The way of the transgressor is hard, and indeed, none felt this more keenly than Jim Collins, the only survivor of the Collins-Clayton feud. Forced to flee with, but a hurried farewell to Mary and the baby, the marked man had remained in hiding for four years. Then, prevailed upon by the pleadings of his sick wife, he ventured home only to be captured almost upon the threshold of his cabin. Beyond the closed door, Mary Collins lay dying, while little Regina was being given to Colonel and Mrs. Clark for adoption. Fifteen years passed; Jim Collins had become a trusty in the prison, while his daughter, now known as Regina Clark, had refused her various suitors, among them, the family lawyer, Victor Mills, for the jolly young Lieutenant Walter Warren. Hoping to obtain some valuable information for a case which was to be re-opened, Victor called at the State Prison. Here, he was taken in charge of by a trusty and later turned over to a guard. As the lawyer returned to the office, however, he discovered that his hat and coat were missing; for Jim Collins, taking advantage of the warden’s absence from the room, had slipped them on and made good his escape. Two months elapsed, then, as Mills passed a small country story, he came face to face with Jim Collins, the trusty who had shown him around, and later gotten away with the aid of his coat. Mills’ first impulse was to inform the authorities; then a picture of Regina and the successful Lieutenant, arose in his mind. He knew that the girl was adopted and that her father might still be alive. Now, if this convict could be made to represent himself as her father, he believed that Lieutenant Warren would hastily withdraw. Hurriedly following Jim to his cabin, the lawyer gave the wretched man his choice, and as a result, the next day found them at Colonel Clark’s home breaking the news to that unhappy family. Reluctantly, Jim forced himself to read the letter Regina’s mother had left for her husband, only to find that it had been written by his own wife, imploring him to keep their child in ignorance of his past. Glancing at his weeping daughter, the father realized that Mary had spoken wisely, crossing quietly to the table, Jim wrote: “am not your father. I have lied to you.” Then with one last look at the girl, he stole silently from the room, and ere sundown presented himself at the warden’s office, content to finish out his prison term rather than disobey his dying wife’s commands.