"Don't think about your heart," she implored, "and don't shake so! Just think that you're going to Lafe and Peg."

Then they began their long, perilous journey to the corner of the building. It must have taken twenty minutes. Jinnie had no means by which to mark the time. She only knew how difficult it was to keep the blind child moving, with the water below bellowing its stormy way down the rock-hill to the lake. Happy Pete gave a weird little cry now and then. But on and on they went, and at the corner Jinnie spoke:

"Bobbie, we've got to turn here. Let your body go just as I shove it."

Limp was no word for Bobbie's body. He was dreadfully tired. His heart thumped under Jinnie's arms like a battering-ram.

"Bobbie, don't breathe that way, don't!" she entreated.

"I can't help it, honey! my side hurts," he whispered. "But I'll go where you take me, Jinnie dear."

The girl turned him carefully around the sharp ledge corner, and they went on again. Her arms seemed almost paralyzed, but they clung to the child ahead, and the child ahead clung to the little dog, who hung very straight and inert in front of his body.

When they reached the south corner, Jinnie explained their next move to Bobbie in this way:

"Now listen," she told him. "You get on my back with your legs under my arms, hang to me like dear life, and keep Happy Pete between us. Don't hurt him if you can help it."

They were within touch of one of the dangling ropes and far below Jinnie saw the swaying plank to which it was fastened. Once on that board, she could get to the ground.

Then she continued: "Now while I lean over, you get on my back."

As she guided his slender hands, she felt them cold within her own, but in obedience to her command, Bobbie put his legs about her, one arm around her neck, and with the other held Happy Pete.

"We won't fall, will we, Jinnie?" quavered the boy.

"No," said Jinnie, helping to settle him on her back.

Then she crawled closer to the rope, took up her skirt and placed it about the rough hemp. She was afraid to use her bare hands. The rope might cut and burn them so dreadfully that she'd have to let go. With a wild inward prayer, she swung off into the air, with the boy, the dog and the fiddle on her back, and began her downward slide. She counted the windows as they passed, one, two, three, and then four. Only a little distance more before she would be upon firm ground. As her feet touched the plank, she glanced into the street and in that awful moment saw Jordan Morse crossing the corner diagonally, within but a few yards of where she stood, terrified.



CHAPTER XLVII

BOBBIE'S STARS RENEW THEIR SHINING

Jinnie stood rooted to the spot, the burden on her back bearing heavily upon her. She scarcely dared breathe, but kept her startled eyes upon the advancing man. Her uncle was walking with his head down. As he approached the building, a terrible shiver passed over the blind boy.

"The black man's comin'!" he shuddered. "I hear——"

"Hush!" whispered Jinnie, and Bobbie dropped his head and remained quiet.

The girl's heart was thumping almost as fast as his.

In the oppressive silence she heard Bobbie's faint whisper: "Our—our Father who art in Heaven," and her own lips murmured: "He has given his angels charge over thee."

Without raising his eyes, Jordan Morse sprang to the steps and entered the door.

Jinnie turned her head and almost mechanically watched him disappear. Then she took one long, sobbing breath.

"Bobbie, Bobbie," she panted, "get down quick!"

The boy slid to the plank, dropping Happy Pete.

Jinnie grasped the child's cold hand in hers, and they ran rapidly to a thick clump of trees. Once out of sight of the building, she picked up the little dog and sank down, clutching Bobbie close to her heart.

The beginning of the second day of Lafe's trial brought a large crowd to the courthouse. All the evidence thus far given had been against him, but he sat in his wheelchair, looking quietly from under his shaggy brows, and never once, with all that was said against him, did the sweet, benevolent expression change to anger. The cobbler had put his life into higher hands than those in the courtroom, and he feared not.

After the morning session, Jordan Morse left the room with a satisfied smile. He walked rapidly to the streetcar and took a seat, with a thoughtful expression on his countenance. Lafe would be convicted, and he would get rid of the girl now shut away from the world in the gorge building. Then, with the money that would be his, he'd find his child,—the little boy who was his own and for whom he so longed. He often looked at Molly and wondered how she could smile so radiantly when she knew she had lost her child,—her own flesh and blood,—her own little son.

Even after he left the car and was approaching the gorge, he worried about the two in the house. It was because his mind was bent on important plans that he did not see Jinnie swinging in the sunshine between heaven and earth. He climbed the stairs, framing a sentence for the girl's benefit. As he unlocked the door, the silence of the room bore down upon him like an evil thing. He went hurriedly into the second room, only to find it also empty. For the moment he did not notice the shattered glass on the floor, and his heart sank within him, but the breeze that drifted to his face brought his eyes to the broken window. With an oath, he jumped to it and looked out. Far below, the water tumbled as of yore over the rocks. He strained horrified eyes for a glimpse of a human body. The girl and boy must have dropped together into the deep abyss, preferring death to uncertainty. They were gone—gone over the ragged rocks, where their bodies would be lost in some of the fathomless juts a mile beyond. He would never be bothered with Jinnie again. Then he turned from the window. His most terrifying obstacle was out of his way. The blind child did not concern him. He was but a feather in the wind,—the little fellow who always shrank from him.

As if leaving a tomb, he went softly from the room and turned the key in the lock with a sigh. Jinnie had relieved him of an awful responsibility. At least fate had taken from his hands a detestable task, at which he had many a time recoiled. So far all of his enemies, with the exception of Theodore King, had one by one been taken away, and he swung himself out of the building with a great burden lifted from his shoulders.

As he passed, Jinnie was still drawing long breaths under the thick bushes, Bobbie's face against her breast, and it was not until she was sure Morse had gone that she ventured to speak.

"We're going to Lafe and Peg, Bobbie," she said. "Can you walk a long way?"

"Yes," gurgled Bobbie, color flaming his face. "My legs'll go faster'n anything."

And "faster'n anything" those thin little legs did go. The boy trotted along beside his friend, down the hill to the flats. Jinnie chose a back street leading to the lower end of the town.

"I'd better carry you a while, dearie," she offered presently, noting with what difficulty he breathed. "You take the fiddle!" And without remonstrance from the boy she lifted him in her arms.

From the tracks Lafe's small house had the appearance of being unoccupied. Jinnie went in, walking from the shop to the kitchen, where she called "Peggy!" two or three times. Then the thought of the cobbler's trial rushed over her. Peggy and the baby were at court with Lafe, of course.

Knowing she must face her uncle in the courtroom, she went to Lafe's black box and drew forth the sealed letter her father had sent to Grandoken. This she hid in her dress, and taking Bobbie and the fiddle, she went out and closed the door.

Another long walk brought them to the courthouse, which stood in solemn stone silence, with one side to the dark, iron-barred jail. Jinnie shivered when she thought of the weary months Lafe had sat within his gloomy cell.

She entered the building, holding Bobbie's hand. Every seat in the room was filled, and a man was making a speech, using the names of Maudlin Bates and Lafe Grandoken.

Then she looked about once more, craning her neck to catch sight of those ahead. Her eyes fell first upon Lafe, God bless him! There he sat, her cobbler, in the same old wheelchair, wearing that look of benign patience so familiar to her. Only a little distance from him sat Peggy, the baby sleeping on her knees. Molly the Merry was seated next to Jordan Morse, whose large white hand nervously clutched the back of the woman's chair.

Several stern-looking men at a table had numerous papers over which they were bending. Then Jinnie's gaze found Jasper Bates. She could see, by the look upon his face, that he was suffering. She felt sorry, sorry for any one who was in trouble, who had lost a son in such a manner as Jasper had. Then she awoke to the import of the lawyer's words.

"Before you, Gentlemen of the Jury," he was saying, "is a murderer, a Jew, Lafe Grandoken. You know very well the reputation of the people on Paradise Road. The good book says 'a life for a life.' This Jew shot and killed his neighbor——"

Jinnie lost his next words. She was looking at Lafe, and saw his dear face grow white with stabbing anguish. The girl's throat filled with sobs, and she suddenly remembered something Theodore had once said to her.

"If you want anything, child, just play for it."

And she wanted the life of her cobbler, the man who had taken her, with such generosity, into his heart and meagre home. She slipped the fiddle from the case and stooped and whispered in Bobbie's ear:

"Grab the back of my dress, dearie, and don't let go!"

She moved into the aisle, making ready to start on her life mission. She lifted the bow, and with a long sweep, drew an intense minor note from the strings. A sea of faces swung in her direction. Jinnie forgot every one but the cobbler—she was playing for his life—improvising on the fiddle strings a wild, pleading, imploring melody. On and on she went, with Blind Bobbie, in trembling confusion, clinging to her skirts, and Happy Pete with sagging head at their heels. At the first sound of the fiddle Lafe tried to rise, and did rise. He stood for a moment on his shaking legs, and there, to the amazement of the gaping crowd of his townsfolk, he swayed to and fro, watching and listening as the wonderful music filled and thrilled through the room.

A heavenly light shone on the wrinkled face.

Jordan Morse got to his feet, chalk white. Molly the Merry was looking at Jinnie as if she saw a ghost.

The onlookers saw Lafe's unsteady steps as he tottered toward the lovely girl and blind child. When he was within touching distance, she put the instrument and bow under one arm and took Lafe's hand in hers. Her voice rang out like the tone of a bell.

"I've come for you, Lafe. I've come to take you back."

Then Molly's eyes dropped from Jinnie to the boy, and a cry broke from her. Before her was the child for whom, in spite of the evidence of her smiling lips, she had truly mourned. The wan, blind face was turned upward, the golden hair lying in damp curls on the lovely head. Spontaneously the woman reached forward and took the little hand in hers. All the mother within her leaped up, like a brilliant flash of lightning.

"My baby!" was all she said; and Bobbie, white, trembling and palpitating, cried in a weird, high voice:

"I've found my mother!"

Then Jordan Morse understood. The hot blood was tearing to his ear drums. The blind boy he had persecuted and tortured, the boy he had made suffer, was his own son. That wonderful quality in the man, the fatherhood within him, rose in surging insistence. Instant remorse attacked him, as an oak is attacked by fierce winter storms. He saw the boy's angelic face grow the color of death; saw Molly the Merry gather him up. Then a stab of jealousy cut his heart like a knife. He bent over with set jaws.

"Give him to me," he cried. "He's mine!"

Molly surrendered the child with reluctance, but terror and fright were depicted upon Bobbie's face.

"Jinnie! Lafe! Peggy!" he screamed. "He'll hurt me! The black man's goin' to kill me! Jinnie, pretty Jinnie——"

The passionate voice grew faint and ceased. Then the loving little heart burst in the boyish bosom, and Bobbie's angels bore away his young soul to another world where blindness is not,—where his uplifted being would understand that the stars he'd loved,—the stars he'd gathered in his small, unseeing head,—were but a reflection of those in God's firmament. With one final quiver he straightened out in his father's arms and was silent. All his loves and sorrows were in the eternal yesterdays, and to-day had delivered him into the charge of Lafe's angels.

Jinnie was crying hysterically, and her father's dying curse upon her uncle leapt into her mind. She was clinging to the cobbler, and both had moved to Peg, where the woman sat as if turned to stone.

Not a person in the courtroom stirred. In consternation the jury sat in their chairs like graven images, taking in the freshly wrought tragedy with tense expressions. The judge, too, leaned forward in his chair, watching.

Jordan Morse faced the room, with its silent, observant crowd, pressing to his breast the dead body of his child. Then he turned to Lafe, white, twitching, and suffering.

"I shot Maudlin Bates," he said, haltingly; then turning to the jury he continued: "The cobbler's an innocent man——"

A menacing groan fell from a hundred lips at his words.

He deliberately took from his hip pocket a revolver, lifted the weapon and finished:

"I'm—I'm sorry, Jinnie, I'm——"

Then came the sharp, short bark of the gun, and the bullet found a path to his brain. He staggered, frantically clutching the slender body of Bobbie closer—and toppled over.



CHAPTER XLVIII

FOR BOBBIE'S SAKE

Lafe's homecoming was one of solemn rejoicing. The only shadow hanging over the happy family was the absence of Blind Bobbie, who now lay by the side of his dead father.

After the first greetings, Lafe took his boy baby and pressed him gratefully to his heart.

"He's beautiful, Peggy dear, ain't he?" he implored, drinking in with affectionate, fatherly eyes the rosy little face. "Wife darlin', make a long story short an' tell me he's beautiful."

Mrs. Grandoken eyed her husband sternly.

"Lafe," she admonished, "you're as full of brag as a egg is of meat, and salt won't save you. All your life you've boasted till I thought the world'd come to an end, an' I ain't never said a word against it. Now you can't teach me none of your bad habits, because I won't learn 'em, so don't try." She paused, her lips lifting a little at the corners, and went on: "But I'm tellin' you with my own lips there ain't a beautifuller baby in this county'n this little feller, nor one half so beautiful! So there's my mind, sir."

"'Tis so, dear," murmured the cobbler, rejoicing.

About five o'clock in the afternoon, while Peggy was uptown replenishing the slender larder and Lafe and Jinnie were alone with the baby, there came a timid knock.

Jinnie went to the door and there stood Molly Merriweather. The woman's face was white and drawn, her eyes darkly circled underneath.

One glance at her and Jinnie lost her own color.

"I want to speak with you just a moment," the woman said beseechingly. "May I come in?"

Without answering, Jinnie backed into the room, which action Molly took as a signal to enter.

She inclined her head haughtily to the cobbler.

"Would you mind if I spoke to Miss Grandoken alone?"

Lafe looked to Jinnie for acquiescence.

"If Jinnie'll help me to the kitchen," he replied, "you can talk here. I'm a little unsteady on my feet yet, miss!"

It took some time for the tottering legs to bear him away, but the strong, confident girl helped him most patiently.

"You might just slip me the baby, Jinnie," said Lafe, after he was seated in the kitchen. "I could be lookin' at 'im while you're talkin'. You ain't mindin' the woman, honey lass, be you?"

"No, dear," answered Jinnie.

This done, the girl returned to Molly, who stood at the window staring out upon the tracks. She turned quickly, and Jinnie noticed her eyes were full of tears.

"I suppose you won't refuse to tell me something of my—my little boy?" she pleaded.

Tears welled over Jinnie's lids too. Bobbie's presence and adoration were still fresh in her mind.

"He's dead," she mourned. "My little Bobbie! Poor little hurt Bobbie!"

Molly made a passionate gesture with her gloved hands.

"Don't, please don't say those things! I'm so miserable I can't think of him. I only wanted to know how you got him."

"I just found him," stated Jinnie. Then, because Molly looked so white, she forgot the anguish the woman had caused her, and rehearsed the story of Bobbie's life from the time she had discovered him on the hill.

"I guess he was always unhappy till he came to us."

"And I helped to hurt him," cried Molly, shivering.

"But you didn't know he was yours," soothed Jinnie.

The woman shook her head.

"No, of course I didn't know," she replied, and then went on rapidly:

"I was so young when I married your uncle, I didn't know anything. When I lost my baby, I knew no way to search for him."

"Won't you sit down?" Jinnie had forgotten that they were both standing. "Sit in that little rocker; it's Bobbie's," she finished.

Molly looked at the little chair and turned away.

"Lafe bought it for him," Jinnie explained eagerly. "He was too sick with his heart to get around much like other boys."

Miss Merriweather wrung her hands.

"Don't tell me any more," she begged piteously. "He's dead and nothing can help him now. I've—something else to say to you." Jinnie wiped her eyes.

"Mr. King is quite well now, and——"

"Oh, I'm glad!" cried Jinnie. "Does he—he ever speak of me?"

Molly shook her head mutely.

"I don't want him to see you!" she cried, her eyes growing hard and bright.

"Why?" Jinnie said the one word in bewilderment.

"He doesn't know yet what Jordan and I did to you, nor about—about—Bobbie. I don't want him to, either, just yet. I fear if he does, he won't care for me."

Jinnie's eyes drew down at the corners.

"Of course he wouldn't if he knew," she said, with tightly gripped fingers.

Molly paid no heed to this, but went on rapidly:

"Well, first, you don't love him as I do——"

"I love him very much," interjected Jinnie, "and he used to love me."

The woman's lips drew linelike over her teeth.

"But you see he doesn't any longer," she got out, "and if you go away——"

"Go away?" gasped Jinnie.

"Yes, from Bellaire. You won't stay here, now that you're rich." She threw a contemptuous glance about the shop. Jinnie caught the inflection of the cutting voice and noted the expression in the dark eyes.

"I'll stay wherever Lafe and Peggy are," she said stubbornly.

"Perhaps, but that doesn't say you're going to live in this street all your life.... I want you to go back to Mottville."

Jinnie still looked a cold, silent refusal.

Molly grew even whiter than before, but remembering Jinnie's kindly heart, she turned her tactics.

"I'm very miserable," she wept, "and I love Theodore better than any one in the world."

"So do I," sighed Jinnie, bowing her head.

"But he doesn't love you, child, and he does love me."

Jinnie's eyes fixed their gaze steadily on the other woman.

"Then why're you afraid for him to see me?" she demanded.

Molly got to her feet. She saw her flimsily constructed love world shattered by the girl before her. She knew Theodore still loved her, and that if he knew all her own wickedness, his devotion would increase a hundredfold. He must not see Jinnie! Jinnie must not see him! Rapidly she reviewed the quarrels she and Theodore had had, remembered how punctiliously he always carried out his honorable intentions, and then—Molly went very near the girl, staring at her with terror in her eyes.

"Jinnie," she said softly, "pretty Jinnie!"

Those words were Bobbie's last earthly appeal to her, and Jinnie's face blanched in recollection.

"Didn't you love my baby?" Molly hurried on.

A memory of fluttering fingers traveling over her face left Jinnie's heart cold. Next to Lafe and Theodore she had loved Bobbie best.

"I loved him, oh, very much indeed!" she whispered.

"And he often told you he loved—his—his—mother?"

"Yes."

Molly was slowly drawing the girl's hands into hers.

"He'd want me to be happy, Jinnie dear. Oh, please let me have the only little happiness left me!"

Jinnie drew away, almost hypnotized.

"I can't be a—a good woman unless I have Theodore," Molly moaned. "You're very young——"

Her eyes sought the girl's, who was struggling to her feet.

"For Bobbie's sake, Jinnie, for—for——"

Jinnie brought to mind the blind boy, his winsome ways, his desire for his beautiful mother, her own love for Theodore, and turning away, said with a groan:

"I want Theodore to be happy, and I want you to be happy, too, for—for Bobbie's sake. I—I promise not to see him, but I'll always believe he loves me—that—that——"

"You're a good girl," interrupted Molly with a sigh of relief.

Jinnie went to the door.

"Go now," she said, with proudly lifted head, "and I hope I'll never see you again as long as I live."

Then Molly went away, and for a long time the girl stood, with her back to the door, weeping out the sorrow of a torn young soul. She had promised to give up Theodore completely. She had lost her love, her friend, her sweetheart. Once more she had surrendered to Bobbie Grandoken the best she had to give.

Later, when the cobbler and his wife were crooning over their little son, Jinnie, with breaking heart, decided she would leave Bellaire at once, as Molly had asked her. She must never think of Theodore again. She'd renounced him, firmly believing he still loved her; she'd promised to depart without seeing him, but surely, oh, a little farewell note, with the assurances of her gratitude, would not be breaking that promise.

So, until Peggy carried the baby away to bed, the girl composed a letter to Theodore, pathetic in its terseness. She also wrote to Molly, telling her she had decided to go back to Mottville immediately.

When she had finished the letters, she took her usual place on the stool at the cobbler's feet.

"Lafe," she ventured, wearily, "some time I'm going to tell you everything that's happened since I last saw you, but not to-night!"

"Whenever you're ready, honey," acquiesced Lafe.

"And I've been thinking of something else, dear. I want to go to Mottville."

Lafe's face paled.

"I don't see how Peg an' me'll live without you, Jinnie."

Jinnie touched the hand smoothing her curls.

"I couldn't live without you either, Lafe, and I won't try——"

The cobbler bent and kissed her.

"I won't try, dear," she repeated. "You must all live with me, although I'll go first to arrange things a little. We'll never worry about money any more, dearest."

"And Mr. King," Lafe faltered, quite disturbed, "what about him?"

"I shan't ever see him again," Jinnie stated sadly. "I've just written him, and he'll understand."

Lafe knew by the finality of her tones that she did not care to discuss Theodore that night.



CHAPTER XLIX

BACK HOME

Late the next afternoon Jinnie left the train at Mottville station, her fiddle box in one hand, and a suitcase in the other. She stood a moment watching the train as it disappeared. It had carried her from the man she loved, brought her away from Bellaire, the city of her hopes. One bitter fact reared itself above all others. The world of which Theodore King had been the integral part was dead to her. What was she to do without him, without Bobbie to pet and love? But a feeling of thanksgiving pervaded her when she remembered she still had Lafe's smile, the baby to croon over, and dear, stoical Peggy. They would live with her in the old home. It was preferable to staying in Bellaire, where her heart would be tortured daily. Rather the brooding hills, the singing pines, and all the wildness of nature, which was akin to the struggle within her, and perhaps in the future she might gather up the broken threads of her life.

She shook as if attacked with ague as she came within sight of the gaunt farmhouse, and the broken windows and hanging doors gave her a sense of everlasting decay.

Below her in the valley lay the blue lake, a shining spread of water, quiet and silent, here and there upon it the shadow of a floating, fluffy cloud. She listened to the nagging chatter of the squirrels, mingled with the fluttering of the forest birds high above her head. As she stood on the hill, the only human being in all the wilderness about, in fancy she seemed to be at the very top of the world.

She heard the old familiar voices of the mourning pines, and remembered their soothing magic, and a stinging reproach swept over her at the thought of her forgetfulness of them. They had been friends when no other friends were near. Along with the flood of memories came Matty's ghastly ghost stories and her past belief that her mother's spirit hovered near her.

She went through the lane leading to the house and paused under the trees. Presently she placed her violin box and suitcase on the grass and lay down beside them. In the eaves of the house a dove cooed his late afternoon love to his mate, and Jinnie, because she was very young and very much in love, brought Theodore before her with that lingering retrospection that takes possession in such sensuous moments. She could feel again the hot tremor of his hands as they clung to hers, and she bent her head in shame at the acute, electrifying sensations. He belonged to another woman; he no longer belonged to her. She must conquer her love for him, and at that moment every desire to study, every thought of work seemed insipid and useless. The whole majestic beauty of the scene, her sudden coming into a great deal of money, did not add to her happiness. She would gladly give it all up to be again with her loves of yesterday. But that could not be! The future lay in a hard, straight line before her. She was striving against a ceaseless, resisting force,—the force of her whole passionate nature.

With their usual reluctance, the things of night at length crept forth. Jinnie felt some of them as they touched her hands, her face, and moved on. One of the countless birds fluttered low, as if frightened at the advancing dark, brushed her cheek, then winged on and up and was lost in the tree above her. Somewhere deep in the gloom shrouding the little graveyard came the ghostly flutter of an owl.

Jinnie was flat on her back, and how long she lay thus she could never afterward remember, but it was until the stars appeared and the moon formed queer fantastic pictures, like frost upon a window pane. In solemn review passed the days,—from that awful night when she had left her father dead upon the floor in the house nearby to the present moment. She glanced at the windows. They looked back at her like square, darkening eyes.

She wondered dully how that wee star away off there could blink so peacefully in its nightly course when just below it beat a heart that hurt like hers. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, long black fingers were drawing dark pictures across the sky. A drop of rain fell upon her face, but still she did not move. Then, like rows of soldiers, the low clouds drew slowly together, and the stars softly wept themselves out.

Suddenly, from the other side of the lake, the thunder rolled up, and with the distant boom came the thought of Lafe's infinite faith, and the memory fell upon Jinnie like a benediction from God's dark sky.

She arose from the grass, took the fiddle box and bag, and walked to the porch. She went in through the broken door. It was dark, too dark to see much, and from the leather case she took a box of matches and a candle. Memories crowded down upon her thick and fast. In the kitchen, which was bare, she could mark the place where Matty used to sit and where her own chair had been.

The long stairs that led from the basement to the upper floor yawned black in the gloom. Candle and fiddle in hand, Jinnie mounted them and halted before the unopened door. Somehow it seemed as if she would find before the grate the long, thin body of her dead father, and she distinctly remembered the spindle fire-flames falling in golden yellow licks upon his face. In her imagination she could again see the flake-like ashes, thrown out from the smoldering fire, rise grey to the ceiling, then descend silently over him like a pale shroud.

After this hesitation, she slowly turned the handle of the door and walked in. The only things remaining in the room were a broken table and chair. She placed the violin on the floor and the candle on the table. Then with a shudder Jinnie drew from her blouse an unopened letter, studying it long in the flickering light. It had been written in this very room three years before, and within its sealed pages lay the whole secret which now none but the dead knew.

It took no effort on her part to bring back to her memory Jordan Morse's handsome face and his rock-grey eyes, eyes like Bobbie's. He and Bobbie had gone away together. She touched the corner of the envelope to the candle, watching it roll over in a brown curl as it burned.

"He's happy now," she murmured. "He's got his baby and Lafe's angels."

Then she gathered up the handful of ashes, opened the window, and threw them out. The hands of the night wind snatched them as they fell and carried them swiftly away through the rain.

On her way to the attic stairs, she stood a minute before the window, awe-stricken. From the north the great storm was advancing, and from among the hills rolled the distant roar of thunder. It brought to her mind the night when Peggy had gone into the life-valley and brought back Lafe's baby; and she remembered, too, with a sob, Blind Bobbie, and how she missed him. Ah, it was a lonely, haunted little spirit that crept up the dark narrow stairs to the garret!

Only that the room seemed lower and more stuffy, it, too, was much the same as she had left it. She brushed aside some silvery cobwebs, raised the window, and sat down on a dilapidated trunk. On the floor at her feet, almost covered with dust, was the old fairy book about the famous kings. She picked it up mechanically. On the first page was the man in the red suit, with the overhanging nose and fat body,—he whom she at one time believed to be related to Theodore.

Again she was overwhelmed with her misery. Theodore belonged to another woman, and Jinnie, alone with her past and an uncertain future, sat staring dry-eyed into the stormy night.



CHAPTER L

"GOD MADE YOU MINE"

"I haven't seen any papers for three days, Molly. What's become of them all?"

Theodore and Molly were sitting in the waning sunshine, the many-colored autumn leaves drifting silently past them to form a varied carpet over the grass.

All fear had now left the woman. She had Jinnie's promise not to see Theodore, and he had apparently forgotten there ever was such a girl in the world.

"I'd really like to see the papers," repeated Theodore. "Dear me, how glad I am to be so well!"

"We're all glad," whispered Molly, with bright eyes.

She had kept the papers from him purposely, playfully pretending she would rather give him an account of the court proceedings. When she described how another man had confessed to the shooting, Theodore felt a glad thrill that the cobbler was exonerated. Later Molly decided she would tell him about Morse, but never that she had married him. It was she who suggested, after a time of silence:

"Theodore, don't you think a little trip would do us all good? Your mother's been so worried over you——"

"Where would we go?" he asked, without interest.

"Anywhere to get away from Bellaire for a season."

"We might consider it," he replied reluctantly. Then he fell to thinking of a blue-eyed girl, of the letter,—that puzzling letter she had sent him. When he could bear his thoughts no longer, he got up and walked away under the trees, and Molly allowed him to go. She watched him strolling slowly, and was happy. He had been so sweet, so kindly, almost thrilling to her of late. She would make him love her. It would be but a matter of a few weeks if she could get him away from Bellaire. Just at that moment Mrs. King's bell rang, and she went into the house. When she came back, Theodore was sitting on the veranda reading a letter, with another one unopened on his knee. The sight of his white face brought an exclamation from her lips.

"Theodore!" she cried.

He reminded her she was standing by saying:

"Sit down!"

This she was glad to do, for her knees trembled. Her eyes caught the handwriting on the unopened letter, resting like a white menace on Theodore's lap. She saw her own name upon it, but dared not, nor had she the strength, to ask for it.

At length, with a long breath, Theodore looked at her steadily.

"This letter is for you," he said, picking up her own. "Open it and then—give it to me."

Never had she heard such tones in his voice, nor had she ever been so thoroughly frightened. Mechanically she took the letter, tore open the flap, and read the contents:

* * * * *

"DEAR MISS MERRIWEATHER:

"After you left the shop, I decided to do as you wanted me to. I shall go back to Mottville, and afterwards Peggy and Lafe will come to me. I'll keep my promise and won't see Theodore. I hope you will make him happy.

JINNIE GRANDOKEN."

* * * * *

Molly crushed the paper between her fingers.

"Don't do that," commanded Theodore sharply. "Give it to me."

"It's mine," murmured Molly, lacking breath to speak aloud.

"Give it to me!" thundered Theodore.

And because she dared not disobey, she slowly extended the letter.

With deliberation the man spread out the crumpled page and read it through slowly. Then once more he took up his own letter and perused it.

* * * * *

"DEAR MR. KING:

"I'm going back to my home in the hills to-morrow. I'm so glad you're better. I thank you for all you've done for Lafe and Peggy, and hope you'll always be happy. For what you did for me I can't thank you enough, but as soon as I get my money, I'll send back all you've advanced for my lessons and other things. I'm praying all the time for you.

"JINNIE GRANDOKEN SINGLETON."

* * * * *

Sudden tears almost blotted the signature from Theodore's vision.

On the spur of the moment he picked up both letters and thrust them into his pocket.

"Come upstairs with me," he ordered the woman staring at him with frozen features.

Molly followed him as in a dream, preceding him when he stepped aside to allow her to enter the little sitting-room, where of late she had passed so many pleasant hours. Then as he closed the door, he whirled upon her.

"Now I want the meaning of those letters. Have you seen Miss Grandoken?"

"Yes!" She could say no more.

"When?"

"Yesterday."

"There's something I don't know. Ah! That's why you kept the papers from me." Quickly he turned to the bell.

"Theodore!" gasped Molly. "Wait! Wait! Don't—don't ring! I'll tell you; I will!"

He pressed the bell button savagely.

"I wouldn't believe you under oath," he muttered.

"I want all this week's papers, and I want 'em quick!" he snapped at the servant. "Every one! Last night's too!"

He walked to the window, but turned again as a knock came upon the door.

"I can't find the papers, sir," excused the maid.

"Wait!" Theodore closed the door, exclaiming in white heat, "Molly, where are those papers?"

"In my room," replied Molly sulkily.

Mr. King gave the order, and again they were behind closed doors. Molly made a sorry picture of shame when Theodore looked at her.

"I'll get to the bottom of this if it kills me," he said wearily.

"Theo, Theo, don't read the papers!" she gasped. Then she fell forward at his feet. "I love you, dear; I love you."

"You've lost your mind, Molly," he said harshly. "You're mad, completely mad."

"No, I'm not. Listen, Theodore, I'm here at your feet, miserable, unhappy; I want to be forgiven——"

"Then tell me what you did to Jinnie Grandoken."

"I can't! I can't!"

When another knock sounded on the door, Theodore opened it and took the papers through the smallest imaginable crack. Molly crawled to a chair and leaned her head upon the seat. Without a word, Theodore sat down and began to turn the pages of the papers nervously. As he read both accounts of Lafe's trial, bitter ejaculations fell from his lips. The story of Bobbie's dramatic death and Morse's suicide brought forth a groan. When he placed the papers slowly beside him on the floor, Molly raised her face, white and torn with grief.

"Now you know it all, forgive me!"

"Never, while I live!" he cried. "What ungodly wretchedness you've made that child suffer! And you were married all the time to Morse, and the mother of that poor little boy!"

"Yes," sobbed Molly.

Then a sudden thought took possession of him.

"You and Morse made Jinnie write me that first letter."

Molly nodded.

"May God forgive you both!" he stammered, and whirled out of the room.

An hour later, with new strength and purpose, Theodore threw a few clothes into a suitcase, ordered the fastest motor in the garage, and was standing on the porch when Molly came swiftly to him.

"Theodore," she said, with twitching face, "if you go away now, you won't find me here when you get back."

He glanced her over with curling lip.

"As you please," he returned indifferently. "You've done enough damage as it is. If you've any heart, stay here with the only person in the world who has any faith in you."

Vacantly the woman watched the motor glide away over the smooth white road, and then limply slid to the floor in a dead faint.

All the distance from Bellaire to Mottville Theodore was tortured with doubt. He brought to mind Jinnie's girlish embarrassment when they had been together; the fluttering white lids as his kisses brought a blue flash from the speaking love-lit eyes. She had loved him then; did she now? Of course she must love him! She had brought to him the freshness of spring—the love of the mating birds among the blossoms—the passionate desire of a heaven-wrought soul for its own, to whom could be entrusted all that was his dearest and best. He would follow her and win her,—yea, win the woman God had made for him and him alone, and into his eyes leapt the expression of the conquering male, the force God had created within him to reach for the woman sublime and cherish her.

When the car entered Mottville, rain was falling and the wind was mourning ceaselessly.

By inquiry, Theodore found the road to the Singleton farm, and again, as he impatiently sank back in the motor, he mentally vowed, with the vow of a strong man, that the girl should listen to him. He never realized, until they were climbing the rain-soaked hill, how starved was the very soul of him.

The road was running with water, but they ploughed on, until through the trees the farmhouse loomed up darkly. Bennett stopped the car at the gate and Theodore jumped out. A light twinkling in the upper part of the house told him she was there. Harmonious echoes were sounding and resounding in his ears. They were notes from Jinnie's fiddle, and for a moment, as they sobbed out through the attic window, he leaned back against the wet fence, feeling almost faint. The wild, sweet, unearthly melody surged over him with memories of the past.

Then he passed under the thrashing pines, mounted the broken steps, and entered the house.

It took but a minute to find the stairs by which to reach her, and there he stood in the gloom of the attic door, watching the swaying young figure and noting the whole pitiful dejection of her. In the single little light her eyes were as blue as the wing of a royal bird, and oh, what suffering she must have gone through! Then Jinnie ceased playing, and, as if drawn by a presence she knew not of, she turned her eyes slowly toward the door, and when she saw him, she fell, huddled with her violin on the garret floor, staring upward with frightened eyes.

"If you're there," she panted, "if—if—speak to me!"

He bounded forward and gathered her up, and the light of an adoring love shone full upon him.

"My sweet, my sweet, my beautiful, my little wonder-woman!" he breathed. "Did you think I could live without you?"

She was leaning, half fainting, against his breast, like a wind-blown flower.

"I've come for you," he said hoarsely. "Dearest, sweetest Jinnie!"

She pressed backward, loyalty for another woman rising within her.

"But Molly, Molly the Merry——" she breathed.

Theodore shook his head.

"I only know I love you, sweetheart, that I've come for you," and as his lips met hers, Jinnie clung to him, a very sweet young thing, and between those warm, passionate kisses she heard him murmur:

"God made you mine, littlest love!"

And so they went forth from the lonely farmhouse, with none but the cobbler's angels watching over them.

THE END