When the thought of trying to refine the somewhat rude household in which she dwelt occurred to her, she discovered that the work was already well begun, for the chief condition of success was present—the disposition to do as she would like. The Atwoods soon surmised that the family was in trouble of some kind, and were able to distinguish between pride of caste and a sorrowful preoccupation. It was scarcely in Mrs. Jocelyn and Mildred's nature to speak otherwise than gently and kindly, and so without trying they disarmed their hosts and won their sympathy. Notwithstanding their dejection and lassitude, they maintained the habits of their lives, and unwittingly gave Mrs. Atwood and her daughter a vague impression that neatness, attractiveness, and order were as essential as good morals.

At first Roger had dressed more roughly than ever, in order to assert his right to his old ways, but as Mildred did not protest even by a glance, he next took pains to show her that he had "good clothes" if he chose to wear them. This fact she also accepted without the faintest interest, and so at last he was rather nonplussed. He was not accustomed to being politely ignored, and since he felt a growing interest in this new type of girl, he had an increasing desire to make her aware of his existence. "Hang it all," he would mutter, "I'm no more to her than Jotham and the other farm animals. What can a fellow do to make her look at him as if she saw him? She's very kind and polite and all that; she'd as soon hurt the brindle cow as me, but this fact is not very flattering. However, I'll find you out, my lady, and you too shall learn that the one whom you now regard as an object merely has a will and a way of his own."

Therefore it may be guessed that in Roger Mildred might discover more docility and plastic readiness than she desired. Only old Mr. Atwood and Jotham seemed incorrigible material; but she did not despair even of them, and resolved to set about reclaiming this family from barbarism at once.



CHAPTER VII

COMPARISONS

"Mrs. Atwood," said Mildred one Saturday evening, "I'll go with you to church to-morrow if you'll let me. Belle has been once, and it will be my turn to-morrow."

"Oh, certainly, miss; you will go with Roger in the buggy, I s'pose, like Miss Belle."

"If you please, I'd rather go with you."

"Really, miss, the roads have been muddy of late, and the wagon isn't very nice."

"I would rather go with you," pleaded Mildred, with an appeal in her blue eyes that few resisted.

"Father," said Mrs. Atwood, as soon as her husband came in, "Miss Jocelyn wishes to go with us to meeting to-morrow. Can't you or Roger tidy up the wagon a bit? 'Tain't fit for her to ride in."

"There'tis again—more time spent in fixing up and fussing than in looking after the main chance. You are all gettin' too fine for plain farmin' people."

"I don't see why plain farming people need enjoy mud more'n other folks. You ought to be ashamed to ask your wife and daughter to ride in such a wagon."

"I don't know why I should be more ashamed to-morrow than on any other Sunday, and you was never ashamed before. Your boarders don't seem inclined to take any rides and pay for them, so I don't see why I should fix up any more'n usual. Anyhow, it's too late now; Jotham's gone home, I'm too tired, and Roger's dressed to go out. Why can't she go with Roger?"

"She says she'd rather go with us, and if you men-folk let her ride in that wagon I hope the minister will give you a scorching sermon"—and she turned toward her son, who, dressed in his rural finery, was finishing an early supper, To her surprise he, from whom she expected no aid, gave her a significant nod and put his finger on his lips. He had already decided upon one bold stratagem, in the hope of opening Mildred's eyes, and if this failed his mother's words suggested another line of policy.

"Sue," he said, with affected carelessness, "I may bring Amelia Stone to spend part of the evening with you."

"Amelia Stone isn't my style, if the young men do say she's the prettiest girl in town."

"If you don't treat her well she'll think you're jealous," said Roger, and with this artful stroke he departed to carry out his experiment. "I'll teach my city lady that I'm not a clodhopper that other girls won't look at," he thought as he drove away.

Everything went according to his mind, for Amelia broke an engagement in order to come with him, and was very friendly. The young fellow thought that Mildred must see that he was not a person to be politely ignored when so handsome a girl was flattering in her favors. Susan would not be thought jealous for the world, and so was rather effusive over Miss Stone. She also imbibed the idea that it might be a good chance to make Mildred aware that they knew some nice, stylish people; therefore, as the rural beauty mounted the steps of the porch she introduced her to Mildred and Belle. Roger meanwhile stood near, and critically compared the two, girls. They certainly represented two very different types, and he might have brought a score of his acquaintances that would have been more to Mildred's taste than the florid beauty whose confidence was boldness, and who had inventoried her own pronounced charms more often than had any of her admirers. One girl was a lily, with a character like a delicate, elusive fragrance; the other, a tulip, very striking, especially at a distance. The one no more asserted herself than did the summer evening; the manner of the other the same as button-holed all present, and demanded attention. Her restless black eyes openly sought admiration, and would speedily sparkle with anger and malice should their request be unrewarded. Roger was quick enough to feel Mildred's superiority, although he could scarcely account for it, and he soon experienced so strong a revulsion of feeling toward his unconscious ally that he would have taken her home again with a sense of relief.

"If Miss Jocelyn thinks that's the style of girl that takes with me, I might as well have remained a scarecrow. Amelia Stone seems loud as a brass band beside her," and his gallantries perceptibly diminished.

True to her nature, Amelia assumed toward him what she imagined were very pretty airs of proprietorship. Eoger knew well that her manner would have been the same toward the youth with whom, from a sudden caprice, she had broken her engagement for the evening. Her habitual coquetry nevertheless unwittingly carried out his original programme with a success that made him grind his teeth with rage, for he supposed that Mildred would gain the idea that they were congenial spirits drawn together by strong affinities.

And she, half divining his vexation, shrewdly increased it by pretending to associate him with the transparent coquette, while at the same time manifesting disapproval of her by a fine reserve. Amelia felt herself scanned quietly, coldly, and half curiously, as if she belonged to some strange and hitherto unknown type, and her vivacious egotism began to fail her. She was much relieved therefore when Mildred excused herself and went to her room, for careless, light-hearted, and somewhat giddy Belle imposed no restraint. Roger, however, did not recover himself, for he saw that he had made a false step in his effort to win recognition from Mildred, and he waited impatiently until his companion should suggest returning. This she soon did, and they rode toward her home with a mutual sense of dissatisfaction. At last Amelia broke out, "I think she's absurdly proud!"

"Who?" Eoger asked demurely.

"You know who well enough. I thank my stars we have no city folks putting on airs around our house. I suppose you think her perfection. You looked as if you did."

"I'm not acquainted with her," he said quietly.

"Not acquainted! Darsn't you speak to her high mightiness then?"

"Oh, yes, I can speak to her when there is occasion, but that does not make one acquainted. I don't understand her."

"I do, perfectly. She thinks herself a wonderful deal better than you or me."

"Perhaps she is," he admitted.

"Well! that's a nice speech to make to ME! I was a fool to break my engagement and go with you."

"All right," responded Eoger, with satirical good-nature, as he assisted her to alight; "we'll both know better next time."

She would not speak to Mm again, but he escorted her to her door, and bowed in parting with mocking politeness. Instead of inviting him in, as was her custom, she closed the door with a sharpness that spoke volumes.

"I don't believe Miss Jocelyn ever banged a door like that in her life," he muttered with a smile as he hastened homeward.

Hearing unusual sounds in the farmyard before retiring, Mildred peeped out from under her curtain. The moonlight revealed that Roger was washing the wagon with a vigor that made her laugh, and she thought, "After what I have seen this evening, I think I can civilize him."



CHAPTER VIII

CHANGES

Bent upon carrying out her project of introducing among the Atwoods a more gracious and genial family life, and lured by the fresh coolness of the summer morning, Mildred left her room earlier than usual. Mrs. Atwood, whose one indulgence was a longer sleep on the day of rest, came down not very long after and began bustling about the kitchen. Hitherto their meals had been served to the Jocelyns in the sitting-room, the farmer and his family eating as before in the kitchen. Mildred felt that they had no right to impose this extra labor on Mrs. Atwood, especially on the Sabbath, and she also thought it would do her mother good to be roused from the listless apathy into which she was sinking. These were her chief motives, but she knew that at no other place could people be taught the refinements of life more effectually than at the table, and it was her plan to bring about the changes she desired, without appearing to be the conscious cause.

"Mrs. Atwood," she said, "why can we not all take our breakfast together in the sitting-room this morning? I have noticed that your hired man is absent on Sundays"—her zeal for reform would not induce her to sit down with Jotham—"and I can see no reason why you should have the task to-day of preparing two meals. Of course, if this is not agreeable to you let there be no change, but do not put yourself to the extra trouble on our account."

"Well, now, miss, you are very kind, and to tell you the truth, I was thinking of this very thing, but we don't wish to intrude."

"Intrude, Mrs. Atwood!" exclaimed Mildred, assuming surprise. "I don't understand you, and shall now feel hurt if we do not take our meals together to-day."

"It's very good of you to think of us, and Susan and me will have a more restful day."

Mildred gave her one of her rare smiles, which Mrs. Atwood said "lighted up the old kitchen like a ray of sunshine," and then went to prepare her mother and sister for the change. Belle was pleased, as she ever was with novelty.

"Millie," she cried, "you shall sit next to that great animal, Jotham, and if you don't take care he'll eat you unawares."

"Jotham is not here to-day, and I'll have him fed in the kitchen hereafter."

"Have you become mistress of the farmhouse? Has Roger made proposals? Won't it be fun to hear Mr. Atwood grumble! There is nothing I enjoy more than to hear him grumble and old Gruff growl. They must be chips off the same block."

Mrs. Jocelyn shrank from seeing and speaking to any one, bat was much too unselfish to impose extra tasks on Mrs. Atwood.

Susan soon came down to assist her mother, and was delighted at the prospect of taking her meals in the sitting-room, feeling that it was a decided social promotion. Moreover, like all young girls, she longed for companionship, and believed that Mildred would now be more approachable.

By and by Roger came from the barnyard in his working-clothes, and seeing no preparations for breakfast in the kitchen, exclaimed:

"So we heathen must sit down to the second table to-day."

"Yes, if you wish. Susan and me are going to take our breakfast in the sitting-room with Mrs. Jocelyn and her family."

"Am I not invited?" he asked a little anxiously.

"There's no need of any invitation. You have as much right there as I have, only I would not come in looking like that."

"They won't like it—this new arrangement."

"It seems to me that you have grown very considerate of what they like," put in Susan.

"Miss Jocelyn proposed it herself," Mrs. Atwood said, "and if you and father would fix up a little and come in quietly and naturally it would save a deal of trouble. If I can't get a little rest on Sunday I'll wear out."

Roger waited to hear no more, and went hastily to his room.

Mr. Atwood was more intractable. He distinguished the Sabbath from the rest of the week, by making the most of his larger leisure to grumble.

"I'm in no state to sit down with those people," he growled, after the change and the reasons for it had been explained to him.

"I'm glad you feel so," his wife replied; "but your old clothes have not yet grown fast to you; you can soon fix yourself up, and you might as well dress before breakfast as after it."

He was perverse, however, and would make no greater concession to the unwelcome innovation than to put on his coat. Mildred smiled mentally when she saw him lowering at the head of the table, but an icicle could no more continue freezing in the sun than he maintain his surly mood before her genial, quiet greeting. It suggested courtesy so irresistibly, and yet so unobtrusively, that he already repented his lack of it. Still, not for the world would he have made any one aware of his compunctions. Mrs. Atwood and Susan had their doubts about Roger, fearing that he would rebel absolutely and compel a return to their former habits. They were all scarcely seated, however, before he appeared, a little flushed from his hasty toilet and the thought of meeting one who had been cold and disapproving toward the belle of Forestville, but Mildred said "good-morning" so affably and naturally that he was made quite at ease, and Mrs. Jocelyn, who had seemed unapproachable, smiled upon him so kindly that he was inclined to believe her almost as pretty as her daughter. As for Belle and the children, he already felt well acquainted with them. Mrs. Atwood and Susan looked at each other significantly, for Roger was dressed in his best and disposed to do his best. Mildred saw the glance, and felt that the young fellow deserved some reward, so she began talking to him in such a matter-of-course way that before he was aware he was responding with a freedom that surprised all the family, and none more than himself. Mildred was compelled to admit that the "young barbarian," as she had characterized him in her thoughts, possessed, in the item of intelligence, much good raw material. He not only had ideas, but also the power of expressing them, with freshness and vivacity. She did not give herself sufficient credit for the effects that pleased her, or understand that it was her good breeding and good will that banished his tongue-tied embarrassment. The most powerful influences are usually the most subtle, and Roger found, as had Vinton Arnold and others, that for some cause Mildred evoked the best there was in him.

Poor Mrs. Jocelyn did not have very much to say. Her depression was too deep to be thrown off appreciably, but she replied to Mrs. Atwood's remarks with her wonted gentleness. Belle's spirits soon passed all bounds, and one of her wild sallies provoked a grim smile from even Mr. Atwood, and she exulted over the fact all day. In brief, the ice seemed quite broken between the family and the "boarders."

The old farmer could scarcely believe his eyes when he went out to harness the horses to the three-seated wagon, for it was neat and clean, with buffalo robes spread over the seats. "Well," he ejaculated, "what's a-coming over this here family, anyway? I'm about all that's left of the old rusty times, and rusty enough I feel, with everybody and everything so fixed up. I s'pose I'll have to stand it Sundays, and the day'll be harder to git through than ever. To-morrow I'll be back in the kitchen again, and can eat my victuals without Miss Jocelyn looking on and saying to herself, 'He ain't nice; he don't look pretty'; and then a-showin' me by the most delicate little ways how I ought to perform. She's got Roger under her thumb or he wouldn't have cleaned up this wagon in the middle of the night, for all I know, but I'm too old and set to be made over by a girl."

Thus grumbling and mumbling to himself, Mr. Atwood prepared to take his family to the white, tree-shadowed meeting-house, at which he seldom failed to appear, for the not very devotional reason that it helped him to get through the day. Like the crab-apple tree in the orchard, he was a child of the soil, and savored too much of his source.

Roger was of finer metal, and while possessing his father's shrewdness, hard common-sense and disposition to hit the world between the eyes if it displeased him, his nature was ready at slight incentive, to throw off all coarseness and vulgarity. The greater number of forceful American citizens are recruited from the ranks of just such young men—strong, comparatively poor, somewhat rude in mind and person at the start, but of such good material that they are capable of a fine finish.

Roger had grown naturally, and healthily, thus far. He had surpassed the average boy on the play-ground, and had fallen slightly below him in the school-house, but more from indifference and self-assurance than lack of ability. Even his father's narrow thrift could not complain of his work when he would work, but while a little fellow he was inclined to independence, and persisted in having a goodly share of his time for the boyish sports in their season, and for all the books of travel and adventure he could lay his hands upon. In spite of scoldings and whippings he had sturdily held his own, and at last his father had discovered that Roger could be led much better than driven, and that by getting him interested, and by making little agreements, like that concerning the buggy, the best of the bargain could always be obtained, for the youth would then work with a will and carry out his verbal contracts in a large, good-natured way. Therefore Mildred's belief that he was good raw material for her humanizing little experiment had a better foundation than she knew. Indeed, without in the least intending it, she might awaken a spirit that would assert itself in ways as yet undreamed of by either of them. The causes which start men upon their careers are often seemingly the most slight and causal. Mildred meant nothing more than to find a brief and kindly-natured pastime in softening the hard lives and in rounding the sharp angles of the Atwood family, and Roger merely came in for his share of her attention. Flesh and spirit, however, are not wood and stone, and she might learn in deep surprise that her light aesthetic touches, while producing pleasing changes in externals, had also awakened some of the profoundest motives and forces that give shape and color to life.

In smiling ignorance of such possibilities, she said to him as she came out on the porch dressed for church, "You have given your mother and me also a pleasant surprise, and we shall enjoy our ride to church far more, not only because the wagon is nice and clean, but also because of your thoughtfulness of our pleasure. The wagon looked so inviting from our windows that I have induced my mother to go, and to take the children. I think they will keep still. We will sit near the door, and I can take them out if they get tired."

Her words were very simple, but she spoke them with a quiet grace all her own, while pulling her glove over a hand that seemed too small and white for any of the severer tasks of life. As she stood there in her pretty summer costume, a delicate bloom in her cheeks relieving the transparent fairness of her complexion, she seemed to him, as Amelia Stone had said, perfect indeed—and the young girl could not suppress a smile at the almost boyish frankness of his admiration.

"You gave me a pleasant surprise, also," he said, flushing deeply.

"I?" with a questioning glance.

"Yes. You have brought about a pleasant change, and made breakfast something more than eating. You have made me feel that I might be less nigh of kin to Jotham than I feared."

"I shall imitate your frankness," she replied, laughing; "you are not near so nigh of kin to him as I feared."

"I have not forgotten that you thought me identical with him," he could not forbear saying.

"I did not mean to hurt your feelings," she answered, with deepening color.

"Oh, you were not to blame in the least," he said good-naturedly. "I deserved it."

"You must remember, too," she continued, deprecatingly, "that I am a city girl, and not acquainted with country ways, and so have charity." Then she added earnestly, "We do not want to put a constraint on your family life, or make home seem less homelike to you all."

Mrs. Jocelyn with Belle and the children were descending the stairs. "I misunderstood you, Miss Jocelyn," said Roger, with a penitent look, and he hastily strode away.

"I've disarmed him," thought Mildred, with a half smile. She had, a little too completely.

Belle claimed her old place with Roger, and their light wagon was soon lost in the windings of the road.

"Millie," whispered Belle, as the former joined her at church, "what could you have said to Roger to make him effervesce so remarkably? I had to remind him that it was Sunday half a dozen times."

"What a great boy he is!" answered Mildred.

"The idea of my teaching him sobriety seemed to amuse him amazingly."

"And no wonder. You are both giddy children."

"Until to-day, when you have turned his head, he has been very aged in manner. Please let him alone hereafter; he is my property."

"Keep him wholly," and the amused look did not pass from Mildred's face until service began.

Dinner was even a greater success than breakfast. Mrs. Jocelyn had become better acquainted with Mrs. Atwood during the drive, and they were beginning to exchange housekeeping opinions with considerable freedom, each feeling that she could learn from the other. Fearing justly that a long period of poverty might be before them, Mrs. Jocelyn was awakening to the need of acquiring some of Mrs. Atwood's power of making a little go a great way, and the thought of thus becoming able to do something to assist her absent husband gave her more animation than she had yet shown in her exile. Mildred ventured to fill her vase with some hardy flowers that persisted in blooming under neglect, and to place it on the table, and she was greatly amused to see its effect on Roger and Mr. Atwood. The latter stared at it and then at his wife.

"Will any one take some of the flowers?" he asked at last, in ponderous pleasantry.

"I think we all had better take some, father," said Roger. "I would not have believed that so little a thing could have made so great a difference."

"Well, what is the difference?"

"I don't know as I can express it, but it suggests that a great deal might be enjoyed that one could not put in his mouth or his pocket."

"Mr. Roger," cried Belle, "you are coming on famously. I didn't know that you were inclined, hitherto, to put everything you liked in your mouth or pocket. What escapes some people may have had."

"I never said I liked you," retorted the youth, with a touch of the broad repartee with which he was accustomed to hold his own among the girls in the country.

"No, but if I saw that you liked some one else I might be alarmed"—and she looked mischievously toward Mildred.

For reasons inexplicable to himself, he fell into a sudden confusion at this sally.

With a warning glance at the incorrigible Belle, whose vital elements were frolic and nonsense, Mildred began talking to Mr. Atwood about the great hotel a few miles distant.

"Would you like to go there?" asked Roger after a little.

"No," she said; "I have not the slightest wish to go there." Indeed there was nothing that she shrank from more than the chance of meeting those who had known her in the city.

Later in the day Susan said to her mother, with much satisfaction, "She's not stuck up at all, and we might have found it out before. I can't go back to the kitchen and live in our old haphazard way. I can see now that it wasn't nice at all."

"We'll see," said the politic Mrs. Atwood. "We mustn't drive father too fast."

Roger felt that at last he was getting acquainted, and he looked forward to the long summer evening with much hope. But nothing happened as he expected, for Mildred was silent and preoccupied at supper, and Mrs. Jocelyn appeared to have relapsed into her old depression.

Instead of going out in his buggy to spend the evening with one of his many favorites, as had been his custom, he took a book and sat down under a tree near the porch, so that he might join Mildred if she gave him any encouragement to do so. Belle found him taciturn and far removed from his gay mood of the morning, and so at last left him in peace.

Sue was entertaining a rural admirer in the parlor, which was rarely used except on such momentous occasions, and all was propitious for a quiet talk with the object of his kindling interest. His heart beat quickly as he saw her appear on the porch with her hat and shawl, but instead of noticing him she went rapidly by with bowed head and climbed an eminence near the house, from which there was an extended view to the southward. He felt, as well as saw, that she wished to be alone, that he was not in her thoughts, that she was still as distant from him as he had ever imagined her to be. The shadows deepened, the evening grew dusky, the stars came out, and yet she did not return. For a long time he could see her outline as she sat on the hill top, and then it faded. He knew she was in trouble, and found a vague pleasure in watching with her, in remaining within call should she be frightened, knowing, however, that there was little danger of this in quiet Forestville. Still, the illusion that he was in some sense her protector pleased him in his sentimental mood, and in after years he often recalled this first faint foreshadowing of his lot.

Could he have seen the poor girl, when at last, conscious of solitude and darkness, she gave way to the passionate grief that, for her mother's sake, she had so long repressed, he would have felt that she was distant indeed—far removed by experiences of which he as yet knew nothing. She had been gazing southward, toward the city in which her father was vainly seeking a foothold on the steep incline up which the unfortunate must struggle, and in fancy she saw him lonely, dejected, and deprived of the family life of which he was so fond. Her sympathy for him was as deep as her strong affection. But in spite of her will her thoughts would recur to the beautiful dream which had been shattered in that distant city. Not a word had she heard from Arnold since leaving it, and her heart so misgave her concerning the future that she threw herself on the sod, sobbing bitterly, and almost wishing that she were beneath it and at rest. In the deep abstraction of her grief she had scarcely noted the lapse of time, nor where she was, and the moon had risen when she again glided by Roger, her step and bearing suggesting lassitude and dejection.

Soon after he entered the sitting-room, where he found his mother with a troubled look on her face. "Roger," she said, "I feel sorry for these people. When I went upstairs a while ago I heard Mrs. Jocelyn crying in her room, and coming down with the lamp I met the young lady on the stairs, and her eyes were very red. It's certain they are in deep trouble. What can it be? It's queer Mr. Jocelyn doesn't come to see them. I hope they are all right."

"Mother," he burst out impetuously, "they are all right—she is, anyway," and he went abruptly to his room.

"Well," remarked the bewildered woman sententiously, "there never were such goings on in the old house before."

An event momentous to her had indeed taken place—Roger's boyish days were over.



CHAPTER IX

NEITHER BOY NOR MAN

The two following weeks passed uneventfully at the farmhouse, but silent forces were at work that were as quiet and effective as those of Nature, who makes her vital changes without ever being observed in the act. In respect to the domestic arrangements Mrs. Atwood effected a sensible compromise. She gave the men-folk an early breakfast in the kitchen, so that they might go to their work as usual, and her boarders were thus not compelled to rise at an unaccustomed hour. She and Susan afterward sat down with them, and Mr. Atwood and Roger joined them at dinner and supper. On the Monday following the scenes described in the last chapter, Mildred and Mrs. Jocelyn were listless and unable to recover even the semblance of cheerfulness, for a letter from Mr. Jocelyn informed them that he was making very little headway, and that some agencies which he accepted yielded but a scanty income. Mildred chafed more bitterly than ever over her position of idle waiting, and even grew irritable under it. More than once Roger heard her speak to Belle and the children with a sharpness and impatience which proved her not angelic. This did not greatly disturb him, for he neither "wanted to be an angel" nor wished to have much to do with uncomfortable perfection. A human, spirited girl was quite to his taste, and he was quick-witted enough to see that unrest and anxiety were the causes of her temper. Poor Mrs. Jocelyn was too gentle for irritation, and only grew more despondent than ever at hope deferred.

"Millie," she said, "I have dreadful forebodings, and can never forgive myself that I did not think night and day how to save instead of how to spend. What should we do if we had no money at all?"

"Belle and I must go to work," said Mildred, with a resolute face, "and it's a shame we are not at work now."

"What can you do when your father can do so little?"

"Other poor people live; so can we. I can't stand this wretched waiting and separation much longer," and she wrote as much to her father. In the hope of obtaining a response favorable to her wishes she became more cheerful. Every day increased her resolution to put an end to their suspense, and to accept their lot with such fortitude as they could command.

One morning she found Mr. and Mrs. Atwood preparing to go to the nearest market town with butter, eggs, and other farm produce. She readily obtained permission to accompany them, and made some mysterious purchases. From this time onward Roger observed that she was much in her room, and that she went out more for exercise than from the motive of getting through with the weary, idle hours. For some reason she also gained such an influence over thoughtless Belle that the latter took tolerably good care of little Fred and Minnie, as the children were familiarly called. While she maintained toward him her polite and friendly manner, he saw that he was forgotten, and that it had not entered her mind that he could ever do anything for her or be anything more to her than at the present time. But every hour she gained a stronger hold upon his sympathy, and occasionally, when she thought herself unobserved, he saw a troubled and almost fearful look come into her eyes, as if something were present to her imagination that inspired the strongest dread. At such times he was mastered by impulses of self-sacrifice that would have seemed very absurd if put into plain words. He kept his thoughts, however, to himself, and with an instinctive reticence sought to disguise even from his mother the feelings that were so new, and so full of delicious pain. That he was becoming quite different from the careless, self-satisfied young fellow that he had been hitherto was apparent to all, and after his outburst on Sunday evening his mother half guessed the cause. But he misled her to some extent, and Susan altogether, by saying, "I've had a falling-out with Amelia Stone."

"Well, she's the last girl in the world that I'd mope about if I were a man," was his sister's emphatic reply.

"You're not a man; besides I'm not moping. I'm only cutting my wisdom teeth. I want to do something in the world, and I'm thinking about it."

"He's a-growing," said his mother with a smile, and on this theory she usually explained all of her son's vagaries.

He still further misled his unsophisticated sister by making no special effort to seek Mildred's society. After one or two rather futile attempts he saw that he would alienate the sad-hearted girl by obtrusive advances, and he contented himself by trying to understand her, in the hope that at some future time he might learn to approach her more acceptably. The thought that she would soon leave the farmhouse depressed him greatly. She had suggested to him a new and wholly different life from that which he had led hitherto, and he felt within himself no power or inclination to go on with his old ways. These thoughts he also brooded over in silence, and let himself drift in a current which seemed irresistible.

During this period he was under the influence of neither apathy nor dejection. On the contrary, his mind was surging with half-formed plans, crude purposes, and ambitious dreams. His horizon lifted from the farm and Forestville until there seemed space for a notable career. His soul kindled at the thought of winning a position that would raise him to Mildred's side. So far from fearing to burn his ships, and strike out unsupported, the impulse grew strong to make the attempt at any cost. He was sure that his father would not listen to the project, and that he would be wholly unaided, but riot many days passed before the thought of such obstacles ceased to influence him. "I'll take my way through the world, and cut my own swath," he muttered a hundred times as he swung the scythe under the July sun.

Moreover, he had a growing belief in his power to climb the heights of success. His favorite books of travel and adventure that he had devoured in boyhood made almost anything seem possible, and the various biographies that the village library furnished revealed grand careers in the face of enormous obstacles. His mind was awaking like a young giant eager for achievement. Even after the toil of long, hot days he took up his old school-books in the solitude of his room, and found that he could review them with the ease with which he would read a story. "I've got some brains as well as muscle," he would mutter, exultantly. "The time shall come when Mildred Jocelyn won't mistake me for Jotham."

Poor Mr. Atwood would have been in consternation had he known what was passing in his son's mind; and Mildred even less pleased, for after all it was she who had inspired the thoughts which were transforming him from a simple country youth into an ambitious, venturesome man.

He knew of but one way to please her, but he made the most of that, and worked quietly but assiduously whenever he could without exciting his father's opposition. After the day's tasks were over the time was his own. He began by cutting all the weeds and grass in the door-yard and around the house. Palings that had disappeared from the fence were replaced, and all were whitewashed.

Mrs. Atwood and Susan were greatly pleased at the changes, but thought it politic not to say much about them; one evening, however, his father began to banter him, remarking that Roger must be intending to "bring home a wife some fine morning." The young fellow reddened resentfully, and brusquely retorted that they "had lived in their old slovenly way long enough. People might well think they were going to the bad." This practical view somewhat reconciled his father to the new ideas, and suggested that Roger was not so daft as he feared. A little time after he was led to believe his son to be shrewder than himself. Needing some money, he took a note to the bank with much misgiving, but was agreeably surprised when one of the officers said affably, "I think we can accommodate you, Mr. Atwood. I was by your place the other day, and it is so improved that I scarcely knew it. Thrift and credit go together."

But Mildred doubted whether thrift and policy were the only motives which had led to Roger's unwonted action, and believed rather that he had awakened to a perception of the value and attractiveness of those things which hitherto he had not appreciated. This, in a sense, was already true, but had she known to what extent she was in his thoughts she would not have smiled so complacently when, on the Saturday morning after the completion of his other labors, she noted that the weed-choked flower-borders along the walk had been cleaned and neatly rounded up, and the walk itself put in perfect order. "The flower-beds remind me of himself," she thought, as from time to time she glanced at them through her open window. "They contain a good deal of vacant space, and suggest what might be there rather than what is. Would to heaven, though, that Mr. Arnold had more of his muscle and decision. If Vinton were only different, how different all the future might be! But I fear, I fear. We have not enough money to last all summer if we remain here, and father writes so discouragingly. Thank God, I'm no longer idle, whether anything comes of my work or not," and the delicate piece of fancy work grew rapidly in her deft hands.

Toward evening she started out for a walk, but uttered an exclamation of surprise as she saw the flower-borders were bright with verbenas, heliotrope, geraniums, and other bedding plants. Roger's buggy stood near, containing two large empty boxes, and he was just raking the beds smooth once more in order to finish his task.

"Why, Mr. Atwood!" she cried, "it has long seemed to me that a good fairy was at work around the house, but this is a master-stroke."

"If you are pleased I am well repaid," he replied, the color deepening on his sunburned cheeks.

"If I am pleased?" she repeated in surprise, and with a faint answering color. "Why, all will be pleased, especially your mother and Susan."

"No doubt, but I thought these would look more like what you have been accustomed to."

"Really, Mr. Atwood, I hope you have not put yourself to all this trouble on my account."

"I have not put myself to any trouble. But you are in trouble, Miss Jocelyn, and perhaps these flowers may enliven you a little."

"I did not expect such kindness, such thoughtfulness. I do not see that I am entitled to so much consideration," she said hesitatingly, at the same time fixing on him a penetrating glance.

Although he was much embarrassed, his clear black eyes met hers without wavering, and he asked, after a moment: "Could you not accept it if it were given freely?"

"I scarcely understand you," she replied in some perplexity.

"Nor do I understand you, Miss Jocelyn. I wish I did, for then I might do more for you."

"No, Mr. Atwood," she answered gravely, "you do not understand me. Experience has made me immeasurably older than you are."

"Very possibly," he admitted, with a short, embarrassed laugh. "My former self-assurance and complacency are all gone."

"Self-reliance and self-restraint are better than self-assurance," she remarked with a smile.

"Miss Jocelyn," he began, with something like impetuosity, "I would give all the world if I could become your friend. You could do so much for me."

"Mr. Atwood," said Mildred, with a laugh that was mixed with annoyance, "you are imposed upon by your fancy, and are imagining absurd things, I fear. But you are good-hearted and I shall be a little frank with you. We are in trouble. Business reverses have overtaken my father, and we are poor, and may be much poorer. I may be a working-woman the rest of my days; so, for Heaven's sake, do not make a heroine out of me. That would be too cruel a satire on my prosaic lot."

"You do not understand me at all, and perhaps I scarcely understand myself. If you think my head is filled with sentimental nonsense, time will prove you mistaken. I have a will of my own, I can assure you, and a way of seeing what is to be seen. I have seen a great deal since I've known you. A new and larger world has been revealed to me, and I mean to do something in it worthy of a man. I can never go on with my old life, and I will not," he continued, almost passionately. "I was an animal. I was a conceited fool. I'm very crude and unformed now, and may seem to you very ridiculous; but crudity is not absurdity, undeveloped strength is not weakness. An awakening mind may be very awkward, but give me time and you will not be ashamed of my friendship."

He had ceased leaning against a tree that grew near the roadway, and at some distance from the house. In his strong feeling he forgot his embarrassment, and assumed an attitude so full of unconscious power that he inspired a dawning of respect; for, while he seemed a little beside himself, there was a method in his madness which suggested that she, as well as the young man, might eventually discover that he was not of common clay and predestined to be commonplace. But she said, in all sincerity, "Mr. Atwood, I'm sure I wish you twice the success you crave in life, and I've no reason to think you overrate your power to achieve it; but you greatly overrate me. It would be no condescension on my part to give you my friendship; and no doubt if you attain much of the success you covet you will be ready enough to forget my existence. What induces you to think that a simple girl like me can help you? It seems to me that you are vague and visionary, which perhaps is natural, since you say you are just awaking," she concluded, with a little smiling sarcasm.

"You are unjust both to yourself and to me," he replied firmly, "and I think I can prove it. If I shall ever have any power in the world it will be in seeing clearly what is before me. I have seldom been away from this country town, and yet as soon as I saw you with a mind free from prejudice I recognized your superiority. I brought the belle of Forestville and placed her by your side, and I could think of nothing but brazen instruments until I left her loudness at her father's door. I would not go near her again if there were not another woman in the world. I saw at a glance that she was earthenware beside you."

Mildred now could not forbear laughing openly. "If you lose your illusions so rapidly," she said, "my turn will come soon, and I shall be china beside some fine specimen of majolica."

"You may laugh at me, but you will one day find I am sincere, and not altogether a fool."

"Oh, I'm ready to admit that, even now. But you are altogether mistaken in thinking I can help you. Indeed I scarcely see how I can help myself. It is a very poor proof of your keen discernment to associate me with your kindling ambition."

"Then why had you the power to kindle it? Why do I think my best thoughts in your presence? Why do I speak to you now as I never dreamed I could speak? You are giving purpose and direction to my life, whether you wish it or not, whether you care or not. You may always be indifferent to the fact, still it was your hand that wakened me. I admit I'm rather dazed as yet. You may think I'm talking to you with the frankness—perhaps the rashness—of a boy, since you are 'immeasurably older,' but the time is not very distant when I shall take my course with the strength and resolution of a man."

"I should be sorry to be the very innocent cause of leading you into thorny paths. I truly think you will find more happiness here in your quiet country life."

His only answer was an impatient gesture.

"Perhaps," she resumed, "if you knew more of the world you would fear it more. I'm sure I fear it, and with good reason."

"I do not fear the world at all," he replied. "I would fear to lose your esteem and respect far more, and, distant as you are from me, I shall yet win them both."

"Mr. Atwood, I suppose I have as much vanity as most girls, but you make me blush. You are indeed dazed, for you appear to take me for a melodramatic heroine."

"Pardon me, I do not. I've been to the theatre occasionally, but you are not at all theatrical. You are not like the heroines of the novels I've read, and I suppose I've read too many of them."

"I fear you have," she remarked dryly. "Pray, then, What am I like?"

"And I may seem to you a hero of the dime style; but wait, don't decide yet. What are you like? You are gentle, like your mother. You are exceedingly fond of all that's pretty and refined, so much so that you tried to introduce a little grace into our meagre, angular farmhouse life—"

"Thanks for your aid," interrupted Mildred, laughing. "I must admit that you have good eyes."

"You shrink," he resumed, "from all that's ugly, vulgar, or coarse in life. You are an unhappy exile in our plain home."

"All which goes to prove what an ordinary and unheroic nature I have. You will soar far beyond me, Mr. Atwood, for you have portrayed a very weak character—one that is in love with the niceties of life, with mere prettiness."

"You are still laughing at me, but I'm in earnest; and if you mean what, you say, you understand yourself less than you do me. Why will you not go to the hotel occasionally? Because with all your gentleness you are too proud to run the slightest risk of patronage and pity from those who knew you in your more fortunate days. Why do you remain in your little hot room so much of the time? I don't know; but if you will permit a guess, you are working. Every day you grow less content to sit still in helpless weakness. You are far braver than I, for I do not fear the world in the least; but, no matter how much you feared it, you would do your best to the last, and never yield to anything in it that was low, base, or mean. Oh, you are very gentle, very delicate, and you will be misunderstood; but you have the strongest strength there is—a kind of strength that will carry you through everything, though it cost you dear."

"And what may that be?" she asked, looking at him now in genuine wonder.

"I can't explain exactly what I mean. It is something I've seen in mother, plain and simple as she is. It's a kind of enduring steadfastness; it's a patient faithfulness. I should know just where to find mother, and just what to expect from her, under all possible circumstances. I should never expect to see you very different from what you are, no matter what happened. You often have the same look or expression that she has; and it means to me that you would do the best you could, although discouraged and almost hopeless. Very few soldiers will fight when they know the battle is going against them. You would, as long as you could move a finger."

"Mr. Atwood, what has put all this into your head? This seems very strange language from you."

"It is not so strange as it seems. It comes from the gift on which I base my hope of success in life. I see clearly and vividly what is before me, and draw my conclusions. If I see the antlers of a stag above some bushes, it is not necessary to see the whole animal to know he is there, and what kind of a creature he is. I'm not a scholar, Miss Jocelyn, but you must not think I do not know anything because I work in the corn or the hayfield all day. We have long winters up here, and I've studied some and read a great deal more. There are but few books in the village library that I have not read more or less thoroughly, and some of them many times. Because I was a careless, conceited fellow a few weeks since, it does not follow that I'm an ignoramus."

Mildred was decidedly puzzled. She could not account for the change in him; and she did not like to think of that to which his words and feelings pointed. He asked for friendship, but she strongly doubted whether such a placid regard would long satisfy him. Her chief impulse was to escape, for the bare thought of words of love from him or any one except Vinton Arnold was intensely repugnant. As she glanced around, seeking in what direction she might take her flight, she saw a gentleman coming rapidly toward the house. After a second's hesitation she rushed toward him, crying, "Papa, papa, you are welcome!"



CHAPTER X

A COUNCIL

Roger saw Miss Jocelyn rush into the arms of a tall, florid gentleman, whose dark eyes grew moist at the almost passionate warmth of his daughter's greeting. To Mildred her father's unexpected coming was thrice welcome, for in addition to her peculiarly strong affection for him, his presence ended an interview not at all agreeable, and promised relief from further unwelcome attentions on the part of Roger. Almost in the moment of meeting, she resolved to persuade him that his family would be happier with him in the city. This had been her feeling from the first, but now she was wholly bent on leaving the farm-house; for with her larger experience and womanly intuition she read in Roger's frank and still half-boyish face the foreshadowing of an unwelcome regard which she understood better than he did.

While his manner for a few weeks past, and especially his words during their recent interview, made it clear that he was not the rough, awkward rustic she had first imagined him to be, he still seemed very crude and angular. In spite of her love for Vinton Arnold, which had not abated in the least, he had ceased to be her ideal man. Nevertheless, his refined elegance, his quiet self-restraint, his knowledge of the niceties and proprieties of the world to which she felt she belonged by right, did combine to produce an ideal in her mind of which she was but half conscious, and beside which Roger appeared in a repulsive light. She shrank with instinctive distaste from his very strength and vehemence, and feared that she would never be safe from interviews like the one just described, and from awkward, half-concealed gallantries. Even the flowers he had set out became odious, for they represented a sentiment the very thought of which inspired aversion.

A coquette can soon destroy the strong instinct of sacredness and exclusiveness with which an unperverted girl guards her heart from all save the one who seems to have the divine right and unexplained power to pass all barriers. Even while fancy free, unwelcome advances are resented almost as wrongs and intrusions by the natural woman; but after a real, or even an ideal image has taken possession of the heart and imagination, repugnance is often the sole reward of other unfortunate suitors, and this dislike usually will be felt and manifested in a proportion corresponding with the obtrusiveness of the attentions, their sincerity, and the want of tact with which they are offered.

To that degree, therefore, that Roger was in earnest, Mildred shrank from him, and she feared that he would not—indeed, from his antecedents could not—know how to hide his emotions. His words had so startled her that, in her surprise and annoyance, she imagined him in a condition of semi-ambitious and semi-amative ebullition, and she dreaded to think what strange irruptions might ensue. It would have been the impulse of many to make the immature youth a source of transient amusement, but with a sensitive delicacy she shrank from him altogether, and wished to get away as soon as possible. Pressing upon her was the sad, practical question of a thwarted and impoverished life—impoverished to her in the dreariest sense—and it was intolerable that one who seemed so remote from her sphere should come and ask that, from her bruised and empty heart, she should give all sorts of melodramatic sentiment in response to his crude, ambitious impulses, which were yet as blind as the mythical god himself.

Had she seen that Roger meant friendship only when he asked for friendship, she would not have been so prejudiced against him; but the fact that this "great boy" was half consciously extending his hand for a gift which now she could not bestow on the best and greatest, since it was gone from her beyond recall, appeared grotesque, and such a disagreeable outcome of her changed fortunes that she was almost tempted to hate him. There are some questions on which women scarcely reason—they only feel intensely.

Mildred, therefore, was heartily glad that Roger did not wait to be introduced to her father, and that he kept himself aloof from the reunited family during the evening. She also was pleased that they were not joined by the Atwoods at the supper-table. That this considerate delicacy was due to the "young barbarian's" suggestion she did not dream, but gave good-hearted but not very sensitive Mrs. Atwood all the credit. As for poor Roger, his quick insight, his power to guess something of people's thoughts and feelings from the expression of their faces, brought but little present comfort or promise for the future.

"I made a bad impression at the start," he muttered, "and it will be long before she loses it, if she ever does. She shrinks from me as from something coarse and rough. She feels that I don't belong to her world at all. In fact, her father's fine bearing, his erect, elegant carriage make me feel as if I were but a country lout in very truth." The reception given to Mr. Jocelyn satisfied Mrs. Atwood thoroughly that his prolonged absence did not result from any alienation from his family. They overwhelmed him with caresses, and either Fred or Minnie could scarcely be kept out of his arms a moment.

"Fanny," he said to his wife, "I almost made a vow that I would not come here until I had secured a position that would give you all the comforts of life, if not at once its luxuries; but such positions are occupied, and when one becomes vacant they are filled by relatives of the firm, or by those who have stronger claims than I can present. Still my friends are working for me, and I have the prospect of employment where the compensation will be small at first, but if I can draw a considerable Southern trade it will be increased rapidly."

And yet he sighed while revealing this hopeful outlook, and Mildred noticed that he sighed more than once during the evening, in spite of the torrent of affectionate welcome which almost swept him away.

After Belle and the younger children were sleeping, the husband and wife with Mildred talked late over their prospects. Mr. Jocelyn suggested that they should remain in the country, and even that they should rent a small cottage in Forestville or elsewhere, but his gentle wife soon proved that on some occasions she could be decided.

"No, Martin," she said, with the quiet emphasis which reveals a purpose not to be combated, "one thing is settled—there must be no more separation. I have suffered too much during these last few weeks ever to listen again to such an arrangement. Now that you are with us once more, I learn that the ache in my heart was caused not so much by losses and the prospect of poverty as by loneliness and the feeling that you were left to struggle by yourself. It's my place to be with you, and I am willing to live anywhere and in any way. I can see that I might have aided you in providing against this evil time, but it seems now that I thought only of what we wanted for each day as it came, and the trouble was that we all got just what we wanted. Here is the result. Oh, I've thought it over through long sleepless nights till my heart ached with a pain that I hope none of you will ever know. But to sit idly here and wait while you are trying to retrieve my folly is a greater punishment than I can endure. Give me something to do which will be of help to you, and I will do it gladly, even though it be in two attic rooms."

"Mamma's right," added Mildred earnestly. "Papa, you must find a place for us in New York—a place within our means. Let us begin life right this time, and I believe God will bless and prosper us. It won't be many days before Belle and I will find something to do."

Mr. Jocelyn sighed more deeply than ever, and, indeed, appeared so overcome for a few moments that he could not speak. At last he faltered, "I have all of a Southern man's pride, and it's more bitter than death to me that my wife and daughters must work for their bread."

"Papa," exclaimed Mildred, "would it not be infinitely more bitter to us all to eat the bread of charity? I shall pretend to no unnatural heroism, nor say I like toil and poverty. On the contrary, I think I shrink from such things more than most girls do. But I don't propose to sit down and wring my hands. I can put them to a better use. We must just put away all talk of pride and sentiment, and remember only our poverty and self-respect. As Christian and sensible people we are bound to accept of our life and make the best of it. You and mother both know how much this change has cost me," she concluded, with a few half-stifled sobs, "and if I am willing to enter on a cheerful, patient effort to make the best of life as it is, I think all the rest might, too. If we give way to despondency we are lost. Let us be together again, and pull together as one."

"The idea of Nan and the children coming back to the city in August!" said Mr. Jocelyn dejectedly. "You don't either of you realize what you are talking about. We should have to go into a tenement-house."

"Martin, I do realize it," replied his wife earnestly. "The country is doing me no good—indeed I'm failing in health. Nothing does us good when we are unhappy and anxious. Find me two rooms in a tenement-house if we cannot afford more, and let us be together as soon as possible."

"Well," said Mr. Jocelyn, after a long breath, "with such a wife and such children to work for a man ought to be able to do great things; but it's much the same as it was in the army—if one lost his place in the ranks he was hustled about in everybody's way, and if weak and disabled he was left to his fate. The world goes right on and over you if you don't stand aside. I know you've suffered, Nan, and you know that if I had my wish you would never have a care or a pain; but God knows I suffered too. After you all were gone and my duties to my former partners ceased, I began to learn from experience how difficult it is in these cursed times to get a foothold, and I became almost sleepless from anxiety. Then set in that villanous neuralgia, which always strikes a man when he's down,' and for a week or more it seemed that I should almost lose my reason.

"Oh, Martin, Martin!" his wife exclaimed reproachfully, "and you did not let us know!"

"Why should I? It would only have added to your burden, and would not have helped me. I was glad you knew nothing about it."

"This is another proof that we must be together," said his wife, her eyes filling with tears. "How did you come to get better?"

"Oh, the doctor gave me something that made me sleep, and I seldom have neuralgia now."

"Come, papa," cried Mildred, as she put her arms around his neck and leaned her face against his, "there are thousands worse off than we are, and thousands more have retrieved far worse disasters. Now take courage; we'll all stand by you, and we'll all help you. We will one day have a prettier home than ever, and it will be all our own, so that no one can drive us from it;" and with hope springing up in her heart she tried to inspire hope and courage in theirs.

"Oh, Millie," he said, taking her on his lap, "when you coax and pet one you are irresistible. We WILL begin again, and win back all and more than we have lost."

Then, partly to amuse her father and mother, but more for the purpose of hastening their departure, Mildred told them of Roger's peculiar mood, and her conscience smote her a little as she caricatured rather than characterized the youth. Mrs. Jocelyn, in her kindliness, took his part, and said, "Millie, you are satirical and unjust I'm sure he's a well-meaning young man."

"The dear little mother!" cried Mildred, laughing; "when she can't think of anything else good to say of a person, she assures us that he is 'well-meaning.' Life may bring me many misfortunes, but I shall never marry what mamma calls 'a well-meaning man.'"

"But, Millie, I'm sure he's been very good and kind to us all, and he's kind to his mother and sister, and he seems steady—"

"Well, mamma, admitting it all, what follows?" asked Mildred.

"It follows that we had better go away," said Mrs. Jocelyn, with her low, sweet laugh, that had been rarely heard of late; "but I don't like you to be unjust to the young fellow. After all, he's not so very much to blame, Millie," she added, with a little nod. "If I were he I fear I might be in the same fix."

"Oh, papa, now we must go; for if mamma's sympathies are once aroused in behalf of this 'steady, well-meaning young man'—there! I will talk no more nonsense to-night, although I often find nonsense a sort of life preserver that keeps me from sinking. I admit, mamma, that I have been unjust to Mr. Atwood. He's far more clever than I ever imagined him to be, but he's so different"—she finished the sentence with a little repellent gesture that her mother well understood.

They were all comforted, and far more hopeful from their frank interchange of thought and feeling, and both father and mother breathed a fervent "God bless you, Millie," as they separated, long past midnight.

"God will bless us," said the young girl, "if we will just simply try to do what is right and best every day. The blessing will come on doing, not waiting."

She had not been in her room very long before hearing the crunching of gravel under the wheels of Roger's buggy. With a smile she thought, "He must have found a more sympathizing ear and heart than mine to have remained out so late."



CHAPTER XI

A SHADOW

"Mrs. Atwood," said Mildred the next morning, "I want to thank you for your kindness in giving us our supper alone with papa the first evening of his arrival; but you need not put yourself to any extra trouble to-day."

"Roger is the one to thank," replied Mrs. Atwood. "He's grown so different, so considerate like, that I scarcely know him any more than I do the old place he's so fixed up. He says he's going to paint the house after the summer work slacks off. I don't see what's come over him, but I like the change very much."

Mildred flushed slightly, but said, with some constraint, "Please thank him then from papa and mamma, but do not let us make you further trouble. We shall all return to the city soon, and then you will have easier times every way."

"I'm sorry to hear that, Miss Jocelyn, for we shall miss you all very much. You've done us good in more ways than one."

Roger did not appear at breakfast. "A young horse strayed from the pasture, and Roger is out looking for him," his mother explained when Mrs. Jocelyn asked after him.

Although not a member of any church, Mr. Jocelyn had great respect for his wife and daughter's faith, and accompanied them to service that morning very readily. Roger appeared in time to take Belle, as usual, but she found him so taciturn and preoccupied that she whispered to Mildred, "You've spoiled him for me. He sits staring like an owl in the sunlight, and seeing just about as much. You ought to be ashamed of yourself to make him so glum. I intend to have a dozen beaux, and to keep them all jolly."

Mildred was obliged to admit to herself that the young fellow was very undemonstrative at dinner, and that he did not exhibit the rusticity that she half hoped to see. She gained the impression that he was observing her father very closely, and that no remark of his escaped him. "He has the eyes of a lynx," she thought, with a frown. Still, apart from a certain annoyance at his deep interest in her and all relating to her, she was rather pleased at the impression which such a man as her father must make on one so unsophisticated. Mr. Jocelyn was a finished man of the world, and his large experience left its impress on all that he said and did. Although a little courtly in manner, he was so kindly and frank in nature that his superiority was not at all oppressive, and with true Southern bonhomie he made the farmer's family quite at ease, leading them to speak freely of their rural affairs. Susan soon lost all sense of restraint and began to banter her brother.

"You must have had a very affecting time in making up with Amelia Stone to have stayed out so late," she remarked sotto voce.

"I've not seen Amelia Stone since the evening she was here," he answered dryly.

"Indeed! what other charmer then tied you to her apron-strings so tightly? You are very fickle."

"Now you've hit it," he answered, with a slight flush. "I was so undecided that I drove by every door, and was not tied at all."

Belle "made eyes" at Mildred, as much as to say, "It's you who are distracting him."

"Next time," Sue continued, "I think it would be well to make up your mind before Sunday morning."

"My mind is made up," replied Roger—Belle looked at Mildred with an expression of horror, to her intense annoyance—"I shall trouble no one," he added, quietly.

Belle now gave such a great sigh of relief that he turned upon her too swift a glance to leave time for disguise. He smiled a little bitterly, and then began talking in an off-hand way to Mr. Jocelyn about the hotel a few miles distant, saying that it had filled up very rapidly of late. As they rose from the table he remarked, hesitatingly, "My horse and wagon are at your service this afternoon or evening if you would like to take a drive."

Mr. Jocelyn was about to accept, but Mildred trod significantly on his foot. Therefore he thanked Roger cordially, and said he would spend a quiet day with his family.

"I don't wish to be under the slightest obligations to him," explained Mildred when they were alone; "and Belle," she warned, "you must stop your nonsense at once. I won't endure another trace of it."

"Oh, indeed! I didn't know you were so touchy about him," cried the girl. "Is it for his sake or your own that you are so careful? You're stupid not to let him amuse you, since you've spoiled him for me."

Her sister made no reply, but gave the giddy child a glance that quieted her at once. When Mildred was aroused her power over others was difficult to explain, for, gentle as she was, her will at times seemed irresistible.

Roger did not need to be told in so many words that his overtures of "friendship" had been practically declined. Her tones, her polite but distant manner revealed the truth clearly. He was sorely wounded, but, so far from being disheartened, his purpose to win her recognition was only intensified.

"I can at least compel her respect and prove myself her equal," he thought, and instead of lounging or sleeping away the afternoon, as had been his custom, he took a book and read steadily for several hours. At last he left his room to aid his father in the evening labors of the farm-yard, and in doing so would have to pass near Mr. Jocelyn, who, with his family, was seated under a wide-spreading tree. The gentleman evidently was in a very genial mood; he was caressing his children, flattering his wife and Mildred, and rallying Belle after her own frolicsome humor. Roger thought, as he looked at them a few moments through the kitchen window, that he had never seen a happier family, and with a sigh wished that it was his privilege to join them without being thought an intruder. Mildred's reserve, however, formed an impassable barrier, and he was hastening by with downcast eyes, when, to his surprise and the young girl's evident astonishment, Mr. Jocelyn arose and said, "Ah, Mr. Atwood, we're glad to see you. Won't you join our little party? I want to thank you again for offering me your horse and carriage, but I assure you that a quiet hour like this with one's family after long separation is happiness enough. Still, as a Southern man, I appreciate courtesy, and am always ready to respond to it in like spirit. Moreover, it gives me peculiar pleasure to see a Northern man developing traits which, if they were general, would make the two great sections of our land one in truth as well as in name."

Roger gave Mildred a quick, questioning glance, and saw that she was regarding her father with much perplexity.

"Mr. Jocelyn," he said quietly, "the little courtesy of which you speak has cost me nothing, and if it had it would not be worth the words you bestow upon it."

"I do not think of the act itself so much as the spirit, the disposition it indicates," resumed Mr. Jocelyn in a manner that was courtly and pronounced, but otherwise natural and quiet enough. "I do not judge superficially, but look past apparent trifles to the character they suggest. Moreover, my wife informs me that you have been very polite to her, and very kind to Belle and the children, whom you have often taken out to drive without any compensation whatever. Since you will not make a business matter of such things, I wish to repay you in the coin which gentleman can always receive—that of friendly acknowledgments."

"Then please consider me amply repaid," and with a smile and a bow he was about to retire.

"Do not hasten away, sir," Mr. Jocelyn began again. "On this, day of rest your duties cannot be pressing. I want to assure you further of the pleasure I have in finding a young man who, so far from being rendered callous and material by hard and rather homely work, is alive to all refining influences. The changes in this place for the better since I was here, and those pretty flowers yonder, all prove that you have an eye for the beautiful as well as the practical. My daughter Mildred also informs me that you are cherishing hopes and ambitions that will eventually enlarge your sphere of life and take you out into the great world."

Hitherto Roger's eyes had been fixed keenly and unwaveringly on Mr. Jocelyn's urbane countenance, as if he would detect the cause of such unlooked-for words, but at the mention of Mildred's name his brow and even neck was suffused. "She must have spoken of me kindly," he thought, "or her father would not be so friendly." But when a swift glance around revealed that Mrs. Jocelyn was looking at her husband in perplexity, that Mildred was not even trying to conceal her vexation and amazement, and that Belle had stuffed her handkerchief into her mouth to prevent laughter, a spark of anger glittered in his eyes. His first thought was that Mr. Jocelyn was indulging in unexpected irony at his expense, and the ready youth whose social habits had inured him to much chaffing was able to reply, although a little stiffly and awkwardly, "I suppose most young men have ambitious hopes of doing something in the world, and yet that does not prevent mine from seeming absurd. At any rate, it's clear that I had better reveal them hereafter by deeds rather than words," and with a very slight bow he strode away, but not so quickly that he failed to hear Mildred's voice in the exclamation, "Oh, papa! how could you?" and then followed a paroxysm of laughter from Belle.

Roger was deeply incensed, for he believed that Mr. Jocelyn and Belle were deliberately ridiculing him. That Mildred had repeated his conversation was evident, but her manner showed that she did not expect his words to be used against him so openly, and that she had no part in the cruel sport. The worst he could charge against her was exclusive pride; and he did Mrs. Jocelyn the justice to see that she was pained by the whole affair. His face grew rigid as he finished his work and he muttered, "They shall see that my pride is equal to theirs: I won't go out of my way a hair-breadth for them," and he walked in to supper as if he were at home and had an absolute right to be there. He had been at the table but a few moments, however, before the aspect of the Jocelyn family began to puzzle him exceedingly. Belle appeared as if she had been crying; Mrs. Jocelyn looked perplexed and worried, and in Mildred's eyes there were anxiety and trouble. Mr. Jocelyn had not lost his serenity in the least, but his aspect now was grave, and his manner more courtly than ever. He did not seem inclined to say very much, however, and had an abstracted, dreamy look as if his thoughts were far away. When he did speak, Roger thought that Mildred looked apprehensive, as if fearing that he might again say something embarrassing, but his words were quiet and measured, betraying no excitement. The expression of his face, however, seemed unnatural to Roger's close yet furtive scrutiny. An hour before his eyes had been bright and dilated, and his countenance full of animation; now all the light and cheerfulness were fading, and the man seemed to grow older and graver by moments. Was the dusky pallor stealing across his features caused by the shadows of evening? Roger thought not, but a resentful glance from Mildred warned him to curb his curiosity.

He was curious, but not in a vulgar or prying way, and his anger was all gone. He was sure that something was amiss with Mr. Jocelyn, and that his family also was disturbed and anxious. There had been none of the incoherency and excitement of a man who had drank too much, but only a slight exaggeration of the genial traits manifested at the dinner-table followed by a quietude and abstraction that were not natural. Mental aberrations, even though slight and temporary, are instinctively felt by those who are sound and normal in mind. Still Roger would have charged Mr. Jocelyn's words and manner to the peculiarities of a stranger, had not his family been perplexed and troubled also. "There's something wrong about him," he said to himself as he rose from the table; "he lacks balance, or he's not well. I half believe that the time will come when that young girl will be the stay and support of the whole family. You cannot prevent my friendliness, Miss Jocelyn, any more than you can stop the sun from shining, and some day it will melt all your reserve and coldness." He took his volume of history out on the sward near the porch, resolving to see the end of the domestic drama. His mother had told him during the day that their "boarders" would soon depart. He had made no response whatever, but his sinking spirits revealed to him that in some way his life had become involved with that of the girl now so distant and repellent.

He did not turn many leaves, but he sat with the book in his lap until long after nightfall. The domestic drama apparently had a very prosaic ending. Mr. Jocelyn and his family returned for a time to their seats under the trees, but all except the little children were apparently under some constraint. The latter soon grew sleepy, and Mrs. Jocelyn took them in to bed. Belle was not long in following them, darting an ireful glance at Roger in passing, to which he responded by a rather mocking smile. "We were having a lovely time till you came, you old marplot," she muttered under her breath.

Mr. Jocelyn grew more and more quiet until his head sank on his breast, and it was with difficulty that Mildred aroused him sufficiently to urge his retiring. At last he took his daughter's arm and entered the house as if in a dream. The young girl's face was downcast and averted. As they passed between the youth and the still glowing west they cast a faint shadow upon him. Though by no means imaginative, he noted the shadow and thought about it. It seemed that it still rested on him after they were gone, and that it might never pass away. His was not a dreamy, fanciful nature, that could create a score of improbable contingencies, but his shrewd, strong sense was quick to recognize traces of weakness and untrustworthiness in those he met, and the impression grew upon him that Mr. Jocelyn was not a well-balanced man. "If he fails her, I will not," he murmured. Then with a short laugh he continued, "How is it that I am ready to admit such a far-reaching claim from one who repels and dislikes me? I don't know, and I don't care. She has waked me up; she has the power of calling into action every faculty I have. Already, I scarcely know myself. I never lived before, and I feel that I can become a man—perhaps a great man—if I follow this impulse, and I shall follow it."

Soon all were sleeping, and mother and daughter were alone.

"Mamma," said Mildred, in a low, troubled tone, "it seemed to me that papa acted very strangely this afternoon and evening. Can he be well?"

"Oh, Millie," cried the loving, anxious wife, "I fear he is not well at all; and no wonder, when we think of the long strain he has been under. Haven't you noticed that his appetite is very poor? to-night he scarcely ate a mouthful. He has just been trying to keep up ever since he came, and this afternoon he made unusual effort; reaction of course followed, and at last he was so weary and troubled that he could not hide his feelings from us."

"I suppose you take the right view," said Mildred hesitatingly, "but papa has not seemed the same this afternoon as at other times when tired and worried. His gayety was a little extravagant, and so it might naturally be if it were forced. But I can't understand his speaking to young Mr. Atwood as he did. Papa never showed such a lack of tact or delicacy before. I would not dare tell him things if he spoke of them afterward so inopportunely. I felt as if I could sink into the ground. And when Belle—who can't help seeing everything in a ridiculous light—began to laugh he turned and spoke to her as he has never spoken to any of us before, And yet he did not seem angry, but his gravity was more oppressive than any amount of natural anger."

"Well, Millie, your father is very kind-hearted, and, like all Southern men, very sensitive to kindness and courtesy. I suppose he thought that you and Belle had not treated Roger well, and that he ought to make amends. The real explanation is that he is overstrained and unhappy, and so cannot act like himself."

"I do hope he is not going to be ill," faltered Mildred. "Such a strange lethargy came over him after you left us. Oh, the day is ending horribly, and it leaves a weight of foreboding on my mind. I wish we could get away tomorrow, for I feel that Roger Atwood is watching us, and that nothing escapes him. I know that papa's manner seemed strange to him as well as to us, and I almost hate him for his obtrusive and prying interest. Why can't he see that he's nothing to us, nor we to him, and let us alone?"

She often recalled these words in after years.

The wife went to her room and found that her husband was sleeping quietly. Returning, she said, more cheerily, "I think papa will be like himself after a good night's sleep, and there's every promise now that he'll get it; so don't look on the dark side, Millie, nor worry about that young man. He don't mean to be obtrusive, and I must say that I think he behaves very well considering. With troubles like ours, why think of such a transient annoyance? If I only knew just how I could help your father I would not think about much else."

It would have been well indeed if she could have known, for she would have taken from his pocketbook a small syringe and a bottle of Magendie's solution of morphia; she would have entreated him upon her knees, she would have bound him by the strongest oaths to die rather than to use it again. The secret of all that was peculiar and unnatural in his conduct can be explained by the fact that early in the afternoon he went apart for a moment, and with a little innocent-looking instrument injected into his arm the amount of the fatal drug which he believed he could enjoy without betraying himself.



CHAPTER XII

VIEWLESS FETTERS

Although Mr. Jocelyn had retired so early and slept heavily until an hour that at the farmhouse was late, the reader knows that his sleep was not the natural repose which brings freshness and elasticity. His wife and Mildred, however, did not know this, and his languor, continued drowsiness, and depression, which even much effort could not disguise, confirmed their dread of an impending illness. He saw their anxiety, and took advantage of their fears to hide his weakness.

"Yes," he sighed, in response to their gentle solicitude as he pushed away his almost untasted breakfast, "I suppose my health has been impaired by worry of mind and the heat in town. I'm better, though, than I have been. I don't see how you are going to endure the city."

They both assured him, however, that they would not even consider any other arrangement except that already agreed upon, and urged that he should return to town that very day, his wife adding that just as soon as he had secured rooms within their means she would join him and prepare them for the family.

"Oh, Nan," he again said dejectedly, "it's a cruel fate which compels me to take you to a tenement-house in August."

"It would be far more cruel to leave me here," his wife answered earnestly. "I could be happy anywhere if you were your old natural self once more. Millie and I can both see that struggling alone and brooding by yourself over your troubles is not good for you," and her gentle but determined purpose carried the day.

Mr. Jocelyn was then directed to a somewhat distant field, where he found Roger, who readily agreed to take him to the steamboat landing in the afternoon. Lifting his eyes from his work a few moments afterward, the young man saw that his visitor, instead of returning to the house, had sat down under a clump of trees and had buried his face in his hands.

"There's a screw loose about that man," he muttered. "He's too uneven. Yesterday at dinner he was the most perfect gentleman ever I saw; in the afternoon he had a fit of pompous hilarity and condescension; then came abstraction, as if his mind had stepped out for a time; and now, after twelve hours of sleep, instead of feeling like a lark, he looks as though he might attend his own funeral before night, and walks as if his feet were lead. He mopes there under the trees when he has but a few more hours with his family. If I had such a wife and such a daughter as he has, I'd cut a swath for them, no matter what stood in the way."

But Roger's censure was slight compared with that which Mr. Jocelyn visited upon himself; and in order to understand his feelings and conduct, it will be necessary to relate some experiences which occurred after the departure of his family to the country. Throughout the entire winter he had been under a severe strain of business anxiety, and then had come the culminating scenes of failure, loss of income, and enforced and unhappy separation. His natural depression had been so increased by the meagre prospect of finding employment which would yield his family an adequate support, that even his increased and more frequent indulgence in his morphia powders failed to give sufficient hopefulness and courage, while at the same time they began to produce some serious disorders in his system. There is a class of diseases which rarely fails to attack one whose system is reduced and enfeebled, and neuralgia began to bind across his forehead a daily pressure of pain that at last became intolerable. Ordinary remedies not giving speedy relief, his physician injected into his arm a few drops of the solution of morphia. Thus far he had never used the drug in solution hypodermically, and he was much surprised by the agreeable effects of a very much smaller quantity than he had been accustomed to use on any one occasion, and his morphia hunger—already firmly established—immediately suggested that the little syringe might become a far more potent agent than the powders. Therefore he induced the physician to give him an order for the instrument, and to explain more fully the methods of its use, saying that attacks of neuralgia were generally rather obstinate in his case, and that he had neither the time nor the means to seek his services very often.

The physician's few words of warning made but slight impression upon the infatuated man at the time. Mr. Jocelyn remembered only that he had an intolerable pain in his head and a heavy weight upon his heart. Many a time during the long civil war he had smilingly led charges wherein the chances of death were greater than those of life, but neither then nor since had he ever displayed any great aptitude for quiet endurance and self-control. Now every day was precious, and he felt he could not give himself up to pain and patient waiting until the disease could be conquered in a slow, legitimate way, when by a wound no more than a pin-prick he could obtain courage, happiness, and prospects illimitable.

Having obtained the syringe and a vial of the solution of morphia, he injected into his arm a much larger quantity than the physician would have dreamed of employing. Not only did the unendurable anguish pass away within a few brief moments, but the world was transfigured; life's grim outlook became full of the richest promise, and discouragement and dread vanished utterly. So far from fearing that he could not provide for his family, he was sure that he could win for them abundance and luxury. A dozen avenues to fortune opened before him, and he felt that his only task was to choose, believing that in some indefinite yet easily discerned way he would achieve more than falls to the lot of most men to accomplish. Instead of a long, sleepless night like those which had preceded, his waking dreams ended in quiet and equally pleasant visions—then oblivion, which did not pass away until the morning sun was shining. But with the new day came a new access of pain and gloom, and the aid of the magic little instrument was invoked once more. Again within a few moments the potent drug produced a tranquil elysium and a transformed world of grand possibilities. With a vigor which seemed boundless, and hopes which repeated disappointments could not dampen, he continued his quest for employment until in the declining day his spirits and energy ebbed as strangely as they had risen in the morning, and after another night of dreams and stupor he awoke in torture. The powerful stimulant enabled him to repeat the experiences of the previous day, and for two or three weeks he lived in the fatal but fascinating opium paradise, gradually increasing the amount of morphia that his system, dulled by habit, demanded. In the meantime, by the lavish use of quinine he gradually banished his neuralgia with its attendant pain.

It is well known to those familiar with the character of opium that its effects are greatly enhanced at first by any decided change in the method of its use; also that its most powerful and immediate influences can be produced solely by the hypodermic needle, since by means of it the stimulant is introduced at once into the system. When taken in powders, the glow, the serenity, and exaltation come on more slowly, and more gradually pass away, causing alternations of mood far less noticeable than those produced by immediate injection of the poison. Therefore it was not at all strange that Mr. Jocelyn's family should remain in complete ignorance of the habit which was enslaving him, or that his behavior failed to excite the faintest suspicion of the threatening influences at work. There is no vice so secret as that of the opium slave's, none that is in its earlier stages more easily and generally concealed from those who are nearest and dearest. The changes produced in Mr. Jocelyn were very gradual, and seeing him daily even his loving wife did not note them.

During the period of unnatural exaltation that has been described he had accepted agencies which promised thousands if he could sell millions of dollars' worth of goods, and after the subtle morphia had infused itself through his system nothing seemed easier; but dreams are not realities, and after grand hopes unfulfilled, and futile efforts, he would sink into a despondency from which nothing could lift him save the little syringe that he carried hidden next to his heart. As its magic never failed him, he went on for a time, blind to the consequences. At last he began to grow more alarmed than ever before at the ascendency of the drug and his dependence upon it, but when he tried to discontinue its use he found that he had been living so long under the influence of a powerful stimulant that without it he sank like a stone. Then came the usual compromise of all weak souls—he would gradually decrease the amount and then the frequency of its use; but, as is generally the case, he put off the beginning of sturdy self-denial until the morrow, and almost every day he poisoned his system with that which also poisoned and demoralized his soul. He dimly saw his danger, but did not realize it. With the fatuity of all self-indulgent natures he thought the day would come when, with better prospects and health renewed, he would throw away the spell which bound him and become a free man, but day after day passed and he did not; his appetite began to flag and his energy also; he would sit dreaming for hours when he might have been at work. At best his agencies would give him but a scanty revenue, although pushed with extraordinary skill and vigor. As it was, they yielded him little more than personal support, and he began to entertain the hope that if he could only obtain regular employment he could then resume his old regular habits. Therefore he had agreed to accept a position which was little more than a foothold, and yet if he would go to work with a determined and patient industry he might, by means of it, win more than he had lost.

Could he do this? The Sunday he had just spent with his family had awakened him as never before to a sense of his bondage. Even with the society of those he loved to enliven and sustain he had felt that he could not get through the day without the help of the stimulant upon which he had grown so dependent. While at church it was not the clergyman's voice he heard, but a low yet imperious and incessant cry for opium. As he rode home, smiling upon his wife and children, and looking at the beautiful and diversified country, between them and the landscape he ever saw a little brass instrument gauged at four or five times the amount that the physician had at first inserted in his arm. At the dinner table he had spoken courteously and well on many subjects, and yet ever uppermost in his mind was one constant thought—opium. The little diabolical thing itself seemed alive in his pocket, and made its faint yet potent solicitation against his heart. At last he had muttered, "I will just take a little of the cursed stuff, and then I must begin to break myself in dead earnest."

The reader knows what followed. Moreover, he was led to fear that the alternations of mood caused by injections of morphia would be so great that they could not fail to excite remark. Although the new day brought every motive which can influence a man, Mr. Jocelyn found the path to freedom so steep and difficult that the ascent seemed well-nigh impossible. His muscles were relaxed, his whole frame so weary and limp that he even dreaded the effort required to return to the house where his family was waiting for him. But the physical oppression was nothing to that which weighed upon his mind. The sense of misery and discouragement was paralyzing, and he was fairly appalled by his lack of energy. And yet he felt his need of power and resolution as keenly as he realized his feebleness. He knew that he had appeared unnatural to his wife and children, and that while they now ascribed his behavior to the long strain he had been under, their loving and charitable blindness could not last if he often exhibited before them such variable moods and conditions. Therefore he felt that he must overcome the habit before they were together permanently, for to permit them to discover his vile weakness in this time of their great need would be a mortal wound to his pride. All his manhood revolted at the bare thought. Their trust, their love, their dependence and unrepining courage in meeting poverty and privation with him imposed the strongest and most sacred of obligations, and his high sense of honor—which hitherto had been his religion—made failure to meet these obligations the most awful disaster that could overwhelm him. The means of escaping from his wretchedness and dejection—from the horrible lassitude of body and soul—could be grasped in a moment, and the temptation to use them and become within a few minutes a strong, sanguine, courageous man was almost irresistible; but he knew well that such an abrupt change from the heavy, dull-eyed condition in which they had seen him at the breakfast table could not fail to arouse suspicion; and should they once discern his crime—for crime he now regarded it—he feared his self-respect would be so destroyed that he would never have the pride and strength for the struggle now clearly foreseen; therefore, with the instinct of self-preservation, and from the impulse of all his native and long-fostered Southern pride, he resolved that they must never know his degradation. He must rally his shattered forces, spend the few hours before his departure with his family in a way to lull all fears and surmises; then when away by himself he would tug at his chain until he broke it. Summoning the whole strength of his will he returned to the house, and succeeded fairly well.

Could he break his chain? The coming pages of this book will reveal his struggle and its termination. Alas! it is no fancy sketch, but a record of human experience that is becoming sadly frequent. The hunger for opium had grown upon Mr. Jocelyn by its almost constant use for nearly two years. During weeks of pain he had almost lived upon the drug, saturating his system with it. It had come to him like an angel of light, lifting him on buoyant pinions out of suffering and despondency, but the light was fading from the wings and brow of this strong spirit, and it was already seen to be an angel of darkness.

At this time Mr. Jocelyn might have escaped from his thraldom, but would he? The world is full of people who are proud and self-respecting in the extreme, who are honorable and virtuous, good and kindly at heart, but whose wills are nerveless, though they may go safely through life without suspecting the truth; but if they fall under the influence of an evil habit—if they pass under this mightiest and darkest of all spells, opium hunger—they may learn their weakness in despair.

Mr. Jocelyn, however, had no thought of despair; he was only surprised, humiliated, and somewhat alarmed; he was satisfied that he must drift no longer, and in perfect sincerity resolved to make the most of his brief separation from his family, hoping that with a physician's advice he could speedily overcome his morbid craving and distressing need. He left the farmhouse with the resolution that he would never touch the drug again, believing that before a week expired the horrible depression, both mental and physical, would so far pass away as to excite no further suspicion.

For an hour he rode at Roger's side, rigid, taciturn, and pale; for except when heated by exercise his wonted ruddy color was passing away from the effects of the poison. Roger drove around to the large hotel, which was not much out of their way, and said, "Mr. Jocelyn, will you please take the lines a few moments? I have an errand here, but it won't keep me long."

Having transacted his business he stood in the office door watching a young man who sauntered toward him. The stranger was almost as tall as himself, but much slighter. While his carriage was easy and graceful, it was marked by an air of lassitude and weariness, and his step lacked firmness. A heavy mustache relieved his face from effeminacy, but his large, dark eyes were dull and apathetic. Suddenly they lighted up with recognition; he hesitated, and then hastily advanced toward Mr. Jocelyn, but his steps were speedily checked, for the moment the gentleman recognized him he bowed very coldly and turned haughtily away. The young man flushed deeply, stood still a moment in irresolution, and then with a swift glance into Roger's interested face turned and quickly disappeared. Before Roger could resume his place in the wagon the proprietor of the hotel came out and called him back; something had been forgotten.

This interruption was fatal to Mr. Jocelyn's good resolutions. Vinton Arnold, who had won his daughter's affection, but who seemingly had not the manhood to be faithful in her adversity, was the one whom he had repulsed, and the thought of his wealth and luxury, while he was on his way to seek a home in a tenement for his beautiful child, so maddened him that he drove recklessly to an adjacent shed, which shielded him from observation, snatched out his fatal syringe, and in a moment the poison was diffusing itself through all his system. He had returned again before Roger, who had been detained some moments, reappeared, but now his heavy eyes were bright and fiery, and his tongue unloosed.

"Did you see that young man to whom I refused to speak?" he asked as they drove away.

"Yes."

"Well, he's a white-livered scoundrel. He's a type of your Northern gentlemen. A Southern man would starve rather than act so pusillanimously. Of course I'm not going to talk of family secrets, or say anything not befitting a high-toned gentleman, but I taught that snob how a man of honor regards his cowardice and cold-bloodedness. He was one of our fair-weather friends, who promptly disappeared when the sky clouded. Here he is, dawdling around a high-priced hotel, while I'm on my way to seek rooms in a tenement for those to whom he is not worthy to speak; but the time shall come, and speedily, too, when even on the base plane of money—the sole claim of his proud family for consideration—we shall meet him and scorn him as his superiors. I have plans, business prospects—"and he launched forth into such a vague, wild statement of his projects that Eoger looked at him in silent amazement, half doubting his sanity.

In his haste Mr. Jocelyn had not carefully gauged his syringe, and the over-amount of morphia thrown into his system so stimulated him that his words appeared exceedingly irrational to the young man, whose judgment was based on unusual shrewdness and common-sense. He was greatly puzzled by the sudden change in his companion. It was evident that he had not been drinking, for his breath was untainted and his utterance was natural. But his face was flushed, and he seemed possessed by a strange, unbalanced mental exaltation which led him to speak as no sensible man ought in any circumstances, and certainly not to a stranger. Roger therefore interrupted him saying, "I shall respect your confidence, Mr. Jocelyn, and will never repeat what you have said. Please let me suggest, however, that it would be wise not to speak so frankly to others, since they might take advantage of you."