Page 272 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

out the sea, it seemed to him that the letters had shaped
themselves at his very feet,
GOOD MR. DAWES.
‘Good Mr. Dawes’! What a frightful reproach there was
to him in that simple sentence! What a world of cowardice,
baseness, and cruelty, had not those eleven letters opened to
him! He heard the voice of the child who had nursed him,
calling on him to save her. He saw her at that instant stand-
ing between him and the boat, as she had stood when she
held out to him the loaf, on the night of his return to the
settlement.
He staggered to the cavern, and, seizing the sleeping
Frere by the arm, shook him violently. ‘Awake! awake!’ he
cried, ‘and let us leave this place!’ Frere, starting to his feet,
looked at the white face and bloodshot eyes of the wretch-
ed man before him with blunt astonishment. ‘What’s the
matter with you, man?’ he said. ‘You look as if you’d seen
a ghost!’
At the sound of his voice Rufus Dawes gave a long sigh,
and drew his hand across his eyes.
‘Come, Sylvia!’ shouted Frere. ‘It’s time to get up. I am
ready to go!’
The sacrifice was complete. The convict turned away, and
two great glistening tears rolled down his rugged face, and
fell upon the sand.

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