“I had a little plan, sir—­but you might not fall in with it.  It would, perhaps, be only temporary, but it is all I can think of.  I had an applicant this morning—­in fact it came within an hour after I had heard the news.  It seemed almost providential, sir.”

St. George was facing the door, ready to leave the house, his shoulders still bent forward so that Todd could adjust his heavy cloak the better, when for the first time the anxious tone in Pawson’s voice caught his attention.  As the words fell from the attorney’s lips he straightened, and Todd stepped back, the garment still in the darky’s hands.

“An applicant for what?” he inquired in a graver tone.  He was not surprised—­nothing surprised him in these days—­he was only curious.

“For the rooms you occupy.  I can get enough for them, sir, not only to clear up the back interest, but to keep the mortgage alive and—­”

St. George’s face paled as the full meaning of Pawson’s proposal dawned in his mind.  That was the last thing he had expected.

“Turn me into the street, eh?” There was a note of pained surprise in his voice.

“I don’t want you to put it that way, sir.”  His heart really bled for him—­it was all he could do to control himself.

“How the devil else can I put it?”

“Well, I thought you might want to do a little shooting, sir.”

“Shooting!  What with?  One of Gadgem’s guns?  Hire it of him, eh, and steal the powder and shot!” he cried savagely.

“Yes—­if you saw fit, sir.  Gadgem, I am sure, would be most willing, and you can always get plenty of ammunition.  Anyway, you might pass a few months with your kinsfolk on the Eastern Shore, whether you hunted or not; it did you so much good before.  The winter here is always wearing, sloppy and wet.  I’ve heard you say so repeatedly.”  He had not taken his eyes from his face; he knew this was St. George’s final stage, and he knew too that he would never again enter the home he loved; but this last he could not tell him outright.  He would rather have cut his right hand off than tell him at all.  Being even the humblest instrument in the exiling of a man like St. George Wilmot Temple was in itself a torture.

“And when do you want me to quit?” he said calmly.  “I suppose I can evacuate like an officer and a gentleman and carry my side-arms with me—­my father’s cane, for instance, that I can neither sell nor pawn, and a case of razors which are past sharpening?” and his smile broadened as the humor of the thing stole over him.

“Well, sir, it ought to be done,” continued Pawson in his most serious tone, ignoring the sacrifice—­(there was nothing funny in the situation to the attorney)—­“well—­I should say—­right away.  To-morrow, perhaps.  This news of Gorsuch has come very sudden, you know.  If I can show him that the new tenant has moved in already he might wait until his first month’s rent was paid.  You see that—­”