 26. Home. The door of Dr. Decker's consulting-office was ajar, and four gentlemen were within, in earnest conversation. Some one entered the reception room, and a murmur of voices reached to the office. Dr. Decker turned his head in that direction. What is it, daughter? he asked. It is nothing, Papa, except that I want to see Dr. Kelland a moment when he is at leisure. It was Miss Nettie Decker's voice. The younger of the two physicians who were sitting beside the table arose and stepped to the door. I will be at your service in five minutes more, he said, and returned. Did I disturb a solemn council? Nettie asked, when the five minutes were over, and he had joined her in the family sitting-room. I did not mean to speak a word, only to ask James if you were in, but Papa is so quick to hear our voices. Doctors are always in council, and one has to interrupt if one is ever to speak. The business was quite over. Your conscience need not trouble you in the least. What is there I can do for you? Why, I want your company if you can spare the time. I want to meet the 640 train with the carriage. Papa said he could spare that, but not himself, and Robert is away, you know. I could go alone with the driver, of course, but I don't want to. It happens to be an occasion on which I would like to put on all the proprieties possible. The doctor looked at his watch and at his memoranda, inquired as to the amount of time which would probably be involved in carrying out her proprieties, and declared himself entirely at her service for the hour. I have to be explicit as to hours and minutes, you know, he said with an apologetic smile. I know I have not been brought up as a doctor's daughter without learning some things, only I don't think you physicians are ever very explicit. As a rule you have no hours except for sick people. Winter I'm glad you are a doctor, and I'm glad Papa is. It seems to me I would not have him otherwise for the world. But all the same I am quite equally glad that Robert is a lawyer. Can you understand that state of mind? Of course, it is on the principle that if all men were physicians your father and I would have no patience on which to practice. After which he went merrily away. Winter Kelland, M.D. No, he was not used to it. The cards which bore the words had still a strange fascination for his eyes. He had not been so long graduated that the glamour had worn from them. There were leisure moments when it seemed almost a dream to this young man that the years of hard preparation were well over and he had won an honourable title. In point of fact he had been legitimate owner of the title but seven weeks. Long weeks they seemed to look back upon so much of life had been crowded into them. But in passing they seemed to be on wings. The young man will always remember it, that warm evening with the smell of summer in all the dewy air and the lights of the city gleaming upon him from a hundred eyes as the train entered the familiar depot. The exhilaration of triumph which had upborn him throughout the long journey with the coming of evening and weariness had subsided. It was the time for him to realise vividly that he was alone, neither mother nor father nor kindred of any name, to watch eagerly for his triumphant homecoming. Home! Why should he use that word? In point of fact he had no home. The old room at Mrs. Tryon's would be ready he had no doubt to receive him, but a faint smile which was almost the synonym for a tear was on his face as he thought of what a strange sort of home it was. He had been more than two years away in the distant college which had been Dr. Decker's choice. He had had an exceptionally brilliant career there, made exceptional by the intensity of his application, his thorough preparation beforehand, and his utter passionate absorption in whatever pertained to his profession. Dr. Decker had kept himself in regular communication with his student through the years, had been in all respects so far as helpfulness went, as good a father as a young man need desire, and a more grateful young man than Winterkeland it would be hard to imagine. Not the less grateful because the pecuniary part of the helpfulness had been a thorough business transaction, a debt which he had bound himself in honour to discharge as the years went by, and he prospered as he seemed not for one moment to doubt that he would. Nevertheless he was well aware that few men would have trusted him as Dr. Decker had. He was equally well aware that he had been helped in a hundred ways which no money could ever repay. Grateful, he meant that a lifetime of eager return in all possible ways should show something of what he felt. Yet as the train neared the depot the loneliness grew upon him. The past quite over, now the business tie between them was broken. It had been understood, of course, that the young man should begin life for himself from the hour of his graduation. The utmost that Dr. Decker had said about it of late was embodied in that one's sentence. As to the future my advice to you would be to begin in this city where you have already a name with the leading physicians and where my influence will be of more or less help to you, but the world is wide and you will wish, of course, to choose for yourself. The young doctor knew the sentence by heart. It had seemed to him a sort of severing of the former relationship. He had, in his reply, meekly expressed gratitude for this suggestion and said he should like, of all things, to begin in that city since Dr. Decker approved. And then he had added the probable date of his arrival, calculating it carefully, in the hope that the doctor might notice it as being the evening before the annual gathering of certain physicians of rank in his private office, and send him a card of admission, but Dr. Decker had not done so. As the train moved more and more slowly and the engine bell rang out its steady warning and the brake man called out familiar street crossings, indicating that the central station was near at hand, Winter wondered whether he should go at once to Mrs. Tryon's, taking the risk of his old room being vacant, or whether he should stop at a hotel for the night. It was quite past Mrs. Tryon's hour for supper, and probably he must be hungry, though it seemed to him that he could eat nothing. If only he had made one friend while he was in the city, a friend sufficiently interested to meet him at the depot, what a different feeling he should have had about getting in. Then he fell to wondering, for the twentieth time, whether he should stay on with Mrs. Tryon. How would his name look on her side door, Winter Kelland M.D.? Mrs. Tryon would like it, he thought, and the borders would, and it would doubtless be as good a neighborhood as any for a poor doctor to start out in life. He would wait, though, and ask Dr. Decker's advice. Then he wondered when he should see Dr. Decker, and whether he should venture to call the next day, or whether he ought to wait until the council was over. And then it had become quite dark and the train had made a halt in the depot. He remembered how he had almost stumbled upon the platform, dazzled by the sudden glare of light, and how, the next second, a firm hand grasped his own, and a hearty voice said, Welcome home, my boy, where are your checks? Here, Thomas, take these. Come this way, Kelland. And bewildered, silent, almost trembling, he had followed Dr. Decker's quick steps around the platform to where stood the Decker carriage, with the old coachman John grinning at him from the driver's seat, and had managed to step in, with the help of the doctor's motioning hand, and had been whirled down the street, saying nothing the while beyond the nearest common places in answer to the doctor's questions, blundering even over these as though he had lost the power to express himself in the simplest ways. Then the familiar house, well-lighted, had appeared to him, and he had stumbled up the steps after the doctor to the brightly-lighted hall, and had shaken hands with Mrs. Decker, and Miss Nettie, and Miss Sate, and kissed the baby, who was now a pretty girl of five, and had been hurried into dinner, and when fairly seated with the family, Nettie had said, Sate, it seems just as though we had a truly brother, and he had come home. And then every vestige of the homeless young man's composure had deserted him, and he had felt in haste for his handkerchief, and Nett founded in time to rescue a great tear which would roll straight down his nose. What a time it had been! All through the bewilderments and excitements of the next day, he remembered every moment of every hour. He had not been formerly invited to the council, but he had been seated in the doctor's office when several of the members arrived, and had been introduced as Dr. Kelland Gentleman. And then each one had been formally named to him, and he had been asked to supply them with paper and pencils, not as though he were a guest, but as one of the hosts. Throughout the busy, exciting day, he had been constantly appealed to as one who belonged to the establishment, so that he might almost have felt that he had dropped into his old place at Dr. Decker's right hand, but for this astounding difference. The doctor never once addressed him without that bewildering prefix, and he appealed to him several times as an authority in regard to the deliverances of certain recent textbooks. At least, that is about as much of the difference as could be put into words, but it was simply amazing the many nameless ways which Dr. Decker had of making this young fledgling feel that he belonged. They sat late in council, having dined together, of course, at Dr. Decker's. None of them spent the night. Time was very precious with each. But several of them took the two o'clock train so that it was nearly morning when the doctor, with his hand on Winter's shoulder, said, �Well, good night, my boy! This has been a hard day. Tomorrow we will sleep as late as circumstances will admit, and after breakfast I should like a little friendly talk with you.� And then Winter had gone back to the elegant room which he had occupied, apparently as a matter of course, the night before. The friendly talk in the morning had extended over the greater part of the day, having been subject to dozens of interruptions. What was actually said, when they were quite alone, might have been compressed into a few minutes of time. It closed on this wise. �Well, so you are quite willing to settle down here and take hold of whatever you find, and what I can by degrees put into your hands? That is not the way to put it, sir. I can never be grateful enough for your goodness in being willing to help me get started, after all the rest. Then we are all right. I declare it is three o'clock already. I don't know what becomes of the time today. I want you to go with me to see a patient on Green Street, but first come to the door and tell me how you like my new sign. It has just been set up since dinner. The lettering is Nettie's taste, and I rather like it.� And then it had gleamed upon him in green and gold, Norman Decker M.D., and just below it, Winter Kelland M.D., office hours, etc., etc. � �I had to guess at the office hours,� said the doctor, talking rapidly to cover Winter's silence and his own emotion. But I thought they would, on the whole, be the most convenient for you. It will be much better, I think, for you to join our family for the present. We can work together to better advantage. I need your help, my boy. I've been waiting for it for years.� And then he had ordered the carriage immediately, and they had plunged into a whirl of work and care together, with no time for sentiment. Now it was seven weeks afterwards, and at times it almost seemed to the young doctor as though he had always been Dr. Decker's associate. And now he was seated in the family carriage with Nettie on their way to meet the 640 train. It was very pleasant, this having been adopted by the entire family, and called upon for family service as though he were indeed a brother. �I have always wanted a brother.� Nettie had said heartily one day when she asked his help. Winter liked the position and felt no disposition to quarrel with the nearer friend Robert, who was frankly quoted before him as though, since he had been received as one of the family circle, there was no reason to hide from him other relations which were one day to be entered upon. �He is not a brother,� said Winter complacently to himself, thinking matters over carefully. �And I like being a brother. I don't know how people ever care for any pleasanter relation than that.� By which you will understand that the young doctor had some things to learn. During the somewhat long ride to the lower depot, Nettie explained her mission. �It is a scheme of our class. You remember I talked our class to you when I was at home years ago on vacation? Well, it is our class still. I haven't graduated yet. School duties pressed me so that I had to give up the regular meeting. Then there were some things about the ivy circle of which I did not quite approve, so all things considered I dropped it. When I came home last fall I determined to organize another class on a basis which suited me and start afresh. So we did. We belonged to the class of eighty-seven. We have a large circle and real splendid meetings. You ought to want to belong to such a circle as this is for the purpose of helping us. Then I am not absolutely sure, but we could, in some ways, help you. The features to which I specially objected in the ivy circle are eliminated from this. Moral worth is the only criterion of membership. Social distinctions based on position or money are utterly ignored, as they should be among people who have self-respect. I want to tell you about this girl we are going to meet. She is in the Dunbar Street telephone office, a bright, pretty girl, young and quite alone here. Came out west with a brother and he died a few months afterwards. She has been here at work for two years and did not know intimately a dozen people up to the time when we coaxed her into our circle. She lives in a dreary boarding house and used to have some of the most desolate evenings which could be imagined. We were trying to brighten them in every imaginable way. One way and one of the best is to get her to help brighten other desolate lives. Tonight, though, we have a lovely scheme on hand. We always notice birthday anniversaries in some simple manner, not always by gifts, but with a little festivity of some sort. On this occasion seven of the members were so good as to have their birthdays come this month, and the particular young woman you and I are going to meet starts out on her twentieth year tomorrow. So tonight is the celebration for the seven. She has been away for her month's vacation. For once we have been quite reckless of expense. Have planned a lovely little supper gotten up in real elegant style in the private parlor belonging to the WCTU on Portland Street. We have recitations instead of toasts, and flowers, and all festive things, and present each of the seven with two tickets for the oratorio tomorrow evening. Isn't it particularly delightful that only one of the seven would dream of getting to the concert but for this? Now each can go and take a friend. That is Papa's plan. He is especially charmed with the entire program. He says he is forcibly reminded of a birthday party which Aunt Nettie made for him once upon a time. Doesn't it seem comical to think of any person planning an entertainment for Papa's sake to try to help him? But he says it would never be possible for him to tell how much it helped him. I can imagine it, her companion said, with shining eyes. I can imagine it very much better than you can. And then they had reached the depot, and were just in time for the lonely young girl, a trifle red-eyed from recent weeping, who stepped timidly on the platform as soon as the train came to a full stop. Quite alone she was in the crowded city. During the greater part of the day there had been with her a young woman who used to be in the same telephone office, but who had been transferred downtown. These two were not friends, but knew each other well enough to exchange friendly words together, and to be glad that they had chance to meet on this journey back from vacation, so making the way less dreary. The downtown girl was less homesick than this one. She was coming back to friends who would be glad to welcome her. As the train neared the city, the two had questioned each other as to plans. The downtown girl was going to stop at the Fleet Street crossing. That was nearer her boarding-house than any other. No, she was not going to take an omnibus. Oh yes, she would be afraid to walk the streets alone, at least she would not like to do it, not in that part of town. But her friend Kate Green and Kate Green's brother were coming to meet her. And a little pink had flushed into her cheek at mention of the brother which was becoming. A little later she had exclaimed joyously, There they are! and had bowed and smiled, and the pink had deepened, and the lonely girl had seen a trim-looking young man in a gray suit, spring deftly on the platform while the train was still moving, and her companion had said to her with a kindly nod, Well, good-bye! I suppose I shall see you some time. What a long journey it is from your office to ours! I hope you will get home safe to-night. Good-bye! And she had flitted away under the protection of the gray coat, leaving the deserted one to feel more desolate than before. Then the central station had been called, and she had stepped timidly out on that platform, resolved to sacrifice twenty-five cents and take an omnibus rather than walk alone through the crowded streets. And the next second someone had spoken her name and taken her cordially by the hand as though she were actually being waited for, and had introduced her to a tall gentleman, Dr. Kelland, Miss Porter. And the said Dr. Kelland had possessed himself of her check and number, issued his orders about her one little trunk, and seated both ladies in a carriage, which seemed also to be in waiting before the bewildered young woman could gather her wits sufficiently for a demur. The mistress of ceremonies chattered Gay Leon, leaving her companion time to recover from bewilderment. You didn't expect a delegation to meet the train, did you? Bless your heart, do you suppose our circle intends to let any of its members come dolefully back from their vacation in solitude? Besides, isn't it your birthday frolic? We have not forgotten it, if you had. You will find us all ready. How many minutes will you need at your room for brushing your hair and shaking off the dust? That is all which will be necessary. It isn't a dress parade, you know. We allow nothing of that sort. Dr. Kelland, is this the house? Now, Fanny, you may have fifteen minutes to wash and brush, and then we'll drive directly to the rooms. Isn't it nice, she said gleefully, going back to the phraseology of her childhood, as Dr. Kelland, having rung the bell for his lady and waited until she was admitted, came back to the carriage. I have quite looked forward to this evening. It is going to be beautiful, I know. She will not feel so much alone after tonight. First nights from home are always so dreary. I wish you had time to see our parlor, doctor. It is decorated with flowers, pansies, of course, and they are arranged in exquisite designs. The word welcome is made out in them, glowing in a bank of white, and the magic figures, 1887, also done in pansies, look beautiful. Why pansies more than any other flower, and why is the year 87 especially magic? Neddy exclaimed in indignation, Only hear him, the ignorance of the man, when I have done my best to teach him. Don't you know that ours is the pansy class, and that we are all to graduate in the summer of 87? I know as little about it as possible. A reading circle of some sort I have heard hinted at several times in my life, but of its peculiar features I have, for reasons which I seemed unable at one time to control, remained profoundly ignorant. I think I believe in it more fully tonight than I ever did before, at least in your branch of it. Do you undertake much work of the sort you are doing tonight? We are bound in honor to undertake all manner of work, which will develop the spirit of Christian love and fellowship. It is the central feature of our organization. Robert is especially fertile in schemes. I wish he were here tonight. Much of this planning is his own. Robert has been connected with these circles since their first inception years ago, and has worked them always with a view to reaching hearts, as well as intellects. Why don't you join us, Dr. Calland? I never tried harder to do anything than I did to join the circle of which you were once a member. I know, but surely that feeling is unworthy of you. It was, he said frankly. I have lived to be ashamed of it, and have lost it, but I have also lost my interest, or had until tonight. I like this sort of thing. I believe I could take hold with anybody who would reach after lonely people and try to help them. I thought I had not time, but I don't know. It does not take much time. The regular reading is not heavy, and much of it would be familiar ground to you. By the way, have you looked at the book I lent you last week? Not yet, he said, coloring slightly. I will as soon as I can spare the time, because I promised you. But, a moment's hesitation, and then he added frankly, It will bore me, I know, all works of that character do. Of what character? The semi-religious. It is not semi-religious. It is wholly so, and argumentative and well written. I have heard eminent scholars say so. What Papa admires Dr. Calland need hardly bore you. He colored again. That is true, in a sense. He added, after a moment's pause. And yet his tastes in this direction may not be mine. I may not be cultivated up to the point where I can enjoy them. That is true, Dr. Calland, truer than you think. You want a cultivation of heart which will let you enjoy all these things. It is an infinite pity that you are not a Christian. Of all professions, that of a physician should be walled in with prayer. Why, do you consider it such a dangerous profession? Dangerous? Imagine me, Dr. Calland, in mortal agony, you standing over me, conscious that your poor human powers can do nothing for me, that I am going swiftly away, and you, on whom I had placed my trust, can give me no help about the journey. But, Miss Decker, even in that case I might have done all that could be done. Of course there is a point where the physician stands helpless. But there ought not to be. My father never stands helpless before a dying bed. He knows the way so well that he can point it out unerringly in a moment. And he knows the physician into whose hands he must commit the case has never lost one which was fully entrusted to him. I wish you were a Christian, Dr. Calland. The conversation had taken a most unexpected, and, to winter, an embarrassing turn. He was glad that the brushing was at that moment concluded, and the young girl's return made an answer unnecessary. Still it was not easy to get away from the thoughts which had been stirred. They haunted him during his ride back to Dr. Decker's. This young lady, who had adopted him as a brother, had spoken some very plain words, certainly. If their inference was correct, he was not prepared to rise to the heights of his profession, and it was to this that his ambition reached. Could it be possible that a doctor was in honor bound to know something about the other world as well as this? But that was utter nonsense, when it was not possible for any person to know certainly of the things concerning any other world. The moment, however, he had made this statement to himself, he realized that Nettie Decker would have declared it false. She believed that she knew about that other world, she believed her father knew. Were they right, and was he wrong? The young doctor moved restlessly on his seat and wished this ride were at an end, that he might plunge into work and forget uncomfortable thoughts. He found Dr. Decker waiting for him. Could he go to the hospital with him at eleven o'clock? Dr. Kelland shook his head. I'm afraid I can't, doctor. I wanted to ask you to go with me to Mrs. Tryon's. That poor fellow is much worse. He has only volunteer nursing, you know, and I have promised to spend the night with him since it is such a critical time. I am due there at ten o'clock, and shall hardly be able to get away. There is nobody whom I can trust. When he went to his room to make preparation for the night, before him on the toilet table lay the book he had neglected. It recalled Nettie Decker's words. He felt very uncomfortable. Here was he on his way to pass the night with a dying man, and according to this plain-spoken girl, he was by no means prepared to do his whole duty in the case. He had depended on Dr. Decker's presence part of the time. Was it true that while he trusted his medical knowledge of the case in hand perfectly, he yet needed Dr. Decker so that conscience might be entirely clear? It was a humiliating admission, certainly. He was by no means ready to make it. She is such a grand girl, though. He said, as he rearranged his medicine case, if I had had such as she to have given me a lift, I wonder if I would have been better furnished. I had lifts, certainly, but they were not in her direction. I wonder what has become of the boy who gave me the little book. How long I carried that book. I believe I fancied it a sort of talisman. I wonder what has become of Miss Force. I should like to see her again, and thank her for my mental uplift. What a thing she did for me without knowing it. Wait! That reading-circle about which she was fond of talking. I wonder how wide this scheme is, which Miss Decker is pushing. The same general ideas seem to govern them of which I heard, or imagined I heard, long ago. Miss Force told me about a summer school in connection with it, and Miss Decker, the other night, spoke of the same. Now I think of it, the boy on the fence referred to some such place. Wouldn't it be a remarkable coincidence if all these links belonged to the same chain? Where is that card, I wonder, or circular, or something of the sort, which Miss Nettie gave to me a few days ago? I hadn't time to look at it. Ah, here it is. A four years course? Yes, here are the books required for each year, and the books which have been required in the past. How long a past has it? He ran his eye eagerly back over the years, and a curious, almost a stifling sensation came over him as he read the familiar name, Human Physiology by J. Dorman Steele, the very book to which he could distinctly trace back the steps which had set him where he was tonight. Upon my word, he said, with a queer smile on his face, I belong to their circle by the very force of necessity, a foundling adopted and educated without knowing it. This is tremendous. Where's that book? I'll read it tonight. Poor Jarvis will sleep most of the time, I fear, even before he begins his last sleep. I'll join the class of eighty-seven. Why not? I can make up a year's reading. Hold on, weren't those the figures I marked out on a tree once upon a time? As sure as I am the same person, that's the very date, eighteen eighty-seven. I can see it now, my little vine, and the baked potatoes. How long, long, long they have waited! Well, the world is very much smaller than I thought it. See here, Dr. Kelland, it is nearly ten o'clock, you must go at once. In the hall below Dr. Decker was standing, ready to start out on a night of work. Did you say Jarvis is not likely to get through the night? He asked. Poor fellow, I'll look in if I can, my boy. Are you willing to have him slip away from you without being able to say a word to light up the darkness? It is a very dark journey without Christ. I wish you knew him. A whole world of emphasis thrown into that word, wish. Why should Dr. Decker say such words to him tonight of all nights? He passed on with no reply, other than a respectful bow, and opened the door of the little room where sat the bell-boy, a younger brother of the one whom he used to relieve. That one had been promoted. He was the hustler now. Jimmy, said Dr. Kelland, when John brings in the eleven o'clock mail, I wish you would scamper around to fourteen Bond Street to me with it. I expect something of importance to which I want to make a reply tonight. And he slipped a shining quarter into the boy's hand to refresh his memory. Now he was ready for his night's work. A very quiet night it seemed prepared to be. The young tired man who was volunteer nurse was glad to see him, and reported that there had been not much to do but shade the light and keep still. For the most part the sick man slept quietly. Too quietly, said the doctor with a sigh, as he turned from the bed and took his seat by the shaded lamp. He had brought the book to review in order that he might keep his promise to Ms. Decker. The philosophy of the plan of salvation. He read the title with a half-smile. I must read it for another reason, I suppose. He said, if I am really going to join that circle. But I suppose they do not quarrel with a man's belief because it happens to differ from theirs. I am probably as sincere in mine as they are in theirs, and that is the important thing, after all. If I live what I believe and believe what I live, what more can be expected? Saying which, he opened the book at absolute random, and read with slow care the first words which presented themselves. They were these. Perhaps the most absurd and injurious adage that has ever gained currency among mankind is that it is no difference what a man believes if he only be sincere. Now the truth is that the more sincerely a man believes falsehood, the more destructive it is to all his interests for time and eternity. This statement can be confirmed in every mind beyond the reach of doubt. Upon my word, said the reader with a sudden pailing of his face, if I were a believer in something or other, I should feel that the powers of earth and air were combining around me tonight. What a remarkable thing that I should read just that sentence instead of any other. I wonder if the entire book is going to jam into a man's prejudices in that fashion. Still, Winterkeland, you must read it in order to be honest. And whatever else you may be, you are honest. So, saying, he turned with a resolute air to the first page. But he was by no means in so light-hearted a mood as he tried to fancy himself. The circumstances by which he was surrounded were solemn and depressing. Yonder on the bed, the first case he had lost, was slipping steadily away, already beyond his grasp. Aside from the sense of failure as a physician, there were sad features connected with it. It was the young man of the waxed mustache who had questioned Winter's right to a seat at the first table. Though this, of course, the young doctor did not know. The acquaintance then commenced had continued in much the same fashion through the years, a speaking acquaintance only. Yet Winter, with the sense of a long association strong upon him, felt as though his patient was, in a sense, a friend. He had done his utmost for the poor fellow, not trusting to his own skill, but had once and again called Dr. Decker to the rescue, and had been assured by that high authority that nothing which his knowledge could suggest had been left untried. And the result had been failure. A lonely dying bed it was, no relative or near friend at hand. There was a widowed mother, old and feeble, and far away, too feeble to make the long journey had there been time, too poor to come had she been summoned, but not too old or too poor to suffer. It was all very sad. At precisely fifteen minutes after eleven Jimmy appeared with the expected letters, two of them, but the sleeper at that moment stirred on the bed and opened his eyes, rational eyes, for the first time in many hours. Winter laid the letters down hastily and went to him. Am I going to die? These were the first solemn words which confronted the watcher. He waved them for the time being by administering the medicine, by moistening the patient's lips and wiping the cold sweat from his forehead. But the question came again, faintly yet distinctly. Am I going to die? Whatever else I may be I am honest. The doctor had said this to himself not an hour before. Here was a chance to test it. Could he practice dishonesty in this presence? My poor fellow, he said gently. We are doing all we can for you. Dr. Decker has been to see you twice and is coming again tonight. Am I going to die? A low, hollow voice, great solemn eyes looking at him as if they would read his soul. There was no escape. He must say it as tenderly as he could. I'm afraid, Jarvis. And then stop. He could not speak the word. What next? Not certainly the thing which Dr. Kelland had expected. He was not very familiar with deathbeds, though he had stood beside Dr. Decker at one or two. But Dr. Decker was not present now. The responsibility was his own. The question came as distinctly and solemnly as before. Can you pray? Dr. Kelland felt a cold shudder run through his frame. Here he was at last confronted with something which he could not do. Something which others, hundreds of them, with only a tithe of the knowledge which he possessed, could do. Oh, for Dr. Decker now. We are doing all we can for you, poor fellow. How his own words came back on him tonight. He had just used them, and they were not true. Here was something which was wanted, with mortal need, and the young man bending over the bed felt that he could no more do it than he could hold back that rapidly ebbing life. My father never stands helpless before a dying bed. Such were the words Nettie Decker had spoken to him that evening, and only a little later her father had said, My boy, are you willing to have him slip away from you without being able to say a word to light up the darkness? How was he to bear this? He had not expected consciousness again. When will Dr. Decker come? He can pray. Yes, there it was. Winter Kelland, with all his brilliant education, his rare opportunities for culture, was confronted by his first serious case, and was a failure. There was no denying the humiliation of it, but the pain of refusing a request from the dying was the greater burden now. If he only had retained Jimmy, so he might send for Dr. Decker at once, or for a minister, if there were a minister within call. He looked around for the bell, with which he was to summon help when needed, but at that moment there were footsteps outside, and a soft tapping at the door, then Mrs. Tryon opened it and peeped in. I've just got away from Aunt Charlotte, she murmured. She is very poorly tonight. Is there any change here? She looked unusually old. She wore a dark wrapper, and was collarless. Her gray hair had slipped down on one side, and was straggling about her ear. But the eyes of the sick man fastened upon her, and his hollow voice spoke. Mrs. Tryon, can you pray? She gave the doctor a startled, inquiring look, but he bowed gravely. Certainly, the bow said, he is quite himself. Then the gray-haired, collarless woman bent over him. Poor fellow! Oh yes, I can pray! I couldn't have lived through all my trials if I hadn't known how. Do you want us to kneel right down here and pray for you? She was on her knees before the knot of assent was given, and the doctor dropped beside her, hardly knowing what he did in the intense excitement of the moment. Oh yes, she knew how to pray, this uncultured woman! How she poured out her soul for the dying man! Simply, as a child might have spoken, but with the assurance also which a child would have in going to a father in whom she had unbounded confidence. What a blessed thing it was for the graduated physician, of whom his college president had said he was, destined for a brilliant future, that the widow Tryon knew how to pray. Young Jarvis did not die that night. He dozed again presently, and Mrs. Tryon went away, and the doctor went back to his letters. They were disturbing. Matters had gone wrong with a fellow graduate, and winter was powerless to help him. Death had come to close the prospects of another. Death everywhere, murmured winter, with almost a groan, and I am afraid poor Graham was not ready for it. I wonder if there was anybody to pray. Then he looked at the other letter. Both handwriting and postmark were entirely unfamiliar to him, yet the letter commenced. My dear friend winter, have you ever read the story of the man who shot a bow at a venture? This is what I am about to do, troubled all the time by the humiliating recollection that I had ample opportunity to aim surely and did not. Do you remember, I wonder, that morning years ago, when I stood at the gate and talked with you? As I turned away, I said to myself, tonight I will have an earnest talk with him, but long before night I was far away. I think I helped you a little about the arithmetic winter, and the algebra, but I let the vastly more important matter slip. I did not mean to. Even after I went away I meant surely to write to you and put into words the desire of my heart to see you a student of Christ. But I did not. The shadows fell thick around me. When our old friend Miss Putnam went home so suddenly, my only sister was lying very ill. She died not long afterwards of the same disease which took from me my mother. I heard, through Miss Putnam's nephew, her dear Don, what a true and valued friend you were to her and to him to the last. And I thought, when my heart felt a little less sore, and my body was a little rested from the strain which had been upon me for so long, I would write that letter to you. But I did not. The weeks went by, and another shadow, deeper than any before, fell upon me. I do not know winter whether you ever heard of the death of her, dear Don. If you had, you would not have known that my life seemed to have died with him. I was to have been married to him winter in another year. Well, I lost you after that. I may have lost you for ever. I do not know what the years have done to you. I do not know if you are still on earth. Yet I venture, after all this space, to take up my neglected duty and try to gather its raviled threads. There is but one thing I want to say. Then had followed such an appeal, as winter had hardly imagined could be written, that if he were still unacquainted with the great teacher, he would apply to him at once for the only true wisdom. Long before he reached the close of the closely written pages, winter knew, of course, that the name signed would be Elise Forse. He read slowly, carefully, with an absorbed attention which the events of the night had helped to deepen. How strange! he said aloud, as he at last laid down the paper. How strange that this letter should have reached me tonight! There had lain inside a card of delicate tint, and with a faint perfume of violets hovering about it. Winter had not noticed it at first, but in taking up the envelope he felt it. The perfume, by that subtle law which we only half understand, carried him instantly back to the days of his childhood. He drew out the card and examined it carefully. It was closely written. My stranger friend, for you are my friend, though a stranger, because my elder brother is interested in you and wants to serve you. He has commissioned me tonight to write this little card of invitation. If you have not yet decided the question, he wants me to ask you again to come home. He has sent you many invitations, and I do not know, but it may be you have slighted them. Many do, strange as it may seem, for he invites to the palace of the king, and has made royal preparations for his guests. I want to meet you there. I do not know your name. Miss Force did not tell it to me at first, and then I asked her not to, so that you might feel I knew you as little as you did me, and yet that we were to be friends forever in our father's house. I am going. I should like to make your acquaintance there. How shall we know each other? I cannot tell, but perhaps the Lord Christ who knows us both so well, and who knows about this, which I am writing you, will say to you, Yonder is the woman who in the year 1884 gave you that invitation hither. If he does, you will come, it may be, to me, and say. You see, I accepted the invitation, and am come home. Then we will talk it all over. I do not expect to meet you until then, but really and truly I shall look for you when I get home. Good-bye. And then the sick man had stirred again and needed attention, needed much attention for the next hour, and wanted Mrs. Tryon, and she came and talked low, soothing words to him on her knees. And he dozed again and wakened, and was cared for tenderly. And Dr. Decker stole in on tiptoe and whispered, after a few minutes of watchfulness, that he thought the patient would live through the day. The gray dawn of the morning was now breaking, and that one of the hospital attendants had come with him and would stay for a few hours, and that he, winter, would better go home and get some rest, for it was going to be a hard day. So winter, in the growing light, gathered up his letters and went home, went to his room, and locked his door, but did not go to sleep. He got through with that day and the next, busy wearing days they were, and poor Jarvis was still living. On the evening of the third day, as the doctor stood just at sunset alone with him, he bent over the bed, with his hand on the slowly sinking pulse, and said, low and gently, Jarvis, my dear fellow, I can pray with you now. Something very like a flash lighted for a moment the dying eyes, and the voice said distinctly, That is good. It is good to know how to pray. I've been thinking I'm so glad my old mother knows how. I am glad too, doctor, that you haven't waited till you lie where I do. Mine's a wasted life. It was wonderful in him to accept it, but he did. It is wonderful to think of going home. I've wanted all summer to go home to mother, you know, but I never thought of this other home. He planned it. I shouldn't wonder if mother would be coming very soon. Doctor, I'm glad you can pray. Speak a few words for me now, won't you? And Dr. Kelland knelt by his dying patient, and offered his first prayer in the hearing of other ears than gods. A hard struggle he had been through. He felt older by years than on the first night he had watched in this room. It had been of no use to try to hide longer behind the neglects of others. They might not have done their duty, but his eyes being opened he could distinctly see how God himself, looking down the years of his life before they had been lived, had planned the way. Given him a father whose memory had been in many ways a blessing. Given him church and Sabbath school privileges enough to lead him if he had not chosen blindness. Given him the little book, two inches square, full of invitations which he had not heeded. Given him Miss Putnam's life of strict integrity. Miss Putnam's Bible which he had treasured and neglected. Miss Force's unselfish helpfulness. Dr. Decker's daily practical Christianity. There was no use in trying to count the milestones of the way. Yet how certainly it had been marked out for him, strewn with invitations over which he had trod as though they had been weeds, up to that culminating hour of his life when it had been as though the very spirit of God had said. Now gather the threads of the young man's past and present, woven in one complete chain. Tighten it about him on this solemn night while the death angel tarries in the room where he watches, and make one last effort for his soul. Now the two roads part. Now the decision must be made. I felt, said Dr. Kelland, telling Dr. Decker something of the story afterwards, I felt as certain that those repeated appeals from your daughter, from you, from Jarvis, from Mrs. Tryon, and finally from those two remarkable letters, had been planned by an unseen hand to gather about me that night for a final call, as I feel certain now that if I had declined again, I should have had no other call. It was my last invitation home. There was a peculiar smile on Winter's face as he repeated those last words, a smile whose entire significance Dr. Decker lost, for though Winter told him much about Miss Force and her letter, he had passed over the card enclosed with just a word, and for some reason very vaguely understood by himself, when he put Mrs. Force's letter carefully away inside Miss Putnam's Bible, he kept the card, and placed it in the pocket of his private diary which he always carried with him. If the Lord would only give me Jarvis's life as a token, for the sake of his poor mother, said Winter to Dr. Decker on the evening of the fifth day of watching, I would give my energies toward trying to help him redeem what he calls a wasted life. Do you think there is any hope at all, doctor? I do not see a gleam of hope. I believe the Lord has other plans, and he can take care of the mother. I have just been in to see the dear fellow. He is quiet, peaceful, and sinking fast. At midnight he died. Dr. Kelland was kneeling beside him at the time. Dr. Kelland's voice, in prayer, followed him to the very threshold of the other world, and his last word had been with a smile. It is good to know how to pray. I'm glad mother knows. As the doctor turned to leave the quiet form, which needed nothing more from him, a telegram was handed to him, bearing the young man's name. He tore it open, glanced at it, smiled, and, saying only, I will attend to the reply, left the room and went home. In the private office was Dr. Decker. Winter stopped with him long enough to say, Doctor, he is gone. He died at five minutes of twelve. And, look here, this telegram was handed me just afterwards. You were right. God took care of the old mother. She was there to meet him, fully two hours ahead of him. Chapter 29 That Beats Me A stranger might have thought it a special gala day. There were exquisite strains of music rolling up from the lake. There was a grand concert in progress at the amphitheater. There were bulletins at the temple corner, announcing all sorts of delights for the evening. There were people and flowers everywhere. Yet it was only one of the regular days of the summer of 87. It is a gala year, Elise, in honor of our class. There must be many more here this season than have ever been before. It was Vine Wilmuth who spoke. Sauntering with her companion down one of the avenues, their attention had been called to the throngs of people coming up from the wharf where one of the largest steamers had but a few moments before landed its living freight. I hope they will all find pleasant accommodations. Vine said, looking after a group with the thoughtful air of one accustomed to being a caretaker. Then with a little laugh. But I am glad our house is full. It is so long since we have had any new people there. It would seem like an intrusion on family life. Isn't the pansy bed lovely? For at this moment they had reached and paused before the terraced mound aglow with its almost infinite variety of exquisite pansies holding up their faces to catch the spray from the fountain which constantly showered its silver breath over them. Lovely! Miss Force repeated, with a quieter but not less intense enthusiasm. Isn't it a lovely world, this world in the woods? Wood still, although a city. How could one who had never seen the place imagine such a rare combination? I know so many people who are coming here this year, almost as travelers of old made pilgrimages to their shrines. People you know who never go anywhere. Who are and have been all their lives, toilers. Yet having large hearts and strong aspirations. People to whom this visit will be a revelation, a foretaste of the blessed land, an uplifting for which their souls will be the stronger forever. I like this year. I should think you might. You imagine that I do not know the story of the years which have preceded it, so far as your part is concerned, because you have been so quiet about it. But there are people who can write letters, Elise, and a few persons come here each year from New England and talk. I know ever so many of your lovely secrets. I know about the circle which sends delegates this year, six girls who have never been from their busy homes for a week's outing before. I know about two young men who bring their seventy-year-old mother with them to look on while they receive their diplomas. I know about the entire circle from that little farming community among the hills away back from the railroad. I have been over to the houses they are to occupy, and I helped to arrange the nice maiden ladies' room. Oh, you have been very shy and still, but the birds told me, and the waves, and, above all, the flowers, pansies, you know. How busy you have been, and how beautiful the flowers of your ideas must be to you. Not my ideas at all, vine-deer. You planted almost every one of them that moonlight evening when we sat in the hall together, and found motes, I did, and was quite unacquainted with certain beams which were making me as blind as a bat. I have learned some things since then, Elise. With my eyes quite open I have stared about me a good deal, and found that silent influences were at work for which I had been giving no credit. Those girls you remember whom I criticized for being so eager about their skeptic joining the circle. They secured him, and while he was reading the Bible in the nineteenth century he was converted. They told me about it after I grew intimate with them. One of them said that when the book was on the list for the month it seemed to her that she prayed all the time. She was so anxious to have it reach certain minds. Now I should never have known that if I had not chanced across it. And yet what you said was strictly true, and much more could be done if these ways of working were consecrated. Much more will be done in the future. This pansy class is going out strong for service. The two friends were now nearing the lake. This was one of their long, rambling walks and talks. They were having their first week together since that summer of eighty-four. Three years before, when Vine had said goodbye to Miss Force, it had been with the expectation of greeting her among the earliest comers of the following summer. But plans went awry as so often happens in our experiences, and summers and winters had intervened before they met again. Of course there was much to talk over. For these, too, though they had chosen each other almost suddenly, were not of the kind who would be likely ever to drop apart again, no matter how widely separated. Neither, on the other hand, were they very regular correspondence. They lived too busy lives for that. So the letters, though warm and full, had been few, and there were many scattered threads to gather. But two days after that September morning, on which they had separated, Vine had held a letter in her hand addressed in peculiarly graceful chirography, Miss Elise Force. What pretty writing, she had said, as she studied it for a moment, then she had drawn her pen over part of the address, added another, and sent the letter forward, never dreaming that she had held for a moment the link between her and her childhood friend. Sometime afterwards she heard about this letter. Oh, Vine, do you remember our arrow-shotted adventure? It found its mark. My boy, a man now and a physician, writes me that it, the letter, was one of the special cords by which the Holy Spirit drew him homeward. The circumstances by which he was surrounded that night, when our letter reached him, were very marked and peculiar. When I have more leisure I will tell you the story, or perhaps I will leave it until we meet. Meantime he sent his special thanks to his stranger friend. More than this of the story had not yet been told to Vine. There were so many things to talk about, and it was such a busy world. They flitted from one subject to another rapidly, this afternoon, almost childishly glad over being together again. Yet they had eyes and ears for much which was going on about them, and often broke off in the midst of sentences to say, Look at that beautiful old face, or Notice that happy girl! Isn't this evidently her first visit here? And isn't she realizing a castle which she thought was built in the air? And what next, Vine? Miss Force asked, following one of these interruptions. What next? After I have passed the golden gate you mean? With a happy little laugh. Oh, the next thing, whatever it may be. I feel quite content to live on here doing little things from day to day, and letting the great ones hover all about me. There are great events evolving all the time out of what we call little things. My life is summer sunshine nowadays, Elise, all winter long. Mrs. Griggs is a fixture and a comfort. Clockwork represents her kitchen arrangements, and she is conscientious even about mashing potatoes. I have learned to respect her religion. I ought to respect her. We are classmates, you know. We graduate together. Think of it. The laugh rang out merrily now. Well, but seriously, Elise, she knows a great deal more than she did, and respects herself more, I believe, than she ever would have done without the readings. And the rest that she has been to mother is something to make me grateful forever. Oh, I think we shall live on just as we have been doing. Father does not entirely approve of the borders. He says that they are unnecessary now that his business has an assured foundation. But mother likes to have people comfortable now that she has Mrs. Griggs at the helm. Elise, have you noticed that family party? They have been here for a day or two. The elder gentleman is a physician. His name is Decker, Dr. Norman Decker. Dr. Landris says he is very celebrated. I think he is fine looking. That pretty girl is his daughter. I heard her call him Papa. I don't know whether that young man is his son, but I imagine not. He doesn't resemble them, and he gives the sort of attention which as a rule a son and brother does not. Do you like to imagine about people, Elise? Ms. Fours, called a clear voice at a little distance. There, you are being summoned. One of your innumerable girls wants to know which dress she shall be perfectly distracting in tonight or something equally important. How happy all those girls are! You can afford to fold your hands Elise Fours after this, and enjoy the harvest which will result from your gathering them all here this summer. I can't afford not to go to Cali at once, said Ms. Fours, laughing. The child is bubbling over with all sorts of sweet impossible things which she wants to try to do. Will you wait here for me? A few moments consultation with the white-robed maiden, while Vine waited, and the family party whose face is interested her drew nearer. Then Ms. Fours's voice floated back on the breeze. Vine, will you go down by the shore and sit while I run back to the house for a few minutes? Vine nodded. The young man belonging to the family party turned suddenly, and fixed upon her such a prolonged and altogether unexpected stare that her face flushed under it, and she quickened her steps toward the rustic seats by the shore. A few moments more and he had turned abruptly from his companions and was following her. She was quite near the seat now, her favorite resting place. I beg your pardon. The voice was quick and eager but courteous, and his hat was uplifted. I beg your pardon for the intrusion, but is it, isn't it Vine Wilmeth? That is my name. Fair cold dignity, a lady but an astonished one. Then surely you ought to know me, you can't have forgotten. I am Winter Kelland, your old friend win. Forgotten? Who told the tell-tale blood to spread itself in such rich waves all over the fair face of this bewildered Vine? What did she say next, and next, and next as they sat for a full half hour under the trees by the shore? Do you imagine I am going to tell you? Not but that all the world might have heard. That is just the point. So commonplace, so matter of course, the talk. You can imagine it. Where, when, who, why? Just variations to the tune of those words. A road gone over as surely by every company of friends between whom fourteen years of silence have rolled. Very commonplace indeed. Why should I trouble you with it? Yet do you imagine that it ever seems commonplace to the people who with flush cheeks and earnest eyes are rapidly telling it over? It is unaccountable, said Dr. Kelland eagerly. It was the next day, and they were sitting together, he and Vine, in her mother's parlour. They had talked long the day before. Ms. Force had not returned to the shore, but had sent a young girl to report that she was most unavoidably detained. And Winter Kelland, hearing her name, gave again an astonished start, and had more eager questions to ask. But for reasons best known to himself, having received a card with Ms. Force's address, beyond the general statement that he thought he might find in her an old acquaintance, he kept his own counsel. I may as well remark in passing that he renewed his acquaintance with the lady that very evening, an occasional correspondence having been kept up during the years, but this was their first meeting. Among other questions were these. And now, Ms. Force, may I ask, was not the lady who sent me that invitation home, Ms. Vine Wilmuth? And if she were, Dr. Kelland, would I have a right to give you the information? Perhaps not, with a grave smile. Though I should suppose any lady might be proud of having tried to do such work. But I will not ask it. I will only ask if that lady knows my name in connection with those letters, or in connection with you, in any way. So far as I know she has never heard it. Then, may I ask you as a special favor to keep this matter, so far as it relates to the past, in confidence for the present? I assure you I have no unworthy motive in making the request. And now I want to tell you that Ms. Wilmuth is a friend of my childhood, my only friend I might say. I wonder if you may possibly be the boy who went away when she was eight, and he was twelve? I suspect I am that very boy. And he gave Ms. Force such a peculiarly suggestive smile that she looked after him as he went with swift steps down the walk a little later, and said to all her secret self, I tried to weave a pretty little romance for my sweet Vine, and behold the hand of God had set the frame and arranged the threads long years before. And now you know the rest of the story. Commonplace again? Yes, very commonplace, being repeated somewhere every hour of every day as the steady years go by. But I leave it to you whether that story of all others is likely to be commonplace to the person's immediately concerned. For the others they do well to stay outside. Yet I will finish Dr. Kellan's remark. It is unaccountable, he said, the manner in which I have been led. If I had not, with all my soul, been a believer in an overruling hand, I must have been converted by an honest look at my own history. Why, Ms. Vine, it would make a volume of amazing history. And then he turned historian at once, and told her much, in brief and badly, of what you already know having lived it with him. And to think how this circle has wound itself about me and encircled and entangled me when I least suspected it, has been above all things strange. That boy on the fence must have been here the first summer of this development. He must have caught here the spirit which moved him to speak those unusual words to me. That book, that physiology which I told you was the instrument chosen of God to set my very soul on fire. But before that a stray paper fell into my hand, having parts of sentences on it, which, wait, let me show you the very paper. And he drew from his diary the torn bit, and read, Struggle into opportunity, there are valiant souls who, without family prestige, without incitement on the part of father or mother, seem early in life to take a wide view, feel the necessity, and say, by God's help, with our own right hand, and with what brain power we have, we will attain what culture we can. And those hardworking fellows managed to go through college, they fight their way up into power, and while—that is all—he said his face aglow and his eyes flashing with intense feeling. Why, that, said Vine, sounds like, it seems as though, yes, I'm sure I have heard it before on these grounds. You are right, he said eagerly. It was only a few months ago a friend of mine gave me a book to read in order to post me more thoroughly in regard to this movement, for I confess to you that until very recently, although I have been a careful reader of the books, I have been ignorant of its machinery or location or local schemes. I am a very busy man, and have done my reading by snatches and alone. Well, she lent me the book, and I glanced it through in haste, until I came upon some words that I had found years before in a scrap of newspaper, words which had burned at white heat into my heart, and I found them selections from the first graduating address on these grounds, given by the leader himself, was not that overwhelming, and indeed I could give you other facts equally amazing. But about the arithmetic and the algebra and misforce, he was entirely silent. Vine attempted a question. Was the circle in any way helpful to you as a Christian, Dr. Kelland? Have you been a Christian during all these years? He shook his head. No, I have been a Christian hardly three years. Yes, the circle was directly and mysteriously instrumental in leading me by remarkable and unseen and unimagined processes, up to the moment of decision. Sometime, Miss Vine, if you will let me, I should like to tell you that story. But I want to tell you now what an idiot I have been about location. During these later years, when I have often heard the name of these headquarters, I have said occasionally, I was born in the county which bears that name, yet I knew little of its geography when I left that region, and I never heard of the place you mention. And I did not know, I did not dream until the moment when the steamer rounded the point on this very lake, that it was our old woods where we began that day to make a city. He was intensely excited over his own story, and in Vine's eyes there was a peculiar light. But I am not going to tell you the rest of the story. They lived it. They lived hard and fast. Pretty St. Decker complained with pouting lips that adopted brothers were like all other brothers. They went away with other sisters, and left her to console herself with a brother-in-law and a father. It was true. Dr. Kelland spent all the hours at his command among his old friends. They walked and rode and sang and listened together. They looked forward together to that wonderful day when they should pass through the Golden Gate and join in the recognition song. One evening, one lovely evening, just at the sunset hour, they had walked he and Vine around under the hill and up the hill and come out beside the white-pillared hall and stopped under one of the tallest trees and looked about them and were silent. Dr. Kelland took off his hat and looked up reverently to the very top of the tall tree, beyond the top into the blue of heaven. The hall was not here that day. He said at last, but the tree was, and the date in the tree. Do you remember? But Vine said not a word. And we planned it, he added eagerly. Don't you know we planned it? This, you said, was the prettiest spot in all the grove, and our building must be here, room enough in it for me. You surely remember it? Vine's cheeks were aflame, and there was no sort of reply. Vine, look here! He drew from the pocket of his private diary a little card. This is not heaven, yet to me it is almost a glorious foretaste, and I cannot wait for the real heaven. I want to anticipate. You told me to come to you there and say, You see I have accepted the invitation and come home. I say it now and here. It was your invitation which I accepted at last. My little Vine. Isn't it? May I say it? I shall not tell you what she said. It is not fair. You should not be at the Hall of Philosophy just now. There are enough other places for you to visit. Be courteous and move away. You said you would not call me Mr. Kelland. The young doctor exclaimed merrily, sometime after his last quoted statement. Don't you know you were sure you could not? So I had to secure a title for your only sake. Is it easier to say doctor, my little Vine? You said you were sure I would win. I meant to then, and I mean to now. And I'll tell you, Vine, another thing. This was an hour later. I mean to have, I surely mean to have, that birthday supper. Haven't I waited for it long enough? Those potatoes, they must certainly be almost ready. Oh, Vine, let it be the birthday feast. Will you, little Vine? They walked back decorously enough. You met them, I think, more than likely in the avenue which leads from the hall to the auditorium. You may have met them yesterday. You may meet them tomorrow. You will not know what the trees and the flowers say to them. You will not know how every pansy blossom you wear seems to blossom again in their hearts. They will never tell. There is planning going on in the Wilmeth home. It is all a little bewildering, the poor mother things, over one daughter. But you know you invited me to the birthday supper, dear Mrs. Wilmeth, pleads the doctor, and I could not bring it to pass before, and I cannot wait longer. Besides, Vine told me fourteen years ago that she meant to be married the day she was twenty-two, just as her mother was. And Mrs. Griggs, during these days when others are busy about the processions and the flowers and the arches and the golden gate, Mrs. Griggs is forecasting that birthday wedding day supper. Faked potatoes, she says in dumb amaze. Who ever heard the like? If it was anybody but Alvine and Wind Kelland, I couldn't and wouldn't believe it. But they always was the quearest pieces, and just cut out for each other. I used to say it as long ago as when they was forever together every chance they could get. I always expected something or other nice of Wind. I'll say that for him. And as for Alvine, well, there ain't a girl in this world that— but baked potatoes for a wedding supper, that beats me.