Briggs watched the old man with pity that this once trim and active man should have faded to so bloodless a shadow of his former self. Close-shaven the doctor still was, and not without a certain neatness in his dress, despite its poverty; but his bent shoulders, his baggy skin, the blinking of his eyes all told the tragedy of life that fades.
With a pathetic moistening of the eyes, the doctor spoke of this inevitable decay; and with a heartfelt wish that death might have laid its summons on him while still in active service, turned to a few words of explanation as to how he had come to have news again of Captain Briggs.
Chance had brought him word of the captain. A new attendant at the home had mentioned the name Briggs; and memories had stirred, and questions had very soon brought out the fact that it was really Captain Alpheus Briggs, who now was living at South Endicutt. The attendant had told him something more—and here the doctor hesitated, feeling for words.
“Yes, yes, I understand,” said Briggs. “You needn’t be afraid to speak it right out. It’s true, doctor. I _have_ changed. God knows I’ve suffered enough, these long years, trying to forget what kind of a man I started out to be; trying to forget, and not always able to. If repentance and trying to sail a straight course now can wipe out that score, maybe it’s partly gone. I hope so, anyhow; I’ve done my best—no man can do more than that, now, can he?”
“I don’t see how he can,” answered the doctor slowly.
“He can’t,” said the captain with conviction. “Of course I can’t give back the lives I took, but so far as I’ve been able, I’ve made restitution of all the money I came by wrongfully. What I couldn’t give back directly I’ve handed over to charity.
“My undoing,” he went on, then paused, irresolute. “My great misfortune—was—”
“Well, what?” asked Filhiol. And through his glasses, which seemed to make his eyes so strangely big and questioning, he peered at Captain Briggs.
The captain clenched his right fist, and turned it to and fro, studying it with rueful attention.
“My undoing was the fact that nature gave me brute strength,” said he. “Those were hard, bad days, and I had a hard, bad fist; and together with the hot blood in me, and the Old Nick, things went pretty far. Lots of the things I did were needless, cruel, and beyond all condemnation. If I could only get a little of the guilt and sorrow off my mind, that would be something.”