"That is it," the old maid answered; "Mostyn never lost a chance to tag on to her. Dolph, mark my words, thar's goin' to be no end o' talk. Why, didn't Ann just as good as tell me t'other day, on her way home from school, that she was goin' to a fine finishin'-school in Atlanta? You know Tom couldn't send 'er. Besides, when I spoke—as I acknowledge I did—about Dolly an' Mostyn, Ann grinned powerful knowin'-like an' never denied a thing. Even Ann's got a proud tilt to 'er, an' struts along like a young peacock. This here article will explode like a busted gun amongst 'em an' bring the whole bunch down a peg or two. Do you reckon they've got their paper yet?"

"Not yet," Wartrace answered. "The carrier has to go clean round by Spriggs's at the foot of the mountain 'fore he gits thar. He generally hits Tom's place about an hour by sun."

Miss Sally-Lou folded the paper and thrust it into the big pocket of her print skirt. "I am goin' over thar, Dolph," she said, with a rising smile. "I wouldn't miss it for a purty."

"You'd better keep out of it," the storekeeper mildly protested. "You know you have been mixed up in several fusses."

"I don't expect to have a thing to do with this un," was the eager reply. "But I would just like to see if they really are countin' on a man of that sort tyin' himself on to a lay-out of their stripe. Nobody in the valley believed Mr. Mostyn had any such intention. He was just killin' time an' amusin' hisse'f."

Leaving the store, Miss Sally-Lou strode briskly along the hot, dusty road toward Drake's. Every now and then a low giggle would escape her lips, and she would put her thin, gnarled fingers to her mouth as if to hide her smile from some observer. "John Webb wasn't tuck in by it, I'll bet," she mused. "He ain't nobody's fool. John's got a long, cool head on 'im, he has. He kin see through a mill-rock without lookin' in at the hole."

She found John near the front fence, lazily inspecting a row of beehives on a weather-beaten bench.

"Think they are goin' to swarm?" Miss Sally-Lou inquired, in her most seductive tone, as she unlatched the gate and entered.

"Wouldn't be a bit surprised," the bachelor returned, as he automatically touched his slouch hat. "It is time. We had fresh honey last year long 'fore this."

"Has Dolly got home from school?" was the next question.

"Yes'm," Webb answered. "She come in a minute ago. She may be lyin' down. She ain't as well as common; she looks sorter peaked; I told 'er she'd better take a tonic o' some sort. She's stickin' too close over them books; she needs exercise, an' plenty of it."

"I hate to bother her if she ain't up an' about"—Miss Wartrace had the air of a maiden lady who had as soon chat with a bachelor as feast upon any sort of gossip—"but I'm makin' me a new lawn waist, Mr. John, an' I want to ask Dolly if she'd put big or little buttons on. She has such good taste an' knows what the style is."

"By all means git the right sort, Miss Sally-Lou," Webb jested. "If they are as big as mule-shoes, or as little as gnats' eyes, stick 'em on."

"You are a great tease," the spinster smirked. "You always have some joke agin us poor women. You make a lot of fun, but you like to see us look our best, I'll bound you."

John's freckled face bore vague evidence of denial, but he said nothing. He moved toward the farthest hive and bent down as if to inspect the tiny entrance.

"Well, I'll run in a minute," she said. "Watch out an' don't git stung."

"If I do it will be by a bee," said the philosopher to himself, "an' not by no woman o' that stripe. Lord, folks advise me to set up to that critter! She'd talk a deef man to death. He'd kill hisse'f makin' signs to 'er to stop."

The visitor ascended the steps, crossed the porch, and, without rapping at the door, entered the sitting-room where she found Dolly, Ann, and her mother together. Mrs. Drake was patching a sheet at the window; Ann, sulky and obstinate, was trying to do an example on a slate; and Dolly stood over her, a dark, wearied expression on her face.

"Hello, folkses!" Miss Sally-Lou greeted them, playfully. "How do y- all come on?"

When she had taken a chair she mentioned the waist she was making, and as Dolly gave her opinion in regard to the buttons she eyed the girl studiously. She remarked the dark rings around the beautiful eyes, the nervous, almost quavering voice. "She hain't heard yet," the caller decided. "But she may suspicion something is wrong. Maybe he hain't writ to her since he went back—the scamp! He ought to be licked good an' strong."

"What are you fixing up so for, Miss Sally-Lou?" Ann wanted to know, a bubble of amusement in her young eyes and voice. "Are you going to get married?"

"Listen to her," Miss Wartrace tittered, quite unobservant of Ann's sarcasm. "The idea of a child of that age constantly thinking of marrying."

At this juncture John Webb came in and approached his sister. He had not removed his hat, but, catching Dolly's reproving glance, he snatched it off and stood whipping his thigh with it.

"You wanted to know about them bees," he said. "They don't intend to swarm to-day, so you needn't bother any longer about it."

"I was just laughin' at Ann, Mr. John." Miss Sally-Lou raised her voice tentatively, that she might rivet his attention. "Young as she is, I never see 'er without havin' 'er ax some question or other about me or somebody else marryin'."

"It's jest the woman croppin' out in 'er," Webb drawled, with unconscious humor. "Looks like marryin' is a woman's aim the same as keepin' out of it ought to be a man's."

"You needn't judge others by yourself," was the unoffended retort. "Plenty of men know the value of a good wife, if you don't."

Mrs. Drake seemed not to have heard these give-and-take platitudes. She raised her sheet to the level of her eyes and creased the hem of it with her needle-pricked fingers. "What sort o' cloth are you goin' to use in your waist?" she asked.

"White lawn," said Sally-Lou. "I got a rale good grade in a remnant in town yesterday at a bargain. It was a little dirty at the edges, but I'm goin' to trim them off."

"I'd make it plain, if I was you," Mrs. Drake advised. "At your age an' mine it doesn't look well to fix up fancy."

"Humph! I don't know as you an' me are so nigh the same—"

The final word was caught up by an impulsive snicker, which Webb muffled under his hat.

"Oh, I don't mean to say that I am not some older," Mrs. Drake floundered. "Bein' as you are unmarried, it wouldn't be polite for me with as old children as I got to—" "Oh, I'm not mad about it!" Miss Sally-Lou declared, hastily. "I know I'm not as young as Dolly an' her crowd o' girls."

The spinster now frowned resentfully. Nothing could have angered her more than such an allusion made in the presence of the amused bachelor. She nursed her fury in silence for a moment, only to become more set in the grim purpose of her present visit.

"Huh, wait till I git through with 'em!" she thought; then, as if merely to change a disagreeable subject for a happier one, she turned directly to Dolly.

"What do you hear from Mr. Mostyn?" she asked, in quite a tone of indifference.

There was marked hesitation on the part of Dolly, but Ann was more prompt. Her slate and pencil rattled as she dropped them in her lap. "He hasn't written a word," she said, staring eagerly, as if the visitor might help solve a problem which had absorbed her far more than the example on which she was now working.

"You don't say!" Miss Sally-Lou's eyes fired straight gleams at Dolly, as if Dolly herself had made the astounding revelation. "Why, I thought you an' him was powerful thick. Well, well, I reckon he told you all thar was to tell before he left. Young men usually are proud o' things like that, an' can't hold 'em in. Well, I hope he will be happy. I don't wish him no harm if he is high up in the world an' rich. I know I was awfully surprised when I read it in to-day's paper." She thrust a steady hand into her pocket, pushing her right foot well forward to give the rustling sheet better egress. There was silence in the room. Webb glanced at his sister and at Ann. No one, save the tormentor, noticed Dolly, who, pale as death, a groping in her eyes, and lips parted, stood behind her sister's chair.

"Is there something in the paper about him?" Ann cried, eagerly.

"Oh yes, nearly a column on the society page," was the studied reply. "The cat's out o' the bag. He's goin' to get married."

"Oh, Dolly!" Ann clapped her hands and leaned eagerly toward her ghastly sister. "Do you reckon he went and told it? I know; he just couldn't keep it—he is so much in love. Oh, Dolly, tell 'em about it. Here you are keeping it so close, while he is sticking it into a paper for everybody to read. I never could see any reason for you to be so awful secret, anyway. It has been all I could do to—"

"What's the child talkin' about?" The caller's eyes gleamed in guarded delight as she unfolded the paper and spread it out on her knee. "Accordin' to this account, he is marryin' the richest an' most popular woman in the State. I reckon everybody that reads society news has heard about Irene Mitchell."

"Irene Mitchell!" Ann gasped, rising in her chair, her slate and pencil sliding to the floor. "That isn't so. It isn't so, is it, Dolly? Why, what ails—" The half-scream was not finished. Dolly was reeling as if about to fall, her little hands pressed helplessly to her face. John Webb sprang quickly to her side. He threw his arm about her.

"Dry up all that!" he yelled, furiously. "Dry up, I say! She's sick."

Feeling his support, Dolly revived a little, and he led her out into the hall and saw her go slowly up the stairs to her room. As for Mrs. Drake and Ann, they had pounced on the paper and had it spread out before their wide-open eyes. Sally-Lou was now on her feet. She had gone to the door, seen Dolly's wilting form disappear at the head of the stairs, and was now breathlessly feasting on the bewildered chagrin of the stunned mother and daughter.

Ann finished reading sooner than her mother. Pale and indignant, she turned to the caller. She had opened her mouth when John Webb promptly covered it with his red paw. "Come out o' here!" he ordered, sharply. "You go up-stairs an' 'tend to Dolly. She ain't well. She's been ailin' off an' on for a week. You school-children have deviled the life out of the poor thing. What are you all talkin' about, anyway? Mostyn told me an' Dolly all about him an' that woman. We knowed all along that he was goin' to git married, but it was a sort o' secret betwixt us three."

Astounded, and warningly pinched on the arm, Ann, with a lingering backward look, left the room and reluctantly climbed the stairs.

"You'll have to excuse me, Miss Sally-Lou, here's your paper," Mrs. Drake was slowly recovering discretion. "I'll have to see about Dolly. John's right, she ain't well—she ain't—oh, my Lord, I don't know what to make of it!"

"I see she is sort o' upset," Miss Sally-Lou said, "an I don't wonder. I oughtn't to have sprung it so sudden-like. I'll tell you all good day. I'll have to run along. If thar's anything I kin do for Dolly just let me know. I'm a good hand about a sick-bed, an' I know how to give medicine. If Dolly gets worse, send word to me, an' I'll step right over. This may go hard with her. You know I think that idle scamp might 'a' had better to do than—"

But Mrs. Drake, obeying her brother's imperative nod, was moving toward the stairs. Sally-Lou and Webb were left together. Her glance fell before the fiercest glare she had ever seen shoot from a masculine eye, and yet Webb's freckled face was valiantly digging up a smile.

"I see what you thought," he laughed. "You went an' thought Dolly was in love with that town dude. Shucks, she seed through 'im from the fust throw out o' the box. She liked to chat with 'im now an' then, but la, me! if you women are so dead bent on splicin' folks why don't you keep your eyes open? Listen to me, an' see if I ain't right. You watch an' see if Dolly an' Warren Wilks—"

"Pshaw!" Miss Sally-Lou sniffed. "Dolly will never give Warren a second thought—not now, nohow. She's got 'er sights up, an' she'll never lower 'em ag'in."

Webb, almost outwitted, stood on the edge of the porch and watched the spinster trip down the walk. She glanced over her shoulder coquettishly. "You are losin' all your gallant ways, Mr. John," she simpered. "You don't even open the gate for visitin' ladies here lately."

"I greased that latch t'other day," he answered, laconically. "It works as easy as the trigger of a mouse-trap. I don't know as I ever was a woman's jumpin'rjack. I ain't one o' the fellers that fan flies off'n 'em at meetin'. If they draw flies an' gnats that's the'r lookout, not mine."



CHAPTER XIX



Alone in her room, Dolly stood at a window, her distraught eyes on the placid fields lying between the house and the mountains. She was still pale. The tips of her fingers clung to the narrow mullions as if for support. She seemed scarcely to breathe. Her beautiful lips were drawn tight; her shapely chin had a piteous quiver.

"Oh, that was it!" she moaned. "I understand it now. He was engaged to her all the time, but wouldn't tell me. He got tired of us here and went back to her. I'll never see him again—never, never, never!"

The bed, with its snowy coverlet and great downy pillows, invited her. She was about to throw herself upon it, but her pride, pierced to the quick, rebelled. "I sha'n't cry!" she said. "He is marrying for her money. I sha'n't weep over it. He lied to me—to me! He said something was wrong with his business and when that was settled he would write. He was just trifling, passing time away this summer as he did three years ago, and I—I—silly little gump—actually kissed him. I trusted him as I trust—as I trusted God. I even confided father's secret to him. I loved him with my whole soul, and all the time he was comparing me to her."

Far across the sunlit meadows on the gradual slope of a rise she saw her father and George cutting and raking hay. How odd it seemed for them to be so calmly working toward the future feeding of mere horses and cattle when to her life itself seemed killed to its germ. There was a step on the stairs. The door was thrown open, and her sister rushed in.

"Oh, Dolly!" Ann cried, her begrimed fingers clutching at Dolly's arm, "what does it mean? Is it so? Do you think he really is going to—"

"Oh, go away, go away, please go away!" the older pleaded. "Don't talk to me now—not now!"

"But I want to know—I must know!" Ann ran on, hysterically, her young, piping voice rising higher and higher. "I can't stand it, Dolly. Ever since you told me about you and him I have thought about Atlanta and your beautiful home down there and the things I was going to do. Oh, I thought—I thought it was actually settled, but if—if the paper tells the truth—Why don't you talk? What has got into you all at once? Surely—surely he wouldn't—surely you wouldn't have gone out to meet him as late at night as you did and let him—you know, sister, I saw him holding you tight and—"

Dolly turned like an automaton suddenly animated. She laid her hands on her sister's shoulders and bore down fiercely. She shook her so violently from side to side that Ann's plaited hair swung like a rope in a storm.

"Don't tell that to a soul!" Dolly panted. "You must not—don't dare to! You promised you wouldn't. Sometime I will explain, but not now— not now. I'm losing my mind. Go away and leave me."

"I really believe you think the paper is telling the truth," Ann moaned. "You must think so, or you wouldn't look this way and beg me not to tell. Oh, I can't stand it!"

For a breathless moment Ann stood staring at her dumb-lipped sister, and then, tottering to the bed, she threw herself upon it, burying her face in a pillow. Sob after sob escaped her, but Dolly paid no heed. Her lifeless stare on the mountain view, she stood like a creature entranced.

The sun went down. Like a bleeding ball it hung over the mountain's crest, throwing red rays into the valley. A slow step was heard on the stair, the sliding of a dry hand on the balustrade. Mrs. Drake opened the door and advanced to Dolly.

"You mustn't take on this way," she began. "I want you to be sensible and strong. Thar is plenty of fish in the sea. I sort o' thought Mr. Mostyn was talking too much to you for it to be exactly right, but you always had such a level head—more level than I ever had—that I thought you could take care of yourself."

"Mother, please leave me alone for to-day, anyway," Dolly pleaded. "I —I'm not a fool. Take Ann down-stairs. I—I can't stand that noise. It makes me desperate. I hardly know what to do or say."

"I just asked her to tell me the truth." Ann sat up, holding her pillow in her lap as for comfort, her eyes red with rubbing. "But she won't say a word, when all this time I've been counting on—"

"Well, I'm going down and see about supper," Dolly said, desperately. "Father and George have stopped work and they will be hungry."

Her mother tried to detain her, but she went straight down the stairs. Mrs. Drake crept stealthily to the door, peered after her daughter, and then, heaving a sigh, she stood before the girl on the bed.

"Now," she said, grimly, "out with it! Tell me all you know about this thing—every single thing!"

"But, mother"—Ann's eyes fell—"I promised-"

"It don't make no difference what you promised," Mrs. Drake blurted out. "This ain't no time for secrets under this roof. I want the facts. If you don't tell me I'll get your pa to whip you."

Half an hour later, as Tom Drake trudged across the old wheat-field back of the barn, his scythe on his shoulder, he met his wife at the outer fence of the cow-lot. There she stood as still and silent as a detached post.

"Whar's your bucket?" he asked, thinking she had come to milk the cow, which was one of her evening duties.

"I'm goin' to let it go over to-night," she faltered. Then she laid a stiff hand on her husband's sweat-damp sleeve. "Tom Drake," she gulped, "I'm afraid me an' you are facin' the greatest trouble we've ever had."

"What's wrong now?" he asked, swift visions of moonshine stills, armed officers, and grim court officials flashing before him.

Haltingly she explained the situation. He bore it stolidly till, in a rasping whisper, she concluded with the information forced from Ann. She told him of the low whistle in the moonlight at their daughter's window, of Dolly's cautious exit from the house, of the tender embrace on the lawn. Drake turned his tortured face away. She expected a storm of fury, but no words came from his ghastly lips.

"Now, Tom," she half wailed, "you must be sensible. This is a family secret. For once in your life you've got to keep your temper till we can see our way clear. After all, goin' out that way to meet 'im don't actually prove that our girl is bad; you know it don't. Young folks these days—"

"Don't tell me what it meant!" He bent fiercely toward her. "I know. I've heard a lot about that whelp's sly conduct. No bigger blackguard ever laid a trap for a helpless girl. Oh no, I won't do nothin'. I wouldn't touch 'im. When I meet 'im I'll take off my hat an' bow low an' hope his lordship is well. I'm just a mountain dirt-eater, I am. Nobody ever heard of a Drake killin' snakes. A Drake will let one coil itse'f round his baby an' not take it off. We are jest scabs—we are!"

"Tom, for God's sake—"

"Look here, woman—you lay the weight of a hair in front o' me an' that devil—that rovin' mad dog—an' I'll kill you as I would a stingin' gnat! I won't bed with no woman with that sort o' pride. You've got to stand by me. I'll kill 'im if it takes twenty years. I'll keep my nose to his track like a bloodhound till I look in his eye, an' then, if he had a thousand lives, I'd take every one of 'em with a grin, an' foller 'im to hell for more."

Leaving her with her head on the top rail of the fence, stunned, wordless, he strode away in the dusk. Looking up presently, she saw him standing at the well, in the full light from the kitchen doorway. He seemed to be looking in at Dolly, who, with her back to him, was at work over the stove. The next instant he was gone.



CHAPTER XX



It was eight o'clock. Jarvis Saunders alighted from the train at Ridgeville, finding his horse hitched to a rack according to the instructions he had left with his overseer. Mounting, he started homeward in a brisk canter through the clear moonlight. He was soon in the main road, and exhilarated by the crisp mountain air, after a sweltering ride in the dusty train. He had reached the boundary fence of Drake's farm when he thought he heard some one crying out. He reined in and listened.

"Oh, father, please, please wait!" It was Dolly's voice, and it came from the more darkly shaded part of the road in front of her father's house. Urging his mount forward, Saunders was met by Drake on a plunging horse which he was violently whipping into action.

"What is the matter?" Saunders cried out; but with an oath of fury Drake flew past. He was hatless, coatless, and held something clutched in his hand other than the bridle-rein. Fairly astounded and not knowing what to do, Saunders remained in the road for a moment, then the sound of a low sob in the direction from whence Drake had come reminded him of Dolly's nearness, and he guided his horse forward. Suddenly in the corner of a rail fence, her face covered with her hands, he saw Dolly. Springing to the ground, he advanced to her.

"Dolly," he said, "what is it—what is wrong?"

She uncovered her face, stood staring at him helplessly. She raised her hand and pointed after her father, but, though she tried to speak, she seemed unable to utter a word.

"Is there anything I can do?" he asked. "For God's sake, tell me if there is. I want to help you."

"Yes, yes," she managed to articulate, "I know—and you are very kind, but—"

"You were trying to stop your father," he said. "Would you like for me—"

"You couldn't; he would kill you; he has his pistol; he doesn't know what he is doing."

"I think I know—I think I can guess—he is going to Atlanta."

Dolly nodded mechanically, her mouth open. "Oh, he is making an awful mistake, Mr. Saunders! He wouldn't let me explain. Ann told mother that I went out late one night to meet—meet Mr. Mostyn when he whistled. It was not Mr. Mostyn. It was Tobe Barnett, who came to warn me of father's danger of arrest by the officers. I can tell you—I can trust you, Mr. Saunders. Father is connected with some moonshiners, who—"

"I know it," Saunders broke in. "Now, listen to me, Dolly; this thing shall go no further if I can help it. He wants to catch the southbound train. I am going to stop him."

"No, no!" Dolly sprang forward, desperately clutching his arm. "He will shoot you."

"I must do it!" Saunders caught both her hands in his and pressed them. "You must let me—I have never been able to help you in any way, and I have always wanted to. I'd give my life to—to be of service to you to-night. I feel this thing, little friend. I must do something—I simply must!"

"I don't know what to say or do." Dolly clung to his hands desperately. She raised them spasmodically and unconsciously pressed them against her throbbing breast. "Oh, Mr. Saunders, it is so—so awful to be suspected of being bad when I—when I—"

"When you are the purest, sweetest child that ever breathed," he cried, fiercely. "They sha'n't start gossip about you." He dropped her hands and turned his horse round quickly. "I'll overtake him and stop him." He glanced at his watch. "I have no time to lose. I must go. Be brave, Dolly. It will come out right—it must!" He swung himself into his saddle; she clung to his foot which he was trying to put into the stirrup.

"He will kill you, too," she sobbed, "and I'll have that on my head also. Oh, Mr. Saunders—"

Gently he drew his foot from her clutch. There was a look in his eyes which she never forgot to the end of her life. "Excuse me, but I must hurry," he said. "He is on a fast horse, and the train may be on time. He must not get aboard. He mustn't, Dolly—good-by."

Away he dashed at full speed, bent to the mane of his mount like a chased Indian on the plains. Once he looked back, seeing the patient little figure standing like a mile-stone at the roadside. On he sped, tasting the dust pounded into the air by Drake's horse, and feeling the grit between his teeth. No one was in sight. The lights of the farmhouses on the road moved backward like ships in a fog. Suddenly, some distance ahead, he saw a rider dismounting. It was Drake, who now stooped down to pick up something he had dropped. As he did so he saw the pursuing horse, and, quickly springing into his saddle, was off again.

"Hold! Hold!" Saunders shouted.

"Hold—hell!" rippled back on the moonlight. "Bother me an' I'll put a ball in you. Back, I tell you!"

"Stop, Drake!" Saunders cried, without lessening his speed.

The only reply the pursued man made was the furious lashing of his horse. An ominous sound now fell on Saunders's ears. It was the whistle of a locomotive in the deep cut across the fields.

An oath of disappointment from Drake showed he had divined its full portent. It was now merely a question of speed. The race went on. The houses on the outer edge of the village flew past as if blown by a hurricane. Children in the yards looked up and cheered what they took for sport on the part of rollicking mountain riders. Saunders saw that he was gaining, and he urged his horse to even greater speed. He drew so close that the nose of his mount was lashed by the tail of Drake's horse.

"Stop a minute—just a minute!" Saunders pleaded. "I must see you."

Then, without lessening his gait, Drake turned half round in his saddle and pointed his revolver. Saunders heard the click of the hammer as it was cocked. Drake's demoniacal face in the white light had the greenish luster of a corpse—a corpse waking to life and grim purpose. "Fall back or I'll kill you!" he swore from frothing lips. "I know what you want; you want to take up for that dirty son of a—"

"No, no; you are mistaken. I don't. Wait—stop!"

They were now entering the open space between the station and the hotel. The train, with grinding brakes and escaping steam, was slowing up. Drake took aim over his shoulder. He fired. Saunders knew he was not hit. Frightened by the flash in his eyes, his horse reared up and almost threw him off behind. This delayed him for a moment, and Drake galloped on till he was close to the last car of the train. Saunders saw him throw the bridle-rein over the neck of his horse and spring down. The next instant Saunders was by his side and also on the ground. Again Drake raised his revolver, but Saunders was too quick for him. With a sudden blow he knocked the weapon from the other's grasp. It spun and flashed in the moonlight and fell in the weeds several yards away. Then Drake began to fumble in the pocket of his trousers for his knife. But again the younger man got the advantage. With the bound of a panther he had embraced and pinioned the arms of his antagonist to his sides. Back and forth they swung and pounded, Drake swearing, spitting, and trying even to bite. The locomotive whistled. It was off again. Seeing this, Drake swung himself free and made a break for the end car, but Saunders was at his heels; and, throwing out his hand, he grasped the runner's arm and violently threw him around. Again they were face to face. Again Saunders pinioned his arms. Drake was helpless. He struggled with all his strength, but it was unequal to that of his determined captor.

"You've got to listen to me, Drake!" Saunders said, fiercely. "You've got plenty of time to settle with that man if you insist on it, but you've got to hear me!"

"Well, let me loose then, damn you!" Drake panted. "Le' me loose!"

"All right, I'll let you loose." Saunders released him, and they stood facing each other, both out of breath. "I'm your friend, Tom Drake— and you know it," Saunders gasped. "I'm your daughter's friend, too. I'm sufficiently interested in her not to let you soil her good name as you are trying to do to-night. She is innocent, I tell you, and you are a coward to—"

"You say—you say—"

Several by-standers at the ticket-office and hotel, attracted by the combat, were approaching.

"Go back!" Saunders held up his hand warningly. "This is no affair of yours. I want to speak to him in private. Leave us alone."

The men halted, stared dubiously, and finally, seeing that the quarrel was over, they went back whence they had come. "Let's step over here," Saunders proposed; and he led the way to the railway blacksmith's shop, now closed and unlighted. In the shadow of its smoky wall they faced each other again.

"You said—" Drake began, "you said—"

"I said she was innocent of the foul charge you are making against her," Saunders said, sharply. "You are a crazy man, Drake. You tried to kill me back there, although I am bent on befriending you and your daughter. She is as sweet and pure as the angels in heaven."

"I—I know more than you do. Ann said—"

"Yes, I know what the child said," Saunders retorted. "And if you had been the right sort of a father you would not have acted on such slight evidence. Dolly is in this plight simply because she saved you—"

"Saved me? What the hell—"

"Yes, she saved you from arrest and imprisonment as a moonshiner. The whistle Ann heard was not a signal from Mostyn. It was Tobe Barnett, who had come to warn her of your danger. She did meet Mostyn that night, but it was by accident, and not appointment. Dolly could have explained it all to Ann, but she did not want the child to know of your connection with that gang. Now you've got the whole thing, Drake."

The mountaineer stared, his mouth open; the sinews of his face were drawn into distortion.

"You say—you tell me—you say—"

"That's the whole thing," Saunders said. "Now let's go home. Dolly deserves a humble apology from you—you ought to get down on your knees to her and beg her to forgive you. I know of no other woman like her in this world—none, none, anywhere. She has my admiration, my respect, my reverence."

"But—but"—Drake's dead face began to kindle—"Ann said she saw that dirty scamp actually holdin' her in his arms an' kissin' 'er. She said that Dolly made no denial of it, an' now, accordin' to the papers, he's goin' to marry a woman in Atlanta."

Saunders's glance sought the ground, his eyes went aimlessly to the two horses nibbling grass near by.

"Ah, ha, I see that floors you!" Drake flared out. "You admit that the low-lived scamp did take advantage of our confidence, an'—"

"You've got to face that part of it as I would do if she were my child," Saunders answered. "Listen to me, Drake. Mostyn is not a whit better or worse than many other men of his class. He has been fast and reckless, but when he met Dolly he met the first pure and elevating influence of his life. I am in his confidence. He told me the whole story. He determined that he would win her love and make her his wife. When he left here it was with the firm resolution of being wholly true to her. Now, I can only say that on his return home he found himself in a situation which would have taken more strength of character to get out of than he had. You cannot afford to attack him. Such a thing would reflect on your brave daughter, and you have no right to do it, no matter how you feel about it. From now on you've got to consider her feelings. If she cares for—for him, and—and—is depressed by the newspaper reports, that is all the more reason for your sympathy and support. Surely you can realize what she has escaped. As that man's wife her life would have been hell on earth. He is wholly unworthy of her. If she were my—sister, I'd rather see her dead than married to him."

Drake stood with hanging head. He stepped slowly to his horse and grasped the rein. Saunders went a few feet to the right, searched on the ground a moment and picked up the revolver. Returning, he extended it to its owner.

Drake took it silently, and clumsily thrust it into his pocket. He hesitated; he gulped, swallowed, then said, huskily:

"You are my friend, Saunders. I've had some that I depended on in a pinch, but you've done me a big favor to-night. I'll never git forgiveness for tryin' to shoot you—never—never in this world."

"That is all right." Saunders extended his hand, and the other clasped it firmly.

A man with a polished club tied to his wrist was striding toward them. It was the village marshal, Alf Floyd. Drake eyed him helplessly.

"Let me talk to him," Saunders said, under his breath. "You ride on home. Leave him to me. This must not get out."

"What's the trouble here?" the officer asked, arriving just as Drake rode away.

Saunders laughed carelessly as he reached for the bridle of his grazing horse. "It means that I got the best of Tom Drake. He bet me a dollar he could catch that train and get aboard. He would have done it, too, if I hadn't caught him around the waist at the last minute and swung him back. He didn't like it much, but he is all right now."

"Somebody said they heard a pistol-shot," the officer said.

"An accident," Saunders replied. "Drake dropped it—horse jerked it from his hand. I suppose we may have violated an ordinance in racing in town, and if so I'm willing to pay the fine. I'm responsible."

"There is an ordinance," the marshal said, "but I won't make a case out o' this."

"All right, Alf; thanks. How goes it?"

"Oh, so-so. How is it in the city?"

"Hot and dusty." Saunders mounted deliberately. "Good night, Alf; I must get out home and eat something."

A few minutes later as Saunders was slowly riding past Drake's front gate he noticed a figure on the inside of the yard close to the fence. It was Dolly. She opened the gate and came out. He reined in and, hat in hand, sprang to the ground. Her head was covered with a thin white shawl held beneath her chin, and her pale face showed between the folds as pure and patient as a suffering nun's. He saw that she was trying to speak, but was unable to do so.

"What is it, Dolly?" he faltered. "I suppose your father got back?"

"Yes." It was a bare labial whisper. She nodded; she put her cold hand into his great, warm eager one, and he held it as tenderly as if it had been a dying sparrow.

"I am glad I happened to reach him," he said, in an effort to relieve her embarrassment. "We had it nip and tuck," he added, lightly. "My lungs are lined with dust."

He felt her fingers and palm faintly flutter.

"Oh, oh, Mr. Saunders!" she gulped. "I can never, never thank you enough. I met him down the road just now. He actually cried. I have never seen him give way before."

Saunders stared helplessly. He knew not what to say. In the moonlight he saw tears like drops of dew rise in her eyes and trickle down her cheeks.

"You must not cry," he managed to say. "Don't break down, Dolly; you have been so brave all along."

She released the shawl beneath her chin and began to fumble in her pocket for her handkerchief. Seeing she was unable to find it, he took out his own, and while he still held her hand with his left he tenderly dried her tears. Suddenly she clasped his hand with both of hers.

"I suppose you know everything—" she faltered. "How silly I have been to think—to imagine that Mr. Mostyn really meant—" A great sob struggled up within her and broke on her lips.

"I know this, Dolly." His face hardened to the appearance of stone in the white light from the sky. "I know that from this moment on you must never give him another thought."

"You don't understand a woman's feelings," she returned, in the saddest of intonations. "I know what you say is right and true, but— it is like this; he seems to have—died! I think of him only as dead, and a woman with a heart cannot at a moment's notice put her dead out of mind. I can't, somehow, blame him. You see, I think I understand him. He is not going to be happy, and I'm afraid I'll never be able to forget that fact. He was trying to get right. I saw his struggle. I did not fully know what it meant when we parted, but I see it all now. I thought I could help him, but it is too late—too late; and oh, that is the terrible part! I feel somewhat like a mother must feel who sees a son, hopelessly wrong, taken from her sight forever. Oh, I pity him, pity him, pity him!"

"Nevertheless, you must try to put him wholly out of your mind and heart," Saunders urged. "You deserve happiness, and this thing must not kill your chances for it. Time will help."

"Isn't it queer?" she sighed; "but in moments of deepest sorrow we don't want Time, God, or anything else to take our grief away. Really, I feel to-night like an invisible thing crushed out of its body and left intact to float forever in pitiless space."

He led her to the gate and opened it. "You must not indulge such weird thoughts," he said, his features set in a mask of tense inner pain. "You must go to bed and try to sleep."

"Sleep!" she laughed, harshly. "I'll have to wake. The happy chickens, ducks, turkeys, and twittering, chirping birds will rouse me at sun- up. I must teach to-morrow. I must answer questions about grammar, history, geography, and arithmetic. I must correct compositions, write on a blackboard with chalk, point to dots on maps, scold little ones, reprove big ones, talk to parents, and through it all think, think, think! I am Dolly Drake. Do you know, Mr. Saunders, the queerest thing to me in all the world is that I am Dolly Drake? Sometimes I pronounce the name in wonder, as if I had never heard it before. I seem to have been a thousand persons in former periods."

"Dolly, listen." Saunders bent till his face was close to hers. "I am your friend. I shall be true to you forever and ever. From now on nothing else on earth can be of so much importance to me as your welfare. To help you shall be my constant aim."

"I know it, dear, sweet friend." The words bubbled from a swelling sob. "And oh, it is sweet and comforting at a time like this! Don't— don't stop me." And therewith she raised his hand, pressed her lips upon it, and turned quickly away.



PART II



CHAPTER I



Five years passed. Again it was summer. Mostyn with his wife and his only child, Richard, Jr., lived in the Mitchell mansion, which, save for a new coat of paint, was unchanged. Mostyn himself was considerably altered in appearance. There were deeper lines in his face; he was thinner, more given to nervousness and loss of sleep; his hair was turning gray; he had been told by his doctor that he worried too much and that he must check the tendency.

Things had not gone in his married life as the financier had wished. One of the most objectionable was the unexpected change in his father- in-law, who had lapsed quite abruptly into troublesome dotage. From a shrewd business man old Mitchell had become a querulous child, subject to fits of suspicion and violent outbursts of anger. At the most embarrassing moments he would totter into the bank, approach his son- in-law, and insist on talking over matters which he was quite incapable of seeing in a rational light. Mostyn had tried to deal with him firmly, only to bring down a torrent of half-wild threats as to what the old man would do in regard to certain investments the two held in common. Indeed, it was plain to many that Mitchell had formed an intuitive dislike for his son-in-law, which, somehow, was not lessened by his great love for his grandson.

Saunders became a genial sort of escape-valve for the old man's endless chatter and complaint, doing all in his power to pacify him, though it required no little time and energy.

One warm day in the present June Mitchell came to the bank, and, frowning angrily, he went into Mostyn's office, where his son-in-law sat absorbed over some intricate calculations in percentage.

"Huh!" he sniffed. "Your nigger porter told me you were too busy to see me. If he hadn't dodged I'd have hit the whelp with this cane, sir. Busy! I say busy! If it hadn't been for me and my money I'd like to know where you'd be to-day. I guess you wouldn't run long."

Flushing with combined anger and sensitive shame, Mostyn put his papers aside and rose.

"Sit down, and rest," he said. "Albert meant no harm. I told him that I had some important work to do and that I did not want to be disturbed just now; but, of course, I had no reference to you."

"Oh, I know you didn't!" Mitchell sneered, his chin and white beard quivering. "I know what your plan is. I'm no fool. You are handling my means, and you are afraid I'll want to know what you have done with them. I'll have a statement by law—that's what I'll do."

"You really must be reasonable," Mostyn said, helplessly. "Only last week I explained it all in detail in the presence of Saunders and Wright, and you were quite satisfied. You ought to know that we can't go over such matters every day. I assure you that everything is in good shape."

"Are you sure? That's what I want to know." The harsh expression in Mitchell's face was softening. "I—I get to worrying—I admit it. You and I used to get along all right, but you never consult me now as you used to do. I'm older than you are, but my judgment is sound. I'm not dead yet, and I won't be regarded that way."

"I know you are all right." Mostyn smiled pacifically. "Won't you take a seat?"

"No, I'm going back home. I don't like the way things are running there, either. Irene is never at home, it seems to me, and my grandson has nobody to look after him but that trifling nurse. Irene has gone to some fool reception to-day, and says she and Kitty are going to a dance at Buckton's country house to-night. You may call that right and proper, sir, but I don't. The way married couples live to-day is an outrage on common decency. If you had any backbone you'd make your wife behave herself. She is more of a belle, sir, right now than before you married her. She is crazy for excitement, and the whole poker-playing, wine-drinking set she goes with is on the road to perdition."

Laying his hand on the old man's arm gently, Mostyn led him toward the door. "Don't let it worry you," he said. "The boy is well and sound, and Irene means no harm. She has always loved society, and when we were married it was with the understanding that she should not be hampered."

"And that is right where you made the mistake of your life." Mitchell pulled back from the door. "The way you and she live is not natural. The Lord never intended it to be so. You know as well as I do that Irene used to have a silly sort of liking or fancy for Andy Buckton."

Mostyn nodded, his eyes averted. "Yes, yes, of course," he said, hesitatingly. "She told me all about it at the time, quite frankly."

"Well, you know, I presume, that his uncle left him a lot of money when he died the other day?"

"I heard something about it." Mostyn bit his lip in vexation, as he reached out for the doorknob and turned it cautiously.

"Well, it is true, and it has turned the fool's head; he is spending it like water. He is giving a big blow-out to-night, and it is all for your wife, sir—your wife."

Mostyn made no reply, though his face looked graver; the sharp-drawn lines about his mouth deepened.

"You heard what I said, didn't you?" Mitchell demanded.

"Yes, of course."

"Well, let me tell you one thing, and then you can do as you please about it. I am not going to take any hand in it. Irene has no respect for me or my opinion here lately. She gets mad the minute I say a word to her. Andy Buckton is as big a fool about her as he ever was. I got it straight, from a person who knows, that he makes no secret of it. And that isn't all, sir—that isn't all. Irene is just vain enough of her good looks to like it. Le'me tell you something, sir. This town is not Paris, and our country is not France, but that fast set Irene runs with is trying to think so. They read about the Four Hundred in New York, its scandals and divorces in high life, and think it is smart to imitate it. You seem to stay out of it, but what if you do? Are you going to sit like a knot on a log and have them say you made a loveless marriage for money, and—"

"Stop!" Mostyn flared out. "I won't stand it. You are going too far!"

"Ah, I see you can be touched," the old man laughed, putting his hand on Mostyn's arm in his most senile mood. "I just wanted to set you thinking, that's all."

When Mitchell was gone the banker sat down at his work again, but he could not put his mind on it. He fumbled the papers nervously. His brows met in a troubled frown. "I can't stand any more of this," he thought. "He is driving me insane—the man does not live who could put up with it day after day."

Going to the door, he asked one of the clerks to send Saunders to him if he was quite disengaged. A moment later his partner entered. The last five years had served him well. He had never looked better. His skin was clear, his eyes bright, his movement calm and alert.

"Did you want to see me?" he asked.

"If you are not busy," Mostyn replied.

"Nothing to do just now," Saunders said, sitting down near the desk.

Mostyn gave him a troubled look. "The old man has just left," he said.

"I thought I recognized his voice," Saunders answered. "He has a way of talking quite loud of late."

There was a pause, during which Mostyn continued to stare with fluttering lashes; then he said:

"He is giving me a great deal of trouble, Saunders—a great deal."

"I see he is; in fact, all of us have noticed it."

"It is getting more and more serious," Mostyn sighed, heavily. "You see, it is not only here that he talks. He goes to the other banks and to the offices of the brokers and chatters like a child about our confidential affairs. I am afraid he will do us absolute financial injury. He is insanely suspicious, and there is no telling what report he may set afloat."

"I think most persons understand his condition," Saunders returned. "Delbridge does, I know. He goes to see Delbridge often. I see your predicament and sympathize with you. The old man has lost all his discretion, and you really cannot afford to confer with him."

"The trouble is, he has his legal rights," Mostyn said, tentatively, "and the slightest thing may turn him against me. There are shyster lawyers here who would not hesitate to advise him wrongly. They would get their fee, and that is all they would want. As I look at it the situation is serious, and growing worse."

"It is awkward, to say the least," Saunders admitted, "and I confess that I do not know what to advise."

"Well, that is all," Mostyn concluded. "I wanted to speak to you about it. He upsets me every time he comes in, and he is quite as troublesome at home, I assure you. I envy you, old chap, with your care-free life, spent half in the country. How is your plantation?"

"Fine—never had better crops." Saunders's eyes kindled with latent enthusiasm. "The weather has been just right this season. Run up and spend next Sunday with me. It will do you good. You stay in town too much."

Mostyn shrugged his shoulders. He sighed and bowed his head over his papers. "Not this season," he said, as if his thoughts were far away. Suddenly he cast a wavering glance at his partner, hesitated, and said:

"I have always wanted to go back up there, Saunders. That was one period of my life that is constantly before me. I may as well speak of it and be done with it. You always seemed to shirk the subject, and I have hesitated to mention it, but there is no one else I could question. The last time I heard of Dolly Drake she was still unmarried. Is there any likelihood of her marrying?"

Mostyn's eyes were downcast, and he failed to see the half-angry flush which was creeping over Saunders's face.

"I really can't say," he returned, coldly. "She is still teaching school, and is in the best of health; but, Mostyn, you have no right to think—to fancy that she has remained single because—"

"Oh, I don't!" the other sighed. "I'm not such a fool. She knows me too well by this time for that."

There was an awkward pause. Saunders, with eyes on the door, was rising. With an appealing look of detention in his worn face Mostyn also stood up. "I'd give a great deal to see her. I'd be glad even to see a picture of her. I wonder what she looks like now. She was scarcely more than a child when she and I—when we parted. I don't think there can be any harm in my being frank in these days when the wives of men make a jest of matrimonial love, and I confess freely that I have never been able to forget—"

"Don't tell me about it!" Saunders interrupted. "You have no right, Mostyn, even to think of her after—after what took place. But you ought to have sense enough, at any rate, to know that she wouldn't continue to care for you all these years. I see her now and then and talk to her. I am helping her build a new schoolhouse up there on some land I donated, and have had to consult her several times of late about the building-plans. She is more beautiful and brilliant than ever, though she still has cares enough. Her father doesn't make much of a living, and her brother George is engaged to one of the girls in the neighborhood and so cannot be counted on for help. Ann is a young lady now, and Dolly dresses her nicely at her own expense."

"Of course, I know that she has forgotten me," Mostyn said, with feeling. "I made the one great mistake of my life when I—you know what I mean, Saunders?"

"Yes, I know," Saunders answered, quickly, "but that is past and gone, Mostyn. The main harm you did was, perhaps, to kill her faith in men in general. I don't really think she will ever give her heart to any one. She seems farther from that sort of thing than any woman I ever met. She has had, I think, many suitors."

"Then from what you say I gather that she doesn't mention me?" Mostyn said, heavily. "She has no curiosity at all to know how—how my marriage terminated?" "How could she have?" Saunders asked, frigidly. "We'd better not talk of it, Mostyn. I am sure she would not wholly approve of this conversation. But in justice to her I must insist that she is not broken-hearted by any means. She is as brave and cheerful as she ever was. Her character seems to have deepened and sweetened under the knowledge of the world which she acquired by her unfortunate experience with you."

When Saunders had left, Mostyn bowed his head on his desk.

"If I had been the sort of man Saunders is, Dolly would have been my wife," he thought. "My wife! my wife! actually my wife!"



CHAPTER II



That afternoon when the bank was closed Mostyn went home. He walked for the sake of the exercise and with the hope of distracting his mind from the many matters which bore more or less heavily on his tired brain. As he approached the gate the sight of his little son playing on the lawn with a miniature tennis racket and ball gave him a thrill of delight. The boy was certainly beautiful. He had great brown eyes, rich golden hair, was sturdy, well built, and active for a child of only four years.

The father opened the gate softly, and when within the yard he hid himself behind the trunk of an oak and cautiously peered out, watching the little fellow toss the ball and make ineffectual efforts to hit it with the racket. Then Mostyn whistled softly, saw the boy drop his racket and look all round, his sweet face alert with eagerness. Mostyn whistled again, and then the child espied him and, with hands outstretched, came running, laughing and shouting gleefully.

"I see you, Daddy!" he cried. Whereupon Mostyn slipped around the tree out of sight, letting the amused child follow him. Round after round was made, and then, suddenly stooping down, the father caught the boy in his arms and raised him up. Pressing him fondly to his breast, he kissed the warm, flushed cheeks.

Till dusk he played with the child on the grass, pitching the ball and teaching the little fellow to hit it. Then Hilda, the mulatto nurse, came for her charge, and little Dick, with many expostulations, was taken away.

Going into the house, Mostyn met his father-in-law in the hall. The old man stopped him abruptly at the foot of the stairs.

"Did any mail come for me on the noon train?" he demanded, querulously, a light of suspicion in his eyes.

"Not that I know of," Mostyn answered. "It was not put on my desk, I am sure."

"Well, some of it goes somewhere," Mitchell complained. "I know I don't see it all. I've written letters that would have been answered by this time, and it wouldn't surprise me if somebody down there was tampering with it."

Seeing the utter hopelessness of bringing his father-in-law to reason by explanation or argument, Mostyn went on up-stairs. Noticing that the door of his wife's chamber, adjoining his own, was ajar, he pushed it open and went in. The room was brightly illuminated with electric light, and standing before a tall pier-glass he found his wife. She wore a costly evening gown of rare old lace and was trying on a pretty diamond necklace.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, indifferently, as she caught sight of him over her bare powdered shoulder. "I thought it was Cousin Kitty. She promised to be here early. If she is late we'll have to go without her. She is awfully slow. I saw you playing with Dick on the grass. He makes too much noise, screaming out like that, and you only make him worse cutting up with him as you do. Between you and that boy and father, with his constant, babyish complaints, I am driven to desperation."

Mostyn shrugged his shoulders wearily, and sat down in a chair at her quaint mahogany dressing-table. Irene had not changed materially, though a close observer, had the light been that of day, might have remarked that she was thinner and more nervous. Her eyes held a shadowy, unsatisfied expression, and her voice was keyed unnaturally high.

Noticing his unwonted silence, she put down her hand-mirror and eyed him with a slow look of irritation. "Of course, you are not going to- night," she said.

"Hardly," he smiled, satirically, "being quite uninvited."

"Well, you needn't say it in that tone," she answered. "You have only yourself to blame. You never accept such invitations, so how could you expect people to run after you with them?"

"I don't expect them to," he answered, tartly. "If they asked me I'd decline. I simply don't enjoy that sort of thing at all."

"Of course you don't," she laughed. "The last time you went to a ball you looked like an insane man pacing up and down all by yourself. Kitty said you asked her to dance and forgot all about it. Dick, your day is over."

"I wonder if yours ever will be," he sniffed. "I see no prospect of it. You are on the go night and day. You are killing yourself. It is as bad as the morphine habit with you. You love admiration more than any woman I ever saw."

She arched her neck before the glass and turned to him wearily. "Do you know what you'll do in another minute? You'll talk yourself into another one of your disgusting rages over my own private affairs. You are a business man and would not violate an ordinary business agreement, but you are constantly ignoring the positive compact between us."

"I didn't expect at the time to have you going so constantly with a man that—"

"Oh, you didn't?" she laughed, tantalizingly. "You were to have all sorts of outside freedom, but I was not. Well, you were mistaken, that's all. I know whom you are hinting at. You mean Andy Buckton. I'm going with him to-night. Why shouldn't I? He's got up the party for me. Dick, don't tell me that you are actually jealous. It would be too delicious for anything."

"I can't ask you not to go with the fellow," Mostyn answered, "considering the well-known habits of your limited set to lay down new laws of conduct, but you nor no other woman can form the slightest idea of what it costs a man's pride to have people say that his wife is constantly seen with a man who always has been in love with her."

An almost imperceptible gleam of delight flashed into Irene's eyes, and a tinge of real color struggled beneath the powder on her face.

"You don't mean, Dick, that he really, really loves me?" she said, lingeringly.

"I think he does," Mostyn answered, bluntly. "He never got over your refusal to marry him. He shows it on every occasion. Everybody knows it, and that's what makes it so hard to—to put up with. I think I really have a right to ask the mother of my child to—"

"Don't begin that, Dick!" Irene commanded, sharply. "I have my rights, and you shall respect them. It is cowardly of you to always mention the boy in that way. I am not crazy about children, and I won't pretend to be. You know I did not want a child in the first place. I am not that sort. I want to have a good time. I like admiration. I like amusements. You men get the keenest sort of pleasure out of gambling in stocks and futures. All day long you are in a whirl of excitement. But you expect us women to stay at home and be as humdrum as hens in a chicken-house. You are to have your fun and come home and have us wives pet you and pamper you up for another day of delight. Dick, that may go all right with farmers' wives who haven't shoes to wear out to meeting, but it won't do for women with money of their own to spend."

"I knew that would come," he flashed at her. "It always does crop up sooner or later."

"You are out of temper to-night, Dick," she retorted. "And it is simply because I am going with Andy Buckton. You needn't deny it."

"I don't like the gossip that is going around." Mostyn frowned and bit his mustache as he said this. "The people of Atlanta, as a whole, are moral, conservative citizens, and the doings of your small set are abhorrent to them."

"My set!" Irene forced a harsh, mirthless laugh. "And for goodness' sake, what do they think of your set? You force me to say this, Dick. There is not a person in this city who has not heard of you and that unspeakable Winship woman."

Mostyn flinched beneath the gaze she bent on him. "That is a thing of the past, Irene, and you know it," he stammered, trying to keep his temper.

"I can consider it a thing of the past," she returned, coldly, "if I will take your word for it, just as you may or may not take my word for my conduct with Andy Buckton. Oh, I suppose it is nothing for a wife to see the knowing smiles that pass around when the gaudy creature shows up at the theater or ball-game accompanied by gamblers and bar-keepers. The brazen thing stares straight at me whenever I am near her."

Mostyn was now white with restrained fury. He stood up. "I will not go over all that again," he said. "The mistake I made was in ever owning up to the thing."

"You had to own up to it," Irene answered, bluntly. "I knew it when we were married, and I would not mention it now if you were not constantly nagging me about my actions. Dick, you will have to let me alone. I won't take advice from you."

He met her frank eyes with a shrinking stare. "I shall let you alone in the future," he faltered. "I see I have to. You are merciless. For the sake of the boy we must live in harmony. God knows we must!"

"All right," she laughed, coldly, "that is another agreement. Harmony is the word. Now, go away. Kitty is not coming. She may be going with some one else."

Mostyn went to his room across the hall. He bathed his bloodless face and hands and automatically brushed his hair before the glass, eying his features critically. "Can that actually be me?" he whispered to the grim reflection. "I look like a man of sixty. I'm as old and decrepit as—Jeff Henderson. Why did I think of him? Why am I constantly thinking of that old man, unless it is because he has predicted my ruin so confidently? He seems as sure of it as he is of the air he breathes. If evil thought bearing on a man can hurt him, as the mental scientists believe, Henderson's will eventually get me down. He would give his life to permanently injure me. So would Marie. She can't forgive me for ignoring her. She can't understand any more than I do why I ignore her."

There was a rap on the door. It was a servant to ask if he wanted his supper.

"Not now," he answered. "Keep it for me. I'll be in later."



CHAPTER III



He went down to the lawn, lighted a cigar, and began to smoke, striding nervously back and forth. A smart pair of horses hitched to a trap whirled into the carriage-drive and stopped in the porte-cochere. In the rays from the overhead lamp Mostyn saw Buckton alight and ascend the steps to the veranda. A half-smoked cigar cast into the shrubbery emitted a tiny shower of sparks. Mostyn saw the young man peering in at the window of the lighted drawing-room. He noted the spick-and-span appearance, the jaunty, satisfied air of expectancy, and his blood began to boil with rage.

"My God!" he groaned. "She may be falling in love with him—if she has not always loved him, and he now knows it. She may have told him so. And when they are alone together, as they will be in a few minutes on the road, what more natural than that he should caress her? I would have done it with any man's wife if I had felt an inclination. I am the joke of the town and must bear it. I must stand by and let my wife and another man—"

Buckton was at the door speaking to the maid who had answered his ring.

"No; tell her, please, that I'll wait out here on the lawn." Mostyn remarked the note of curbed elation in the voice, and saw Buckton turn down the steps.

A match flared in the handsome face as another cigar was lighted. Fearing that he might have been seen from the drive, Mostyn was compelled to step forward and greet the man with the conventional unconcern he had been able to summon to his aid on former occasions.

"Hello," he heard himself saying, automatically, as he strode across the grass to the other smoker. "Fine evening for your shindig."

"Tiptop," Buckton said, with a sort of restraint Mostyn inwardly resented. "Couldn't have turned out better. Sorry you've cut out the giddy whirl, old man. As I passed your bank this morning I thought of asking you, but you have refused so many times that—"

"Oh no." Mostyn heartily despised the role he was playing. "I am no longer good at that sort of thing."

"Had your day, I see," Buckton laughed, significantly. "You certainly kept the pace, if all tales are true. The sort of thing we do these days must be tame by comparison."

"Oh, I don't know," Mostyn returned, with enforced carelessness. "Men are the same the world over. I have not yet had a chance to congratulate you on your recent good fortune."

"Thanks, old man." Buckton puffed his smoke into the still moonlight. "It certainly was a lift to me. I was never cut out for business, and I was at the end of my row. I confess I am not complaining now. I am just at the age to know how to spend money."

The talk languished. Both men seemed suddenly burthened by obtrusive self-consciousness. Buckton twisted his mustache nervously and flicked at the ashless tip of his cigar, glancing toward the house. "Oh, I quite forgot to deliver Miss Kitty's message to Irene—to Mrs. Mostyn, I should say. She was to drive out with us, but at the last minute Dr. Regan found that he could get off and asked her to go in his car."

"Arranged between them," Mostyn thought, darkly. "I know the trick. Regan doesn't care a rap for Kitty. It is part of the game, and I am the tool."

"I understand you have a new car yourself," Mostyn said, aloud.

"Yes, and experts tell me that it is the best in town. I'll run around and take you out some day. But I really care more for horses. It may be due to my Virginia blood. I wouldn't swap this pair for all the cars in town. For a trip like this to-night horses come handy. There are some rough places between here and my home."

"It does away with the chauffeur," Mostyn said, inwardly, as his tongue lay dead in his mouth. He glanced toward the open doorway. "Irene may be ready," he remarked, moving toward the house.

"Yes, I see her coming down the stairs," answered Buckton, dropping his cigar, a look of boyish eagerness capturing his face. "I'll run on and help her with her wraps. So long, old man."

Mostyn made some inarticulate response of no import in particular, and dropped back, allowing Buckton to stride on to the veranda, his hat jauntily swinging at his side. Irene was now in the doorway, poised like a picture in a frame.

Slinking farther away beneath the trees and behind shrubbery, Mostyn heard the greetings between the two, and saw them shaking hands, standing face to face. Irene looked so young, so different from the calculating woman who had just asserted her financial and marital rights in her chamber. No wonder that her escort was fascinated when she had so long been withheld from him! Mostyn told himself that he well knew the "stolen-sweets" sensation. He peered above a clump of boxwood like a thief, upon grounds to which he was unaccustomed, and watched them as they got into the trap. Irene's rippling laugh, and Buckton's satisfied response as he tucked the robes about her, seemed things of Satanic design. They were off. The restive pair, with high- reined, arching necks, trotted down the drive to the street, and a moment later were out of sight.

Mostyn went into the house, back to the desolate dining-room, and sat down in his chair at the head of the table. The maid who came to receive his order and turn on a fuller light had a look in her eyes which indicated that she was aware of his mood. He would have resented it had he dared, but it was only one of many things which had of late grated on him but could not be prevented.

"Has Mr. Mitchell had his supper?" Mostyn asked, applying himself reluctantly to the simple repast before him.

"Yes, sir, and gone up to his room," the girl answered. "He is out of sorts to-day. I have never seen him so troublesome. He has threatened to discharge us all."

"Don't mind him." Mostyn's voice sounded to him as if uttered by some tongue other than his own. He half fancied that the maid, for reasons peculiar to her class, had a sort of contempt for him. She, as well as the other servants, no doubt thought of him as having married for money, Mitchell's fortune being so much larger than his own diminished and ever-lessening capital.

Supper over, he went back to the veranda. Should he go to the club, as he sometimes did to pass an evening? He had a feeling against it. He did not care for cards or drinking, and they were the chief amusements indulged in by the habitual loungers about the rooms. There might be some summer play on at one of the theaters, but as a rule they were very poor at that season of the year, and he knew he had a frame of mind which could not be diverted. At this juncture he became conscious of something of an almost startling nature. It was an undefinable, even maternal feeling that he ought to stay with his child. He shrugged his shoulders and smiled at the sheer absurdity of the idea, yet it clung to him persistently. He tried to analyze it; it eluded analysis. It had haunted him before, and the time had always been when Irene was away. Was it some strange psychic sympathy or bond of blood between his motherless offspring and himself? Was his guilty soul whispering to him that he was responsible for the deserted human bud, and that he, man though he was, should give it the care and love denied it?

Obeying an impulse he could not put down, he turned into the house and softly ascended the stairs. The door of the nursery was open. A low- turned light was burning in a night-lamp on the bureau. The nurse was below eating with the other servants. He was alone and unobserved. The child was asleep in its little white bed, and he crept forward and looked down upon it. The night being warm, little Richard was not covered, and, with his shapely legs and fair breast exposed, he lay asleep. There was a suggestion of a smile on the beautiful face, the pink lips were parted, the dainty fingers were clutched as if holding some dream-object tight in their clasp.

With a sigh that was almost audible the father turned away. At the door he glanced back, having noted the intense warmth of the room. The nurse, as many of her tropical race are apt to do, had forgotten to ventilate the chamber. The two windows were closed. Angrily he crept across the carpeted floor and noiselessly raised the sashes as high as they would go, feeling the fresh air stream in. With a parting glance at the sleeper he withdrew.

Descending the stairs, he went out on the lawn again. Even that scrap of Nature's realm had a tendency to soothe his snarled sensibilities. It might have been the dew which was rising and cooling his feet, or the pale, blinking stars, the sedative rays of which seemed to penetrate to his seething brain. He remembered John Leach's sermon that day in the mountains at the cross-roads store. The fellow had found something. He had found the way of the life spiritual, and it had come to him through sin, suffering, humiliation, and final self- immolation. Mostyn recalled the resolutions he had made under the influence of the man's compelling eloquence; he recalled the breaking of the resolutions. He thought of Dolly Drake, and groaned in actual pain of body and soul. He told himself that he had then deliberately trampled under foot his last spiritual opportunity. "Dolly Drake, Dolly Drake!" the words, unuttered though they were by lips which he felt were too profane for such use, seemed to float like notes of accusing music. Saunders had said she was more beautiful than ever. She might have been his but for his weakness. Perhaps she still thought of him now and then. If she could know of this unconquerable despair, she would pity him. How sweet such pity as hers would be! A sob struggled up within him and threatened to burst; he felt the sharp pain of suppression in his breast. It was as if his soul was urging his too-callous body to weep. Dolly was as unobtainable as the heaven of the tramp preacher's vision. For Mostyn only protracted evil was now available, and that was sickening to his very thought.

He wondered, seeing that it was now ten o'clock, if he could go to sleep. In deep sleep he would be able to forget. He decided to try. He went up to his room, and, aided only by the moonlight, which fell through the windows, he undressed and threw himself down on his bed. For an hour he was wakeful. He was just becoming drowsy when he heard voices in the nursery across the hall. He recognized the sharp, scolding voice of the nurse, and the timid reply of the child. Rising, Mostyn went to the open door of the nursery and looked in.

"What is it?" he asked.

"He is begging to go to your bed," the woman answered, peevishly. "You've spoiled him, Mr. Mostyn. He wants to do it every night. He is getting worse and worse."

A thrill of delight, yearning delight, passed over the father. He stood silent for a moment, ashamed to have even the black servant suspect what he so keenly desired.

"Daddy, Dick wants you," a voice soft, tremulous, and unspeakably appealing came from the little bed.

"Hush, and go to sleep!" the nurse called out. "You are a bad boy, keeping us awake like this."

"No, let him come," Mostyn said, in a voice which was husky, and shook against his will. "Come, Dick!"

The little white-robed form slid eagerly from the bed and fairly ran to the arms which were hungrily outstretched. With the soft body against his breast, a confident arm about his neck, the father bore him to his room and put him down on the back side of the wide bed.

"Now you will sleep, won't you?" he said, his voice exultantly tender.

"Yes, Daddy." Dick stretched his pretty legs out straight. Silence filled the room; the mystic rays of moonlight falling in at the window seemed to bring with them the despondent murmur of the city outside. The deep, fragrant breathing of the child soon showed that he was asleep. Cautiously Mostyn propped himself up on his elbow and looked into the placid face. "He has my brow," he mused, bitterly; "my hands; my ears; my long ringers, with their curving nails; my slender ankles and high-instepped feet; and, my God! he has my telltale sensual lips. Here am I in the throes of a hell produced by infinite laws. What is to prevent him—the helpless replica of myself—from taking the way I took? The edge of the alluring abyss will crumble under his blind tread as it crumbled under mine, and this—this—this cloying horror which is on me to-night may be my gift to him—for whose sake I would die—yes, die!"

Silently Mostyn left the bed and took a seat on the broad sill of one of the windows overlooking the lawn.

"What will be the end?" he asked himself. "It can't go on like this. I am not man enough to stand it. If I were not afraid of death, I would —no, I wouldn't"—he glanced at the bed—"I am responsible for his being here. He is the flower of my corruption. God may desert him, but I won't. I will protect him, love him, pity him, care for him to the end."

A cold drop fell on his hand and trickled through his fingers. He was weeping.



CHAPTER IV



Saunders spent the end of that week on his plantation in the mountains. On Saturday morning he dropped in at Drake's to see Dolly. John Webb came to the door in response to his rap. He was quite unchanged. Even the clothes he was wearing had the same look as those he wore five years before.

"She ain't here," he said. "I seed 'er, with some books an' papers under 'er arm, headed for the schoolhouse just after breakfast. I reckon she's got some examples to work or compositions to write. They are fixin' for a' exhibition of some sort for the last Friday in this month. Dolly writes a big part o' the stuff the scholars read in public, an' you bet some of it is tiptop. When she is in a good humor she can compose a' article that will make a dog laugh. She is out o' sorts to-day."

"Oh, is that so?" Saunders was moving toward the gate. "Has anything gone wrong?"

"She is bothered about George," Webb answered. "It is first one thing and then another with her. George's crop is a failure this year and he is up to his neck in debt. On top o' that he wants to get married. You know him an' Ida Benson are crazy to get tied, and it was to come off in the fall, but George won't be able to buy a new shirt, to say nothin' of a whole outfit. The boy is awful downhearted, and so is his gal. Dolly busted out an' cried last night while George was a-talkin'. She says Ida will be the makin' of the boy, but they can't stir a peg as it is, for they hain't got a dollar betwixt 'em."

"Well, I'll walk by the schoolhouse and see if Dolly is there," Saunders remarked. "It is on my way home."

As he drew near the little building at the roadside he noticed that the front door was open, and, peering in, he saw Dolly at her desk. She was not at work; indeed, she seemed quite preoccupied with her thoughts, for she was staring fixedly at an open window, a troubled frown on her sweet face. She heard Saunders's step at the door, and, seeing him enter, she began to smile.

"You caught me," she laughed, impulsively. "I was having one of my silly fits of blues. I am glad you came in. You always make me ashamed of my despondency."

"You are freer from it than any human being I ever saw," he declared, as he shook hands with her. "I seldom have the blues; but if I did, one thought of your wonderful patience would knock them higher than a kite."

She laughed merrily, her eyes twinkling, the warm color flushing her face, as was always the case when she was animated. "I suppose it is generally due to one's point of view," she said. "When it concerns myself I can manage very well, but if it is any one else—"

"A dear brother, for instance," Saunders put in, sympathetically, "and his laudable desire to marry a worthy girl."

She looked at him steadily in mild surprise. "I see you know," she nodded. "I suppose half the county are sorry for that pair. George does try so hard, and yet everything the poor boy touches goes the wrong way. It is not his fault. He is young and inexperienced and so full of hope. He is so downhearted to-day that he wouldn't go to work. He got a letter from Cross & Mayhew last night. You know they advanced him his supplies for this season and took a mortgage on his crop as security. It seems that they sent a man out here the other day to see how he was getting on. The man reported the condition of George's crop, and they wrote him that they would not credit him for his supplies next season. That was the last straw. I found him actually crying down at the barn. He had gone into the stall where his horse was feeding and had his arms around the animal's neck. Mr. Saunders, you can't imagine my feelings. I love my brother with all my heart. I offered to help him with part of my wages, but he was too proud to accept a cent. That letter from Cross & Mayhew humiliated him beyond description. It bowed him down; young as he is, he is actually crushed. He is coming here this morning to talk to me. He wants to go West with the hope that he may get started there and come back for Ida. I can't bear to have him go—I simply can't stand it. I want him to stay here at home. It is the place for them both."

"I think so, too," Saunders said, sympathetically. "There is no better spot on earth for a young farmer."

"I am glad you agree with me"—Dolly brightened a little—"and if you should get a chance I wish you would advise him to stay. You have wonderful influence, with both him and my father."

"I didn't know that," Saunders said, modestly.

Dolly smiled, a far-off expression in her deep eyes. "They think you are the best and wisest man in the world. And as for Ann, do you know you did me a wonderful favor in regard to her?"

"You surprise me." Saunders flushed red. "I didn't know that I had ever—I don't remember-"

"No, I'm sure you don't, and I didn't mention it, but I'm going to tell you now, for I am very, very grateful. You know, perhaps, that Ann used to care a good deal for that reckless fellow Abe Westbrook?"

"Yes, I remember seeing them together frequently," Saunders answered.

"Well, he became more and more dissipated and so bold and ill-bred that he even came to see her when he was intoxicated. I was afraid to call father's attention to it for two reasons—first, father's temper, and then the fear I had that Ann might elope with the fellow. So I had to be very, very cautious. I tried talking to Ann, but it went in at one ear and out at the other. Nothing I said had the slightest effect on her. Then she got to meeting him at different places away from home, and I was almost crazy. Then you, as you always have done, came to my aid."

"I? Why, Dolly, I am sure that I have never—"

"You don't remember it"—Dolly's voice shook, and a delicate glow suffused her face—"but I'll remind you. You recall the picnic over the mountain last spring?"

"The day you didn't go," Saunders nodded. "I remember looking for you everywhere."

"Well, that day, when all the girls felt so highly honored by your presence, and you were so nice to them, you paid a good deal of attention to Ann, asking her to drive home with you."

"Of course I remember that," Saunders said; "I enjoyed the drive very much."

"It wasn't anything you said, exactly," Dolly went on, "but you may remember that Abe was drinking that day and misbehaved badly before every one, even when they were all eating lunch together. Ann told me all about it. She came to my bed away in the night and waked me. She told me she had made up her mind never to see Westbrook again. In contrasting him with you she saw what a failure he was. She said she had never before so plainly seen her danger. She saw the look of disgust in your face while Abe was acting so badly, and your failure to refer to the incident on the way home impressed her. That happening completely turned her round, opened her eyes, and already she has stopped thinking of him."

Saunders was modestly trying to formulate some protest when, looking toward the door, Dolly suddenly exclaimed: "Oh, there is George now! Don't leave," for Saunders was rising. "I can see him at home."

"I must be going, anyway," Saunders said, rather nervously, "but if you will let me I'd like to take you for a drive this afternoon. We could pass the new schoolhouse and see how it is coming on."

"I'll be glad to go," Dolly answered. "I understand the men are making fine progress."

Seeing Saunders coming out, George stepped aside just outside the door to let him pass, and they met face to face. The banker's sympathies were deeply touched by the dejected mien of the courageous young man, whom he had always liked.

"Hello, George," he greeted him, cordially. "Your sister tells me you are thinking of pulling up stakes and moving West."

"Yes, I think it is about the best thing for me, now, Mr. Saunders," George answered, gloomily. "I've given this thing a fair test. Perhaps out there among strangers I may have a change of luck. I can't make it go here. I'm a drawback to myself and everybody else. Even Dolly is upset by my troubles, and when she gives up things are bad, sure enough. You can't imagine how a fellow feels in my fix."

"I think I can, George." Glancing back, Saunders noted that Dolly was looking straight at them. He put his hand on the young man's shoulder and let it rest there gently while he went on: "Still, George, I would not advise you to leave home. You see, here you are surrounded by old friends and relatives. Among total strangers the fight for success would be even harder, and I am afraid you'd be homesick for these old mountains. I have met a good many who have come back after a trial at farming out there. They all say this country is as good as any."

"But I am actually at the end of my rope." George's voice shook afresh, and the shadow about his eyes deepened. "Has Dolly told you about Cross & Mayhew?"