in a house not far from the Burdock station.  An old woman did the cooking for him and went home at night.  For the rest he dwelt almost like a hermit, and so far as any one knew he had not a relative in the world.  But the report had gone out as it always does in such cases, that he was very rich, and now his desire to see a lawyer and make a will convinced Roy that for once rumor must be right.