THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE BALLINGTONS
 
 THE 
 
 BALLINGTONS 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 FRANCES SQUIRE 
 
 BOSTON 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
 
 1905
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1905, 
 
 BY 
 LITTLE, BROWN, & COMPANY. 
 
 All Rights Reserved 
 Published October, 1905 
 
 ELECTHOTYPED BY THE HERALD COMPANY OF BINGHAMTON, 
 
 BINGHAMTON, N. Y. 
 
 PRINTED BY THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, 
 U. 8. A.
 
 TO 
 MARY GRAY PECK
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 PART I 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 A GIRL went up to the piano and stood half -turned toward 
 ** the group of guests in Mrs. Ballington s drawing-room 
 while an accompaniest played through the prelude of a Rubin 
 stein song. The girl was dressed in white, with no ornament 
 except an old-fashioned Roman sash; but she stood very 
 straight, and her hair had a rebellious wave that showed fire 
 under the brown, and her neck and arms were like flushed 
 marble. Presently she turned toward the listeners and began 
 to sing. Her voice had the sweep and vibration of a cello 
 and she used it daringly. As she sang she seemed to expand 
 from a fledgling college girl into some elemental spirit, the 
 grandeur of whose passion awed while it thrilled the listeners. 
 
 " Charming ! " Mrs. Ballington said, with a sour look 
 through her lorgnette at the wandering lights in the girl s 
 dark eyes. She had been chagrined for weeks past at her son 
 Donald s devotion to this country doctor s daughter. Her 
 chagrin flamed into exasperation at the girl s unembarrassed 
 flaunting of herself such was Mrs. Ballington s phrase 
 in the Ballington parlor as though it already belonged to her. 
 
 Donald did not speak, but Agnes Sidney caught the look 
 of adoration in his eyes as she left the piano and went over 
 to his younger brother Tom. Tom withdrew his elbows from 
 his knees and looked up from the floor. " No, you don t get 
 me to sing any coon song or play the banjo! " he said briefly. 
 Agnes came to a stop and began to laugh.
 
 2 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " I don t want to talk, either. I want to be impolite and 
 still," he went on severely. " You ought to want to be still, 
 too, after singing like that." 
 
 Another college girl, who had come with Agnes, at this 
 moment joined them. It was her first opportunity to escape 
 from perfunctory conversation with the third man of the Bal- 
 lington family. 
 
 As she drew Agnes down beside her on the lounge near 
 Tom s chair, the light from the chandelier fell upon her heavy 
 hair, changing it from brown to bronze. Her face was not 
 beautiful, but it had a power and a kind of sardonic sweetness 
 which compensated for beauty. A pair of straight black 
 brows marked her face, and impenetrable gray eyes looked 
 out from beneath them. Miriam Cass was five years older 
 than Agnes and was as well-known in the scientific and art 
 life of Winston College as was Agnes in its social life. 
 
 " Then will you play your flute for us ? " said Agnes. 
 " That was what I was going to ask you." 
 
 Tom moved impatiently, whereupon the newcomer inter 
 posed, smiling, " Mr. Ballington thinks the flute is too pre 
 cise and soulless an instrument after your Rubinstein, Agnes." 
 
 Tom looked up with a return of his natural good humor. 
 "Precise?" he exclaimed. "You never heard me play! 
 Soulless, is it? " He paused and looked across the room at 
 the man who was sitting imperturbably where Miriam had 
 left him. " Ferd ! You re the man to play the flute. It shall 
 be my Christmas present to you." 
 
 Agnes sat up eagerly, glad of an excuse to look at the man 
 of whom she had been thinking while she sang. He, too, was 
 looking at her, as it chanced. The flush of her face and neck 
 deepened as their glances crossed. 
 
 Ferdinand Ballington rose at once. Agnes noted afresh, 
 as she watched his leisurely approach, how he differed in 
 looks from his cousins, Donald and Tom. Ferdinand s eyes 
 were blue, but, unlike the mild Ballington eye, bright and in 
 tense. His brows and lashes were dark and there was a cold 
 steadfastness in his regard.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 3 
 
 " Are you going to let them call you soulless, Mr. Balling- 
 ton? " said Agnes, as soon as he reached her side. 
 
 " I have begun to think that I have a soul," Ferdinand 
 answered quietly. 
 
 Agnes felt a tingle of excitement as she asked with a half- 
 smile, " Why haven t you talked to me before this evening? " 
 
 " I have been waiting to do so ever since I saw you. I 
 saw you the moment you entered the room." 
 
 " Well," replied the girl, arching her brows, " I saw you 
 while I was singing and I wondered if you liked the song. 
 You kept so still." 
 
 He made no reply. 
 
 She was embarrassed at his silence and nervously pressed 
 the inquiry, " Did you like the song ? " 
 
 " I would listen as long as you could sing. There is a spell 
 about you." 
 
 Agnes was oppressed by the unvarying gaze of her com 
 panion s eyes. " I would be glad if I could bring out the 
 spell that is in great music. I wish I were great enough to 
 do it," she said. 
 
 There was a dignity in her way of receiving the compli 
 ment which checked him. He considered a moment, then drew 
 a chair near her and sat down, beginning in a less personal 
 tone to question her about her musical studies. They soon 
 passed to other subjects and only the girl s heightened color 
 and eager attention intimated that she was peculiarly in 
 terested in her new companion. 
 
 A kindred interest would have explained Tom s brighten 
 ing up as he found himself with Miriam Cass. 
 
 Presently Miriam withdrew her arm gently from Agnes 
 and turned entirely to Tom. " You don t want to talk," she 
 said humorously, " so I am going to look at these photo 
 graphs." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I do, now ! " Tom answered frankly. 
 
 Miriam s hands were already upon the basket of photo 
 graphs, which she lifted from the table near by and placed 
 upon her knees.
 
 4 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " You won t be interested in these," volunteered Tom. 
 " They are mostly our relations and the hideous houses they 
 lived in and their funeral flowers." 
 
 Miriam laughed and began taking them out carelessly. 
 
 Tom stopped her suddenly. "Wait a minute. That one 
 is worth looking at. It is Uncle Tom s old farmhouse. I 
 was named for him. That was the finest old place between 
 here and Albany. Ferdinand owns it now." He leaned 
 over and pointed at the picture, lowering his voice confi 
 dentially. " You see that beautiful avenue of cedars, winding 
 up to the house? You couldn t have duplicated that any 
 where. Oh, well " he broke off. " Let s look at the next 
 
 one." 
 
 Miriam, however, continued to study the picture, and Tom 
 impatiently picked up another from the heap. He glanced 
 at it and flung it back into the basket. 
 
 The action aroused Miriam and she innocently took it up 
 and looked at it carefully. " Who is this ? " 
 
 " Old General Mott," Tom replied shortly. 
 
 Agnes caught the name and turned toward them. 
 
 " Beatrice Mott s father ! " she exclaimed ; " I want to 
 see it." 
 
 Her energy made the group who had petrified around Mrs. 
 Ballington near the piano look across the room. Agnes was 
 studying the picture. " Does his daughter look like him ? " 
 
 "Very much," said Ferdinand. Then he asked with in 
 terest, " Is Fred Sidney any relation of yours ? " 
 
 Agnes looked up. " Yes. He is my cousin. I ve been very 
 anxious to see the Matts ever since Fred and Beatrice were 
 engaged. Their engagement was so sudden " 
 
 An embarrassed pause followed the words, and Tom s face 
 hardened. 
 
 Without looking at him, Agnes dropped her eyes again to 
 the picture in her hand. It was the likeness of a burly, bold- 
 featured man with lines of laughter about eyes and mouth, 
 a determined chin, and an expression of vigor and content 
 ment. He wore a military uniform.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 5 
 
 To relieve the constraint which General Mott s photograph 
 had produced, Miriam held up the picture of the Ballington 
 farm. " You have a beautiful home, Mr. Ballington," she 
 said to Ferdinand. 
 
 " Yes," he replied. " I think a good deal of it. I intend 
 to make a fine place of it in time." 
 
 Tom was called away during Ferdinand s remark to sum 
 mon the carriage for one of the guests, and when he came 
 back he found that the Ipave-taking had become general. 
 With some relief he noticed that, at last, Agnes and Donald 
 were together. He knew that Donald had planned the whole 
 evening with reference to her coming, and he had wondered 
 why his brother had not taken advantage of his opportunity. 
 Agnes was saying good-night to Mrs. Ballington, who re 
 sponded with grudging civility. Miriam was already in the 
 doorway. Tom caught up his hat and joined her, divining 
 that Donald had looked forward to an uninterrupted conver 
 sation with Agnes as he accompanied her back to the college. 
 Miriam walked rapidly and she and Tom were soon well in 
 advance of Donald and Agnes. 
 
 As the latter went down the path Donald at length broke 
 silence in an unnatural voice. " Are you really going to 
 morrow? " 
 
 " Yes," replied Agnes. " I have stayed over two days, now, 
 and I must go home." 
 
 " Could you not make your home here? " he asked very 
 low. 
 
 It had come sooner than she expected. She did not reply. 
 They reached the end of the linden walk. Here Agnes 
 stopped, and, partly to regain her composure, turned for a 
 last look at the house. She saw Ferdinand Ballington stand 
 ing alone on the piazza, looking after them. Perhaps he saw 
 her stop and look back, for he turned immediately and went 
 into the house. 
 
 " Don t you understand me? " said Donald earnestly. 
 "Will you be my wife?" 
 
 It was her first proposal, and a direct one. Agnes in-
 
 6 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 stinctively quickened her step to catch up with her compan 
 ions. There was a longer pause. She heard Tom s laugh on 
 ahead, and was soon near enough to see the responsive 
 humor in Miriam s face as it was raised to his. It was a 
 relief to hear their words distinctly. 
 
 " How could you expect your mother to tolerate Ben- 
 venuto Cellini ? " Miriam was saying. 
 
 Agnes brought her mind away from Tom s enthusiastic 
 visions of statues in bronze and salt-cellars in gold, to 
 answer her lover. " Donald," she said at length, struggling 
 to utter what was plain to herself, " I ll tell you how it is. 
 I know I must marry some time, but I can t bear to think 
 about it yet. I want to be free." She opened her hands with 
 a sudden gesture of wings. 
 
 " Love doesn t make slaves true love," said Donald. 
 
 " Yes, it does ! " She was started now, and ran on glibly, 
 half in earnest, but with the growing dramatic instinct. " It 
 does. At least for a woman. A woman gives up so much for 
 the man she marries: her name, her individuality, all her 
 chance of personal ambition, her health often, and sometimes 
 her life." 
 
 She stopped, artistically elated with her speech. She could 
 not conceive of herself without health, and she certainly did 
 not intend to give up her life for anyone. 
 
 " Yes," said Donald, with solemnity in his voice. The one 
 word awed her. 
 
 " But I will confess," she went on, after a moment, " there 
 are times when I think I should like to marry now. You 
 know what my home is, how hard papa works and how shut- 
 up mamma is. As your wife of course I can t be oblivious 
 of it I won t deceive you, that s one thing I won t do! it 
 would give me an opportunity " 
 
 He interrupted her, anticipating. " You should do for 
 your parents whatever you might wish," he said seriously. 
 " I can understand the desire, and it would be my happiness 
 and my honor to gratify it." 
 
 Agnes was silent in acute mortification. She was ashamed,
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 7 
 
 for she saw that he had put a generous interpretation to her 
 words. She had been thinking only of herself. 
 
 " Thank you," she said at last. 
 
 " I went up to Kent and called upon your parents a fort 
 night ago," continued Donald. " I went there on purpose 
 to give them an opportunity to see me. I was tempted to 
 speak to your father of this matter, but I thought I ought 
 to ask your permission first. Oh, Agnes ! " He choked and 
 stopped. After a minute he resumed again. " Think what 
 our life together might be ! If God would give me this bless 
 ing, my cup would run over. Everything else I have. There 
 are the ten talents. Oh, my dear girl, help me to make them 
 the twenty ! " 
 
 As she still remained silent, he spoke again. " I feel free 
 to say your father liked me. I went to church with him 
 and had supper at your good home. If you had been there 
 my heart would have been full. I know I am not clever, but 
 I would be content to have you so. Just let me love you ! We 
 would grow nearer each other as the years went on." 
 
 Still Agnes said nothing. Her sensations were confusing. 
 This was not the wooing of which she had read and 
 dreamed this solemn talking about God and the church. 
 Yet she felt the kindliness of his reference to her home and 
 her parents, and a transient tenderness made her exclaim 
 with sudden shame, " You are too good for me ! You deserve 
 a good woman." 
 
 He caught her hand which hung by her side. " Oh, Agnes ! 
 What better woman could I ever find? Say yes to me, 
 dear. Do say yes. " 
 
 " Will you let me wait a little? " she asked, feeling repug 
 nance to pledging herself, yet rebelling against the return 
 to her village life without some chance of escape. 
 
 " Take as much time as you wish," he answered. * God 
 forbid that I should hurry you. But you will write to me, 
 will you not? " 
 
 " Yes, I will write." 
 
 Then he allowed her to change the subject. When they
 
 8 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 reached the college grounds they found Tom and Miriam 
 waiting for them at the gate, and they all walked up the 
 long path together. 
 
 " I used to wonder what was inside this place when I was 
 a boy," remarked Tom, as they neared the steps. " I asked 
 my Uncle Tom once, and he said it was a deer park. So it is," 
 he added, turning a frank smile upon the two girls. 
 
 Miriam laughed, but Agnes scarcely heard the sally. 
 Neither did she hear Tom explaining to Miriam that " Uncle 
 Tom " was Ferdinand Ballington s father, though not a soul 
 would know it. 
 
 After the good-nights were said, Agnes and Miriam hur 
 ried through the dimly-lighted halls of the dormitory. Trunks 
 were standing by certain doorways, but the corridors were 
 deserted. Miriam s room was the first one they reached. 
 
 " Won t you come in ? " she asked, inserting the key and 
 throwing open the door. 
 
 Agnes entered and walked over to the open window. Miriam 
 lighted the gas. " Fraulein is awake still," Agnes said as 
 the sound of a brilliant run in sixths came over from Music 
 Hall. 
 
 After a moment she turned and glanced around the room. 
 It was stripped of all its ornaments except Miriam s finished 
 and unfinished models in clay which stood or lay along the 
 , top of the long bookshelves. As Agnes looked them over, 
 Miriam regarded her with pleasure. She let her eyes pass 
 from the well-poised head down the figure, noting the girl s 
 pose. There was a glint of good-natured satire in her 
 expression as she said finally, " Well, which one of the Bal- 
 lington company do you think the most interesting? I select 
 the dowager." 
 
 Then, with a deepening amusement at the puzzled look 
 Agnes gave her in reply, Miriam went on : " How much 
 longer do you suppose she went on talking about Mrs. Morti 
 mer Tompkins Napoleonic bedquilt after we left her? 
 Wherever do you suppose Tom Ballington got his good- 
 humor from, and his taste? "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 9 
 
 " His taste is making the family a good deal of trouble," 
 commented Agnes ; " when he is supposed to be attending to 
 business, as often as not he is down at the library poring 
 over books on metal work. He has a private collection of 
 outlandish things that have cost him a good deal more money 
 than he ever has made." 
 
 " It s a strange thing," said Miriam in reply, " that con 
 scientious men like Donald Ballington, utterly regardless of 
 centuries of warning examples, keep on trying to make pigs 
 tails out of whistles. He ll be sorry some day that he 
 doesn t let his brother do what he is born to do." 
 
 Agnes laughed. " Tom does pretty much as he wants to. 
 He isn t the martyr in that family. From what I hear, 
 he and Beatrice Mott made a record for gayety in this 
 city." 
 
 Then her expression sobered. " I hurt Tom s feelings to 
 night," she continued regretfully. " I oughtn t to have 
 mentioned Fred s engagement to Miss Mott. There was an 
 old love-affair between her and Tom. Did you notice him 
 while we were speaking of her? " 
 
 " No." The monosyllable was accompanied with a remi 
 niscent look. Miriam added, " I was struck with Ferdinand 
 Ballington s expression. Evidently he doesn t like Miss 
 Mott." 
 
 " Ferdinand Ballington ? " Agnes spoke with quick sur 
 prise. 
 
 " Do you know," Miriam continued reflectively, " I believe 
 his old homestead is the place with the clipped trees 
 out by the lake. You wouldn t recognize it from the old 
 picture." 
 
 " And he says he s only begun the improvements he in 
 tends," Agnes returned with animation. " He told me quite 
 a bit about it, and how he and little Miss Margaret Balling- 
 ton live out there all alone." 
 
 " Why do you like Ferdinand Ballington ? " asked Miriam, 
 gravely. 
 
 Agnes flushed. " Do I? " she said tentatively.
 
 10 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 "Yes. See here, Agnes," Miriam touched her friend s 
 arm with unusual initiative " he is a selfish man. A mate on 
 one of my father s vessels had eyes like his. He stood by and 
 saw a man drown once and said afterwards, The damn fool 
 never learned to swim. I told him he d wish he had. 
 
 " You don t think, do you, that if people look alike they 
 necessarily are alike? " Agnes questioned anxiously. 
 
 Miriam disregarded the question and went on. " Ferdi 
 nand Ballington is the kind of man to say The damn fool 
 never learned to swim. I know that head perfectly." Her 
 hands were modeling imaginary clay. 
 
 Then her manner changed into a caricature of Ferdinand s. 
 " You may think you have been brought up by parents who 
 are an honor to the human race. But they re not. None of 
 the real New Englanders are. They re troglodytes back 
 in the stone age. Ferdinand Ballington is the flower of 
 humanity. Evolution points to him. All the Christians are 
 going to disappear. Not adapted to this world. I hope he 
 will enjoy society when all we decent warm-blooded simians 
 are extinct." She added the last sentence with a reversion 
 to her own tone. 
 
 Agnes did not respond and Miriam added presently, 
 " They are queer business partners." 
 
 " Who are? " Agnes asked. 
 
 " Ferdinand and Donald Ballington. I like your friend," 
 she said courteously. 
 
 And then she rose, as Agnes had done. " It was nice of 
 you to take me with you to-night. I stayed over only be 
 cause Professor Dimmock thought he would be at liberty to 
 show me some new microscope slides alligator egg. It 
 would have been lonely enough here." 
 
 Agnes looked at her friend still more curiously. Miriam 
 always had been odd, she knew, but that a girl should deliber 
 ately stay at college a day after Commencement just to see 
 alligator eggs was abnormal. It was queer, too, that Miriam 
 should speak respectfully of Donald and cavalierly of Ferdi 
 nand Ballington, when the latter seemed to have so much
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 11 
 
 more in common with her. Ferdinand was fluent upon the 
 scientific subjects which interested Miriam, while Donald was 
 a plain business man. Miriam had spoken of Christians with 
 esteem, too, and Agnes noticed this with some relief. Per 
 haps all the gossip about Miriam s heterodox religious opin 
 ions was unfounded. Because a girl studied with Professor 
 Dimmock was no proof that she must share his dangerous 
 doctrines. 
 
 As Agnes turned to say good-by, a wave of emotion swept 
 over her. It was not the first time she had felt it for Miriam 
 during the three years they had lived so near to each other 
 and yet so distinctly apart. In spite of all their differ 
 ences something drew her to the older girl. She had sought 
 her persistently, though with little success. Now Agnes said 
 abruptly and unexpectedly, " I wish you liked me, Miriam." 
 
 " I do," Miriam replied readily. " I have always liked 
 you, Agnes." But she dropped her eyes. 
 
 " Why haven t you ever shown it then ? " persisted the 
 girl. " I have made you many advances. Why do you think 
 I tried to read the Origin of Species. I ve wanted you 
 more than I have any other girl in school, but I ve I ve 
 always been afraid of you." 
 
 Miriam kept her face down. At last she said with her slow 
 smile, " Well, we ll make it up next year. You needn t be 
 afraid of me then." 
 
 " No, we can t make it up next year. I I m not coming 
 back." 
 
 " Not coming back? Your senior year? " Miriam looked 
 up keenly. Then she remembered that there would probably 
 be a marriage, instead, so she dropped her eyes and added, 
 " Something more interesting, of course." 
 
 Agnes was repulsed, but she continued, " I just heard the 
 
 other day. The fact is " Her voice broke. Suddenly 
 
 she dropped on the bed, put her head down in the pillow and 
 began to cry. 
 
 " What on earth do you mean ? " asked Miriam, looking 
 down irresolutely at her companion. She felt tempted to go
 
 12 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 over and put her arms around Agnes, but Miriam was not 
 demonstrative, so she stood still and waited. 
 
 Presently Agnes sat up, much ashamed of herself for 
 giving way to her feelings before her self -controlled friend, 
 and explained why she could not go back to college. An 
 aunt, crippled with rheumatism, had come to live with her 
 parents. She could not use her hands and part of the time 
 she had to be nursed. Dr. Sidney was not able to afford 
 a trained nurse and his daughter was needed at home. 
 
 Miriam heard her through, and then, coloring a little, 
 requested that she might lend Agnes the money to carry her 
 through her last year. 
 
 Agnes was startled. She recalled a school-girl rumor that 
 Miriam sold clay models to enthusiastic New York million 
 aires. " I didn t know you were rich," she said. 
 
 " Oh, not rich ! But I ve a share in one of my father s 
 vessels. It brings me in something, and I ve nothing to spend 
 it on. Dress doesn t suit me." 
 
 Agnes was touched, but she could not be prevailed upon to 
 accept the offer. When Miriam urged the loss of the observa 
 tory work of the senior year the girl replied with sudden 
 frankness that she didn t care much for that or for any other 
 course of study; that her regret was for the athletics, the 
 chorus, the orchestra, the dramatic club. 
 
 Miriam had long secretly ridiculed Agnes for her devotion 
 to what she considered superficialities, and it was therefore 
 quite as much to her own surprise as to her friend s that she 
 found herself urging Agnes to take the money and come back 
 even for these things. It suddenly struck her that the college 
 would seem very lonely and dull without the vivid touch of 
 light and color Agnes lent it, and at the same instant she was 
 conscious that the standards she hitherto had set up for her 
 self seemed false. Life was much wider and richer than she 
 lived it, and as she looked at her friend vague longings and 
 regrets awoke in her. 
 
 Presently Agnes met her gaze with a kindred longing in 
 her own eyes. " Miriam," she said earnestly, " I wish I had
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 13 
 
 a mind like yours. I never wished it so much. It is what you 
 have found lacking in me, and the lack is why you never have 
 responded to me." 
 
 " You have a good mind," answered Miriam, choosing her 
 words. " It is a better one than you deserve, for you don t 
 use it. You have gained results all your life by relying on 
 your temperament. And why not why not ? " She laid her 
 hand on Agnes shoulder as she spoke, and held her off at 
 arm s length, regarding her critically. 
 
 Then with a good-by on her lips she drew the girl toward 
 her. 
 
 Agnes divined her intention and put out her hands with a 
 desperate gesture. " Miriam, no one knows what may happen 
 before we meet again. I want your love, and I want to earn 
 it. You are the thing I want most in the world. That is 
 the truth. You could make out of me almost anything you 
 wished. I will work for years to be what you honor and 
 admire. You are different from everything else I have 
 known. If you turn me off, there s nothing left for me but 
 a country life which I m not fit for. This is my last chance." 
 
 She spoke with difficulty, but with tearless eyes, and then 
 turned away to the window. The truant ivy leaves that were 
 climbing over the window-ledge were cool beneath her hand, 
 and the air was sweet with locust bloom. The turf stretched 
 away like black velvet in the night, and out of the shadows 
 came the sound of water falling from the fountain-jet back 
 into the basin. The elms those palm-trees of the north 
 swayed their Gothic arches softly to and fro, and through 
 them she could see the lights and spires of the city in the 
 valley. As she stood waiting and fearing a reply, the girl 
 experienced a longing to stay on there forever. The fairest 
 life she knew was fading behind her. 
 
 Miriam made no reply. 
 
 Agnes stood erect at last and turned back to her com 
 panion. " I shouldn t have said that, Miriam. What I said 
 about you is true, but it isn t my only chance. I know I m 
 not worth you. I know
 
 14 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 A slow wave of color crept up Miriam s cheeks. " Wait, 
 Agnes ! " she interrupted, with the first uncertainty Agnes 
 ever had seen in her. " It sounded egotistic to say it, but " 
 she made a swift gesture to the casts along the wall 
 " there is my life ! One cannot serve God and Mammon. I 
 want to become a sculptor. I haven t time and I thought I 
 hadn t inclination for the emotions. But to-night I have 
 begun to feel that if I succeed in my work it will be at the 
 cost of sacrifices." 
 
 " Sacrifices ? " repeated Agnes, uncomprehending. 
 
 " Yes. I have no other relation than my father, and I 
 never shall marry." 
 
 " Do you disapprove of marriage? " asked Agnes wonder- 
 ingly. 
 
 " No," replied Miriam seriously, " but if some women are 
 to do their best they must give it up. I believe I must. There 
 is room in the world of homes for us. and if we keep true to 
 ourselves we ought to make the homes more beautiful." 
 
 She put up her hand gently and touched the bust of 
 Hermes on the shelf. As Agnes looked at her she was con 
 scious of a greater distance between them than she ever had 
 realized before. 
 
 " Do you feel that in justice to your work you cannot make 
 friends either? " she asked impersonally. 
 
 Miriam s hand left the Hermes, and her smile came back. 
 " I feel that I may not have many friends," she replied, " and 
 there is therefore a world of meaning in that word to me. It 
 means what home means to other women, the strongest tie I 
 ever shall have." 
 
 Then she put out her hands, drew Agnes to her until their 
 faces touched and said in a tone Agnes never had heard be 
 fore, " I need you more than you need me. Henceforth we 
 will be friends. What I can do for you, I will do. Whatever 
 you may achieve or become, count on my help, such as it is, 
 on my unswerving help."
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 FHERE is a limit even to the patience of Job," remarked 
 Mrs. Sidney, and she looked up significantly from her 
 sewing at her daughter. 
 
 " Oh, I ll write it before long," returned Agnes, putting the 
 last hairpin in her Aunt Mattie s hair. " I ll write it before 
 I go over to the sewing society. There, Aunt Mattie ! " 
 
 Agnes did not look at her mother as she spoke. During the 
 two weeks at home she had been struggling to keep up her 
 collegiate dignity, but it was not easy to do this with her 
 mother, who knew her every weakness, looking on. Mrs. 
 Sidney faced the world squarely and she was a master-hand at 
 stripping off from others their rags of pretence. The zeal 
 with which she called her daughter to account for those slips 
 which Agnes willingly would have hidden even from herself 
 was taking the heart out of the makeshifts which the girl 
 bravely put up to deceive the outside world. Agnes felt her 
 self sinking back into her life-time relation with her mother, 
 and she did not find it half so agreeable to be helped along the 
 road to perfection by being admonished of her faults as in 
 the college way of being lured onward by visions of attain 
 ment. She put on her acquired manner at rarer intervals and 
 even then shamefacedly, feeling ever in her mother s shrewd 
 smile a pitiless comment upon her effort. On this particular 
 occasion she sought to divert attention from herself by cen 
 tering it upon her aunt. She turned the invalid s chair so 
 that the occupant could see herself in the glass. Aunt Mattie 
 eyed quizzically the angular figure which faced her from the 
 mirror. She took in the grim face surmounted by a pom 
 padour roll which Agnes had substituted for the usual tight 
 top-knot, and then she exchanged a humorous smile with her 
 hair-dresser. 
 
 15
 
 16 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 "When Donald Ballington was here," went on Mrs. Sid 
 ney, undiverted, her strong face lighting up with satisfac 
 tion, "he told me he didn t play cards. I thank the Lord 
 there is one pure young man left." 
 
 " There s a younger brother Tom," remarked Agnes, 
 loosening some strands of her aunt s hair still more, and 
 apparently studying it critically. " Did you ever see him ? " 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s face settled into sternness. " Your cousin 
 Fred told me of Mr. Thomas Ballington. He is the one who 
 has been carrying on such a flirtation with Beatrice Mott. 
 He hasn t given it up yet, either. I m very much afraid he s 
 sowing wild oats." 
 
 "Oh, Fred was jealous of Tom," said Agnes carelessly. 
 Then her expression brightened. " I m glad Beatrice and 
 Fred are really engaged. She will give him a great deal he 
 never has had." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney answered with considerable feeling, " We don t 
 any of us know Beatrice Mott, and Fred has known her only 
 a few weeks. Her father is a very worldly man. Fred 
 would have done better to stick to Mary Bucher, whom he s 
 known all his life. This running back and forth out to the 
 Motts lake house is upsetting him at the bank, too. Young 
 girls ought not to interfere with young men s work like that. 
 I m going to tell Mr. Bucher he d better put a stop to it." 
 
 "Oh, don t, mother!" 
 
 " I think I shall." Mrs. Sidney looked over at Agnes, 
 where she stood fingering some wild flowers her father had 
 brought in that morning from the country. " Are you going 
 to write that note now?" she asked without changing her 
 tone of voice. Agnes knew now that her reply to Donald 
 no longer could be postponed. Mrs. Sidney continued, " No 
 girl has a right to shilly-shally as you are doing. Don t 
 tell me it s because you don t know your own mind. It s 
 coquetry, and it s very dishonorable. If you don t want 
 Donald Ballington, you must tell him so, and let him be look 
 ing for somebody else. There are plenty of girls who would 
 be glad to have him."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 17 
 
 "You talk as though a man started out to get a wife as 
 if he were going to buy a hat," said Agnes petulantly. 
 " And if that is the way you look at it, I m sure I don t fit 
 him." 
 
 "Why didn t you refuse him right away, then?" 
 
 "Well, I don t know why I didn t. I thought maybe 
 there was a doubt " 
 
 " He that doubteth is like the surge of the sea, driven and 
 tossed," interrupted Mrs. Sidney. " Do learn to know your 
 own mind, Agnes. There s a tendency in your father s 
 family not to know its own mind. You ll have to guard 
 against that. And when you ve made up your mind, don t 
 be ashamed to say it. I believe you do love him, but you 
 aren t willing to admit it." Mrs. Sidney eyed Agnes over 
 her glasses while she spoke. 
 
 "I don t!" Agnes turned suddenly, then dropped her 
 eyes under her mother s gaze and continued, apologetically, 
 " I just can t take to him. I can t bear the way his lip 
 trembles when he talks. And his hair lies down so sleek." 
 
 " When you re married you can rumple it up for him," 
 suggested Mrs. Sidney, giving her daughter a cheerful smile, 
 to which Agnes disdainfully responded. 
 
 "Yes, you can rumple it up," repeated Aunt Mattie, with 
 a canny glance in the mirror at her own pompadour. 
 
 "You respect Donald Ballington, don t you?" persisted 
 Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I respect him." 
 
 " Respect is the best foundation for " 
 
 The three looked up, for the office door had opened and a 
 tall, slightly-stooped figure stood on the threshold, hat and 
 driving gloves in hand. The face looking down at them was 
 strongly but sensitively featured, weather-beaten by wind 
 and sun, but nevertheless speaking of the study. The eyes 
 were deep-set but clear. The crisp wave of the hair and beard 
 was plentifully sprinkled with gray. 
 
 " Am I interrupting? " he asked, looking at them with 
 a smile.
 
 18 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 "You never interrupt, papa," returned Agnes with a 
 genuine ring of love in her voice. Her next sentence took 
 on a decided tone of proprietorship in her father. " You 
 don t think respect is enough to marry on, do you, papa? " 
 
 The doctor passed his hand across his forehead and an 
 swered tentatively, "No." 
 
 "And you wouldn t advise a girl to marry a man she 
 didn t love, would you? " 
 
 " No, I would not." 
 
 Dr. Sidney turned to his wife. " Did you get those band 
 ages down to the Richards , Kate ? " 
 
 "Yes, I did, but I don t know how I got the time. You 
 seem to think I can be in six places at once, Stephen." 
 
 " You are equal to six women in other respect," returned 
 the doctor, his kind eyes lingering on his wife s face. " I 
 won t be back till late, Kate. I ve got to drive way out on 
 the plank road." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney dropped her sewing instantly and started to 
 get up. "You must eat something first." 
 
 " No, I won t wait." 
 
 " It won t take me five minutes. Agnes, you " 
 
 " I ll have supper at the Block House. I ve got to stop 
 there." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney sat down with a look of relief and the doctor 
 turned to the office. Before he closed the door, however, he 
 paused and looked again toward Agnes. 
 
 " And if no one comes whom you want to marry, you 
 always can count on one man to love you," he said. Then he 
 nodded to them and shut the door. 
 
 " Stephen furnishes every drop of medicine that goes into 
 that Richards house," exclaimed Mrs. Sidney impatiently, 
 as soon as the door closed. " He s paying the nurse, too. 
 I told him I d never take another thing there as long as I 
 lived. I believe he sends them things just to irritate me." 
 
 "Stephen lives to irritate," remarked Aunt Mattie dis 
 passionately. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney looked at her, perceptibly vexed. "Mattie,
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 19 
 
 it wasn t necessary for you to say that. I know just as well 
 as you do that Stephen never did anything to irritate any 
 body in all his born days. I couldn t say as much of you." 
 
 Then she turned to Agnes. " It s all very well for you to 
 have your father to love you," she said meaningly, "but he 
 won t live forever. I want you to consider carefully what 
 you write Donald Ballington." 
 
 There was an old-fashioned desk standing in a corner of 
 the room. When Agnes sat down before it she saw a marked 
 newspaper placed where she would see it. The paragraph 
 indicated read as follows: 
 
 Hannah More, who knew whereof she spoke, was once heard to make 
 the remark that she would advise every woman to close with the offer 
 of the first God-fearing man who wished to marry her. 
 
 Agnes shoved the newspaper aside and began to write. 
 After some painful work upon several sheets, she drew a 
 sigh of relief and began again upon new note-paper. Pres 
 ently she stopped, reflected, rose and consulted a Shake 
 speare in the book-case. Then there was more writing, a 
 pause now and then for thought, and then copying. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney kept watch of her daughter s face, and what 
 she saw there was so gratifying to her hope that she worked 
 silently and did not interrupt her. She only once attempted 
 conversation. Then she said, with the pleasure she always 
 found in making plans, " When you have a home of your 
 own, I ll let you have that desk. It s solid mahogany. 
 Charlie Brace made it for your grandmother. He was the 
 best cabinet-maker in Burlington." Agnes looked indiffer 
 ently at the desk. 
 
 " I want to see your letter before you seal it, Agnes," said 
 Mrs. Sidney when the writing was done. 
 
 Agnes rose and held the envelope before her mother s eyes. 
 It was addressed to Miriam Cass, and she stood waiting super 
 ciliously while her mother glanced at it. 
 
 " Here is the one you want," she said, handing out the 
 first sheet she had written and feeling somewhat embarrassed
 
 20 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 at her mother s silence. Mrs. Sidney adjusted her glasses 
 and read a kind but short refusal of Donald s offer of 
 marriage. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney handed the letter back to her without a word, 
 and, rising, began to pack her hampers for the sewing-society. 
 The odor of lavender penetrated the air as the large figure 
 moved about among the baskets. This mood of her mother s 
 always awed Agnes. She did not understand it, and it was 
 years before she learned that after Mrs. Sidney had passed 
 a certain limit of disappointment her lowered eyes no longer 
 held flames, but tears, behind their brilliant blue. 
 
 When Agnes came back to the sitting room Mrs. Sidney 
 was putting on her bonnet to start for church. Her face 
 showed the disappointment she felt in the outcome of Agnes 
 love-affair, but Mrs. Sidney never wasted time with a matter 
 which was once decided and out of the way. " I m going 
 to carry over all the sewing," she said, at once. " That 
 ought to go first, because they ll be wanting to pack the 
 missionary box right away. You ll have to bring the things 
 to eat. And be sure you bring the plated ware. Don t 
 bring the solid silver. And be sure you count it. Now, I m 
 going, Mattie. You ll find your supper on a plate in the 
 refrigerator, and Agnes shall bring you over some coffee 
 from the church. I m sorry you won t come over to the 
 concert." 
 
 She picked up her hamper and started toward the office 
 door. Here she stopped short and spoke to her sister-in-law 
 again. " If there is anything in a hurry, Mattie, you can 
 telephone Quinn. Run along, Agnes, and open the outside 
 door for me." 
 
 Some fifteen minutes later Agnes followed her mother down 
 the familiar street to the church, walking under elms which 
 met overhead and which lent to the old town a dreamy, half- 
 religious atmosphere. 
 
 As she entered the church and went up the stairs the odor 
 of coffee greeted her. In the front parlor a dozen women 
 were packing the garments for the home missionary into a
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 21 
 
 dry-goods box, while Mr. Carter, the pastor, stood by, pencil 
 in hand, making a note of the contents. Other ladies were 
 setting the table in the back parlor, and further on, in the 
 kitchen, Agnes saw her mother s flushed face bending over a 
 big boiler of coffee on the stove. A few elderly men, 
 early comers, were straggling about the room waiting for 
 supper. 
 
 " There aren t any forks on this table in the corner, 
 Agnes," said a sweet-faced girl who already had been quietly 
 at work for some time. " Did you bring any ? " 
 
 "Yes. They re right out in the kitchen pantry. You 
 can get them. I want to garnish this bowl." 
 
 Mary Bucher went at once for the forks. 
 
 While the girls were setting the table a party of young 
 people came tumultuously into the dining-room. Among 
 them was Agnes cousin, Fred Sidney. The first thing one 
 noticed about Fred was the family resemblance to Dr. Sidney. 
 His face lacked the weather-beaten experience which was so 
 noticeable in his uncle s, but it had a sweetness and innocent 
 grace, while underneath these qualities was a steadfastness 
 that saved him from weakness. His was not an aggressive 
 nature, but it had that fineness of temper that would enable 
 it to resist and endure pressure indefinitely. He carried his 
 youth excellently well as he approached the girls without 
 rawness and without timidity. 
 
 " Good evening," he said, shaking hands with them 
 quaintly. " We came early on purpose to have a good time 
 with you two downstairs in the lecture-room before supper. 
 Will you come down ? " 
 
 "Indeed we will come down!" exclaimed Agnes joyously, 
 and the group left the room, elated with their reinforcement. 
 
 Down in the lecture-room the chairs were not yet placed 
 for the concert which was to take place that evening. The 
 piano stood in front, and near it on a table were several other 
 instruments. 
 
 " Is that your guitar, Hattie ? " asked Mary, turning to 
 a red-cheeked girl in plaid.
 
 22 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Yes. I m one of the old people. Sport and I are going 
 to play some old folks duets, aren t we, Sport? " She 
 elbowed the young man named Sport, and giggled. 
 
 Sport turned a dazzling smile to the rest of the group. 
 " Who else is going to perform ? " he chuckled. 
 
 " I m going to play," said Mary without embarrassment. 
 " And Agnes is going to sing." 
 
 " Yes, and Montfort is going to declaim," added another 
 voice. 
 
 " Meantime," said the young man called Sport, " let us 
 have a cozy dance before we are interrupted. Will you play 
 a waltz, Mary? " 
 
 " I don t believe I d dance if I were you," returned Mary, 
 glancing uneasily at her companions. " Perhaps Mr. Carter 
 wouldn t like it." 
 
 " Father doesn t object to dancing at all," spoke up a 
 young man who wore his hair ferociously low on his forehead. 
 He looked down at Mary from over a very high collar, and 
 remarked in addition, " The Bible upholds dancing. David 
 danced. And some others danced." 
 
 " Perhaps the bears danced while they were eating up the 
 children," suggested Hattie Pierce. 
 
 " Do you think your mother would mind, Agnes ? " asked 
 Mary, still hesitating. 
 
 Agnes had anticipated this question. Her mother s opin 
 ions about amusements were a continual mortification to the 
 girl, and she blushed when thus pinned down to them. " If 
 Montfort thinks his father wouldn t mind, I should think that 
 is all that need be considered." 
 
 She walked over to the piano while speaking, sat down, and 
 began to play a waltz. It always had been a rueful satisfac 
 tion to Agnes that she could at least play the piano at danc 
 ing parties. 
 
 " It s too bad Agnes can t dance," she heard Mary say to 
 Fred as the two went out on the floor ; " I d offer to play for 
 her, but " 
 
 Agnes cheeks crimsoned and she held up her head proudly.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 23 
 
 What an irony of fate it was that her mother should 
 be so fanatical while she herself was so full of music and 
 motion. 
 
 After a time she was conscious of a lull in the scraping of 
 feet and brushing of dresses. She turned on the stool, and 
 saw standing in the doorway a portentous figure. It was 
 Mrs. Sidney, with a pitcher of coffee in her hand, whose steam 
 was like the smoke of a disregarded offering ascending to an 
 irate divinity. 
 
 As she looked from one to another of the dancers a storm 
 gathered rapidly in her face. " Fred Sidney ! " came the ex 
 plosion at length. " Mary Bucher ! Hattie Pierce ! Mont- 
 fort Carter ! Agnes ! " 
 
 There was an ominous pause. Mary was the first to stir. 
 She detached herself from Fred s arms. 
 
 " Dancing ! " continued Mrs. Sidney, and a second gust 
 of terror swept over the room as she spoke. " Dancing in 
 the prayer-meeting room! Montfort Carter, what do you 
 think your father would say ? " 
 
 " Father doesn t object to dancing at all, Mrs. Sidney," 
 began Montfort weakly. " Father approves of dancing. 
 David danced." 
 
 Hattie Pierce choked down a hysterical giggle. 
 
 " David danced before the Lord," said Mrs. Sidney 
 grimly. " He wasn t dancing round dances." She advanced 
 into the room, and looked around her. " Let me see, who is 
 here?" she went on, "Who is that young man?" and she 
 pointed to " Sport." 
 
 " This is my friend, Mr. Hitchcock," answered Hattie, 
 pinching her " friend s " elbow. " He was kind enough to 
 come here to take part in the Old Folks Concert to-night." 
 
 Young Mr. Carter had been regaining his self-possession, 
 and seized this opportunity to speak. " Would you object to 
 telling me why you think it is right to sing in this room and 
 not to dance here, Mrs. Sidney? " he asked blandly. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney turned to Agnes without noticing him. " Have 
 you been dancing ? " she asked sternly.
 
 24 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " I don t care to dance," said Agnes, moving toward her 
 mother. 
 
 " Agnes Sidney, have you been dancing? " 
 
 " No, she hasn t, Mrs. Sidney," interposed Mary Bucher. 
 " She only played for the rest of us." 
 
 " Only played for the rest of you ! Mary, I m surprised 
 at you for excusing her in that way. Was Saul guiltless of 
 Stephen s death because he only held the clothes of them that 
 stoned him? Montfort! don t you leave this room! " 
 
 " What is it you wish, Mrs. Sidney ? " In spite of him 
 self Montfort felt that he was but a toy in her hands, and he 
 fumed inwardly. 
 
 " You go upstairs and tell your father that I want to see 
 him down here." 
 
 Montfort left the room, and Mrs. Sidney sat down to 
 await his return. Agnes made a nervous attempt to take 
 the pitcher of coffee from her mother and escape with it, but 
 Mrs. Sidney silenced her. 
 
 " We didn t mean any harm, Aunt Kate," said Fred, com 
 ing over and sitting down by his aunt. " Don t make too 
 much of it." 
 
 " This comes of your learning to dance, Fred," and Mrs. 
 Sidney shook her head at her nephew. " The responsibility 
 is upon you older ones. You should have been setting a good 
 example to those boys and girls. Look at them! They are 
 just like sheep that will jump over any fence after their 
 leader." The sheep spoken of were now huddled together at 
 the opposite side of the room, and did not look capable of 
 vaulting any kind of a fence. 
 
 At this moment Mr. Carter appeared at the door with 
 Montfort behind him. The minister looked uneasily about the 
 room, and then at Mrs. Sidney with deprecating politeness. 
 He was wondering, as those of his profession so often are 
 obliged to wonder, how he could arbitrate in this awkward 
 affair without offending anybody. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney rose. " Mr. Carter, I came down here to send 
 my daughter on an errand," she said, " and I found these
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 25 
 
 young people dancing round dances in the prayer-meeting 
 room." 
 
 "I see. Yes." 
 
 Mr. Carter let his eyes rove while he was speaking. They 
 rested upon the red tie of Hattie s " friend who was kind 
 enough to come and play at the concert," and the sight of 
 this outsider offered a moment s respite. " Ah ! How do 
 you do, Mr. Hitchcock ! " he said, extending his hand. 
 
 The interruption lasted only an instant, however, and Mr. 
 Carter then felt bound to take some stand upon the question. 
 At this critical moment the side door of the church opened 
 and two gentlemen came into the hall together. They were 
 Judge Pierce and Deacon Snow, both of them advocates of 
 new-fangled ideas, and Mr. Carter felt his position still more 
 ticklish as he observed that they were waiting in the hall to 
 listen. Mr. Carter prided himself upon being a liberal min 
 ister. He liked to refer to the bigotries of his parents and 
 tell how he had outgrown them. It is worthy of remark that 
 his own liberality was along those lines that were in fashion 
 among his contemporaries. 
 
 Now he had just begun to say, " Montfort had been telling 
 
 me " when he noticed the somewhat contemptuous smile 
 
 upon the face of Deacon Snow. He drew up his little figure 
 and completed his sentence with more assertion " That his 
 friends and he were indulging in a little harmless dancing." 
 He glanced furtively toward the hall again, but to his dis 
 may the two men were passing on up the stairs. 
 
 " Harmless dancing ! " exclaimed Mrs. Sidney, facing him. 
 Alas ! She had no intention of following them. " Harmless 
 dancing in the prayer-meeting room, Mr. Carter? " 
 
 " Well ! Mrs. Sidney, the past generation was perhaps a 
 little too stringent. Perhaps there isn t so much harm, after 
 all, in letting the young people dance a little at a church 
 sociable. The Congregational Church at Winston has a 
 theater in it. But, at the same time, if you object, Mrs. 
 Sidney " 
 
 " I do object, Mr. Carter. And Jesus Christ would object.
 
 26 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Would you see any harm in the money-changers turning the 
 temple into a booth for merchandise ? " She controlled her 
 speech and waited for an answer, looking at her pastor with 
 righteous indignation in her eyes. 
 
 " Would you have me drive them out with a scourge ? " 
 questioned the minister, spreading out his hands. " Are you 
 not, perhaps, judging Jesus Christ by one incident, rather 
 than by the trend of His er customs ? Jesus was meek and 
 gentle." 
 
 " He knew how to be meek," returned Mrs. Sidney care 
 fully. Then she dropped her voice to a deep tone. " But He 
 knew how to be terrible." She straightened herself and 
 loomed before them like a prophet in wrath. " I m getting 
 tired of hearing of Jesus meekness. Do you think it was the 
 few wisps of string in His hand that drove the money 
 changers out of the church? You couldn t there are some 
 people who couldn t have driven them out with a flail. It 
 was the moral power of the man. No, I wouldn t have you 
 take a scourge to the children, but I d have you show some 
 moral stamina. They don t know what you mean. Let your 
 yea be yea, and your nay, nay." 
 
 Mr. Carter s fair face flushed, but he smiled through it all. 
 When Agnes was younger she used to wonder if he wore that 
 smile when he was asleep. 
 
 " Have you anything to say to the children ? " asked Mrs. 
 Sidney peremptorily. 
 
 He hesitated, and then said, turning to the awe-stricken 
 group behind him, " Well, children, since Mrs. Sidney 
 objects er suppose we have no more dancing in this 
 room." 
 
 He bowed to Mrs. Sidney and withdrew. 
 
 Outside the door, however, he turned and added to his son, 
 " You can take your friends over to the parsonage when you 
 wish to dance, Montfort." 
 
 Agnes took the pitcher and hurried away. She was glad 
 of an excuse to leave a scene which humiliated her. Why 
 would her mother make such a spectacle of herself? She had
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 27 
 
 seen Deacon Snow s smile, and she knew what a tirade of ridi 
 cule would descend upon her mother as soon as the * chil 
 dren " were left alone together ; so she decided to remain at 
 home for the evening instead of returning to the concert. 
 She was disappointed in her plans, however, for a message 
 came from her mother about an hour later, summoning her 
 back to the church. 
 
 When she entered the lecture-room she saw the people 
 gathered together for the concert. Her mother was sitting 
 alone near the front of the room; for the story of the 
 dancing had circulated, and no one seemed to care or to dare 
 to show friendliness to Mrs. Sidney after the way she had 
 talked to the minister. 
 
 " Why ! Here s Aggy ! " said Judge Pierce, who stood 
 near the door, taking admissions. He drew his mouth down 
 into an " O," and looked at Agnes with the genial surprise 
 which he always seemed to feel upon meeting his daily com 
 panions in their accustomed places. " Well, Aggy, I was 
 brought up to disapprove of round-dancing, too. Your 
 mother is only one generation behind the times. She ll come 
 around in the course of time. I think she s cavin in a little, 
 now," he ended, in a confidential whisper. Agnes passed on 
 coolly. 
 
 The sight of her mother sitting alone caused Agnes irri 
 tation to swerve away from the original object and fix itself 
 upon the other people present. Her loyalty to her mother 
 was further strengthened by the Judge s prophecy that Mrs. 
 Sidney would soon " cave in," a condition of affairs which 
 suddenly struck the girl as so undesirable that she was seized 
 with a determination to back up her mother in her misguided 
 but gallant ways. As she made her way down the aisle she 
 saw Mary Bucher leave the minister, to whom she had been 
 talking, and cross the room to sit down by Mrs. Sidney. A 
 throb of gratitude to her friend caused a flush to rise to 
 Agnes face. She took her seat beside the two with a manner 
 which she meant to be impressive. However they might feel 
 toward her mother, who wouldn t feel proud to sit down by
 
 28 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 herself, she wondered. She had not yet learned that the 
 fluctuation of emotion which Mrs. Sidney aroused in the 
 townspeople at large was only a wider example of the effect 
 produced by the operation of the maternal vigilance upon 
 herself at small. 
 
 She no sooner was seated than Mr. Carter arose and began 
 to speak. He gave a perfunctory account of the missionary 
 box which had been packed that afternoon. 
 
 " We have undertaken the whole support of this home mis 
 sionary and of all his family," he said plaintively. " They 
 are naked and ye clothe them not. They have called for an 
 hundred articles, and ye send them twenty." 
 
 He consulted a paper in his hand and began to read. " John 
 Darke, male, five feet ten, has sadly needed two suits, under 
 clothes, hat, shoes and stockings. He also asks very modestly 
 for an umbrella." Mr. Carter looked up and volunteered the 
 interpolation, " I am sure you will all feel that he certainly 
 ought to receive the umbrella." Then he continued reading, 
 " He has received only one suit, hat and shoes. No under 
 clothes and no stockings." 
 
 " Maude Darke, female, five feet four, waist twenty-six 
 inches. Required, two suits, underclothes, nightclothes, hat, 
 shoes and stockings. She has received only nightclothes." 
 Again he looked up and remarked, " I may state that she has 
 received really more nightclothes than are necessary, but 
 unfortunately this does not relieve her other wants." 
 
 At this point Mrs. Sidney s sides began to shake. She 
 leaned toward Agnes and had it on the tip of her tongue to 
 whisper something. 
 
 She thought better of it, however, and Mr. Carter went on. 
 " Frank Darke, male, four feet ten. Required, two suits, 
 underclothes, hat, shoes and stockings. I am pleased to 
 say " and Mr. Carter beamed " that Frank Darke is 
 thoroughly provided for." 
 
 There followed the requirements of four Darke girls, and 
 then Mr. Carter drew apart his coat-tails and sat down, 
 happily unconscious that he had presented the tragedy of
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 29 
 
 seven isolated lives, dedicated to labor, self-denial, and humili 
 ation, as a farce. 
 
 "Why doesn t the concert begin?" Agnes whispered to 
 Mary. Her question, however, was answered by Mr. Carter 
 himself, who was on his feet and speaking again. 
 
 " As was announced on Sunday, there was prepared an 
 Old Folks Concert for this evening, for the benefit of the 
 home missionary fund," he began, and he dropped his eyes 
 to the programme. The first number upon the programme 
 is a piano solo by Mr. Forest Gregg." 
 
 There was a pause. Several in the audience turned their 
 heads, but no one came forward. 
 
 Mr. Carter continued: 
 
 " If Mr. Gregg is not present, we shall be obliged to pass 
 on to the next number, which is a declamation by Mr. Mont- 
 fort Carter." 
 
 Again the pause. Again a rustle among the audience. 
 Mrs. Sidney s face began to settle into grimness. 
 
 " The third number on the programme is a flute solo, by 
 Mr. Hitchcock," said Mr. Carter, looking innocently around 
 the now smiling audience. 
 
 As was expected, there was no response. 
 
 Agnes felt herself growing hot and red. Mary leaned 
 over and whispered to her: 
 
 " They ve all gone home. I tried to make them stay, but 
 they wouldn t. There s no one to do anything but you and 
 me." 
 
 " I am very sorry we should be so disappointed in our pro 
 gramme," began Mr. Carter, looking not ill-pleased as he 
 cast a glance at Mrs. Sidney s side of the room. " I greatly 
 fear we shall be obliged to dismiss the audience. Judge 
 Pierce, you will please refund the admission fees at the 
 door." 
 
 " Read the programme through, Mr. Carter," said Mrs. 
 Sidney s positive voice, breaking into the hum that 
 followed. 
 
 " Yes, read the programme through. Let us have what we
 
 30 
 
 can," spoke up a sing-song voice from across the aisle where 
 Mr. Bucher sat. " No one wants to have his money re 
 funded." 
 
 " The next number is a song, with guitar accompaniment, 
 by Miss Hattie Pierce," continued Mr. Carter. 
 
 There was no response, but before he resumed Mrs. Sid 
 ney rose. The austerity of her face was replaced by a 
 good-humor. " Well, if we were advertised as an * Old 
 Folks Concert, " she said, walking toward the front, " we 
 might just as well have an * Old Folks Concert. I don t 
 believe in putting our hands to the plow and turning 
 back. I guess Hattie Pierce won t object to my using her 
 guitar." 
 
 She took the instrument off the table and began to tune it. 
 The uncomfortable smile of the audience changed to one of 
 relief. Somebody cheered her, and the applause grew till 
 everybody in the room was clapping. 
 
 " I didn t know your mother played the guitar," whispered 
 Mary to Agnes. 
 
 " She used to when she was a girl, but she does it only once 
 in a long while now." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney began her accompaniment. After playing it 
 a second time her fingers somewhat lost their clumsiness, and 
 her sonorous alto took up a song of her youth : 
 
 "We met; twas in a crowd, 
 And I thought he would shun me; 
 He came; I could not breathe, 
 For his eyes were upon me. 
 He spoke; his words were cold, 
 But his smile was unaltered. 
 I knew how much he felt, 
 For his deep-toned voice faltered." 
 
 When she finished and was eagerly encored, a flitting ten 
 derness softened the corners of her lips and the creases about 
 her eyes while she laughed at what she called the " silly 
 words," but she sang again. 
 
 Agnes watched with satisfaction the frozen pleasantry on
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 31 
 
 Mr. Carter s face, and beyond him she caught a glimpse of 
 Montfort peeking through the window to see what was the 
 meaning of the clapping inside. She set herself at work de 
 terminedly to assure the success of the evening, and when her 
 mother s encore was done, she said with enthusiasm, " Now 
 Mr. Bucher must play the flute. Come, Mary, bring your 
 father up in front. Here s a flute." 
 
 After some urging Mr. Bucher consented and played 
 several airs, ending with " Hail Columbia," which he 
 executed with a spirit that Agnes had not believed possible 
 from him. 
 
 " Ask Mr. Carter to whistle," Mary whispered to Agnes, 
 as she rose from the piano-stool. Agnes pretended not to 
 understand. She did not want to share the evening s success 
 with the pastor. Mary gained courage, however, made the 
 request herself, and offered to accompany him. 
 
 What it was that happened when Mr. Carter whistled no 
 one could quite explain. But the little minister underwent a 
 transformation. His whistling was like a flute for softness, 
 with the melancholy and richness of the cello, and when it 
 was done the afterglow of the transformation still lin 
 gered about the shabby personality, touching it with that 
 grace and kindness which pleasure brings to the most 
 insignificant. 
 
 Mary smiled with delight as Mr. Carter sat down by Mrs. 
 Sidney and received her hearty congratulations. " Now I ll 
 play," she said to Agnes, " and then you sing. That will 
 keep the best for the last." 
 
 During Mary s solo, which was a time for whispered con 
 versation, Agnes caught her mother s eye. She nodded re 
 assuringly, rose, and went forward with resolution. Her 
 song was to have been the chief feature of the evening, as 
 originally planned. Now she was prodigal of her music. 
 The people in the back part of the room began to come for 
 ward, and at last when she turned on the stool and looked 
 laughingly around her, many were gathered in groups about 
 the piano.
 
 32 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Let us have some chorus-singing ! " she cried, keen to 
 their sensitive mood. " Let s begin with America ! " 
 
 She struck the chords. Mr. Bucher took up the flute again 
 and played with her, and all joined in. 
 
 Kent still talks about that Old Folks Concert. Old eyes 
 glistened, faded cheeks grew rosy, voices trembled with 
 emotion that had long lain dormant. A host of memories 
 were summoned from the sweet and glowing past, and 
 thronged into the meeting-house on the wings of familiar 
 and beloved airs. 
 
 At last Agnes took her hands from the keys and sat still. 
 It seemed to her that the whole room was full of the perfume 
 of lindens. She saw a man turn on a broad piazza, and pass 
 away out of sight while she watched him. 
 
 She shook her head, laughed a little to throw off the vision, 
 and turned to the others. Mr. Bucher was wiping his eyes, 
 and Agnes caught the look which Mary Bucher in entire self- 
 forgetfulness was giving Fred. The other singers, too, were 
 looking at one another, confused, ashamed of their feeling, 
 when the door of the lecture-room was thrown open from 
 without. 
 
 Mary, who was half facing it, suddenly flushed scarlet 
 and rose. Those sitting near her turned around. 
 
 " Why, Beatrice Mott ! " exclaimed Mary, speaking in too 
 low a voice to be heard by any save those near her, " where 
 in the world did you come from at this time of night? " 
 
 A young woman, who seemed a blaze of color, had entered 
 the room. The door swung shut behind her and her bold 
 figure seemed to start out from the bare, cheerless wall of 
 the church parlor. 
 
 The newcomer surveyed the group before her with 
 scarcely-disguised amusement. Church sociables were truly 
 appropriate gatherings for these stagnating town-folk. 
 There was a latent distrust and disapproval of her, in turn, 
 on the part of the church people, but Agnes stood up with 
 a throb of interest and started after Fred toward the girl 
 in the doorway.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 33 
 
 Beatrice was standing still waiting for him, but she looked 
 as though she were still in motion because of the forward in 
 clination of her superb head and shoulders. The black hair 
 and red tam-o -shanter, the oriental brilliance of her face, 
 her smile which arrested attention because of the whimsical 
 short upper lip, and the rich red scarf flung backward across 
 the shoulders, made up a picture Agnes never forgot. Wild 
 stories were afloat about Beatrice Mott, and Agnes acknowl 
 edged with a thrill of excitement that the newcomer looked 
 as though one and all might be understated.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 4 * \XfHY did Beatrice Mott throw over Tom Ballington 
 and engage herself to Fred? " Agnes asked herself 
 many times during the days that followed the church sociable. 
 The vivid figure that had appeared in the doorway of the 
 lecture-room at the close of the concert persisted in her 
 memory. How had Fred gotten up courage to offer her his 
 poverty? She was rich, fond of excitement above all, rest 
 less. Fred was quiet and without ambition. During the days 
 that Beatrice stayed in Kent Agnes watched the pair with 
 puzzled anxiety, trying to arrange an equilibrium between 
 Fred s stillness and the energy of Beatrice. She gave it up 
 finally, comforting herself with the reflection that extremes 
 were said to get on better together than two of the same 
 type. 
 
 When Beatrice went back to the lake she took Fred with 
 her and urgently invited Agnes to accompany them. When 
 Agnes reluctantly declined, Beatrice added with a sidelong 
 glance of her black eyes, " Some Ballingtons might come out 
 from Winston ! " 
 
 " Tom? " asked Agnes, confused, looking from Beatrice 
 to Fred. Then she reddened, avoided Donald s name, and 
 concluded, " Do you know Mr. Ferdinand Ballington ? " 
 
 Beatrice laughed. " Know Ferdinand Ballington ? No 
 body knows him better." Then she withdrew her scrutiny 
 from Agnes and smiled at Fred as she continued, " But he 
 won t be down. I want you to remember him, Fred. He s 
 the one man in the world you never need be jealous of." 
 
 Fred looked flattered at this frank recognition of his pro 
 prietorship and Beatrice turned back to Agnes. " I was 
 talking about Donald s coming out," she said. " I m going 
 over to get your mother to let you come." 
 
 Agnes had longed for this invitation, but she had little 
 
 34
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 35 
 
 hope that her mother would consent. As she had expected, 
 Mrs. Sidney promptly declined when Beatrice spoke to her, 
 and, what was worse, gave her reasons. She told the young 
 heiress good-humoredly, but without mincing matters, that 
 she would not permit her daughter to visit at a home where 
 young girls wearing red tam-o -shanters were permitted to 
 come without escort in evening trains to town. 
 
 Agnes left the room in embarrassment while Mrs. Sidney 
 and Beatrice were talking. She was mystified when, a little 
 later, Beatrice came after her, threw a strong and supple 
 arm around her shoulder, and said heartily, " I tell you, I 
 like your mother. She s the j oiliest person in Kent. My 
 General ought to know her. They would like each other. 
 Don t you mind, Agnes ! We ll make it up in August. Then 
 I m coming to Kent to stay weeks." 
 
 Agnes often thought of this promise during the early 
 summer, for by a coincidence it was in August that Mrs. 
 Sidney was to go out to Iowa to stay until her elder 
 daughter, Helen Mabie, should be up again from her coming 
 confinement. This would remove parental supervision, for 
 Agnes never thought of her father as a check, and would 
 give to her more liberty than she had enjoyed at college. 
 
 " I believe you want me gone ! " Mrs. Sidney said abruptly 
 one day, stopping in her preparations and scrutinizing 
 Agnes. 
 
 The girl never had stated this nakedly to herself, and she 
 at once denied it, saying she was glad only for Helen s sake. 
 
 " If I thought you would neglect your father, I would 
 never stir from the house," Mrs. Sidney went on. " He must 
 have his regular meals, and you must get up and give him 
 a lunch when he has to go out at night. I ve done it for 
 twenty years and he would break down without it. I want 
 you to listen to what I am saying, Agnes. You don t know 
 what a heedless girl you are. But I believe you have some 
 love in your heart for your father, and I count on that ! " 
 
 " Papa and I will get along all right together. We gen 
 erally do," answered Agnes.
 
 36 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Yes, because he always lets you have your own way. But 
 I ve always been here to do the unpleasant things, and it s 
 an ungrateful position, I can tell you. Your father never 
 crosses you himself, but you should hear him talk to me at 
 night. Then it s Kate, you must see that Agnes does this, 
 and * Kate, you must take care that Agnes does not do that. 
 He s troubled, too, about Beatrice s wanting Fred to leave 
 the bank. You ll find it a very different thing when I m not 
 here to bear the brunt of everything." 
 
 " Yes, I imagine I shall." 
 
 " I won t be here to do the mending while you smile and 
 pet your father," Mrs. Sidney went on. " It s very easy to 
 bring in bouquets of flowers after somebody else has swept 
 and dusted and put things to rights. I ll work all day and 
 nobody thanks me. But your father and you will bow and 
 scrape to each other over a pansy." 
 
 " Sometimes I wish you wouldn t do so much work and that 
 we could have a breathing spell from gratitude," Agnes ex 
 claimed crossly. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney turned toward her. " How ungrateful you 
 are, Agnes ! What must the Lord think of such a speech? " 
 
 A grim smile came to Aunt Mattie s lips as she sat with 
 her hands crossed watching the two. " If He has any sense 
 of humor I think He might be entertained by this conversa 
 tion, Kate," she remarked. 
 
 " Mattie ! " said Mrs. Sidney to the widow, " I don t like 
 the tone of your voice. You are teaching Agnes irreverance. 
 You may find out, when it s too late, that the Lord does laugh. 
 * He that sitteth in the Heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall 
 have them in derision. " She closed her lips and moved about 
 in silence for some moments. 
 
 But as Agnes was leaving the room she looked up and 
 spoke once more in a prophetic voice : " Experience teaches 
 a dear school. I guess you ll miss mother before she comes 
 home again." 
 
 Before Mrs. Sidney left she made each of them promise 
 various things. Aunt Mattie promised to keep sharp watch
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 37 
 
 of Stephen s health, and, when Agnes went out evenings, to 
 sit up until she returned. Dr. Sidney promised that he 
 would not contribute over a certain amount to the church 
 collections ; he was to make a point of passing in and out 
 of the room when Agnes received callers ; above all, he was 
 not to overdo in night practice. As for Agnes, she had 
 many instructions. She must not forget to comb Aunt 
 Mattie s hair and to help her dress and undress ; she was to 
 keep the boys in the lane from playing in the barn; she was 
 to keep the lamps trimmed and filled, and the best linen 
 packed away. 
 
 " Only if we entertain I will use the best linen, then," the 
 girl excepted. 
 
 " You mustn t think you can invite in the town to eat your 
 father out of house and home," said Mrs. Sidney at once. " I 
 don t like all these new friends of yours. I like to know the 
 parents of your friends. And be careful about this, Agnes ! 
 You must study your father s appetite, and not your own. 
 I think I ve seen a tendency in you to make a god of your 
 belly." 
 
 " Why, mamma ! You know it is you who are always 
 asking people in and cooking good things." 
 
 " When it s proper I should," Mrs. Sidney answered 
 tersely. 
 
 Above all, Agnes was to look after her father. She listened 
 nonchalantly to her list of duties, and felt relieved when 
 her mother was done. She helped Mrs. Sidney pack her 
 satchel very graciously, and went with her parents to the 
 station. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney left in the evening. She would not reach her 
 daughter s home in Iowa till the following afternoon. It 
 was a long journey for the woman who had spent her life 
 time in her country home, but she started out with charac 
 teristic resolution. 
 
 Dr. Sidney saw his wife into her compartment and then 
 returned to Agnes. They stood on the platform till the train 
 rolled away, then turned to where Peggy was waiting. Agnes
 
 38 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 was surprised to find her father so quiet, and more surprised 
 at the depression of her own spirits. As her father helped 
 her out from the buggy at their doorstep, and she glanced 
 up at the house, it looked empty foreboding. 
 
 " Here is the key," said Dr. Sidney. " I told Mattie not 
 to sit up for us." 
 
 Agnes inserted it in the office door and went in. She 
 lighted the lantern, went out through the kitchen door, 
 walked down the garden path beneath its grape arbor, and 
 joined her father in the barn, where he was unharnessing 
 Peggy. 
 
 " So you have begun to take care of me," he said, looking 
 pleased. " Hold the lantern on this side." 
 
 When the task was over and they went inside, Agnes 
 brought a glass of milk to her father, gave him a lighted 
 lamp, and kissed him good-night. " You call me in the 
 morning, if I don t wake up in time," she said. 
 
 Then she went to bed, and in the quiet of the dark began 
 to plan all she would accomplish during her two months 
 regime in the home.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A GNES found the housework irksome at first. Aunt Mat- 
 tie could not assist in the manual part, owing to the 
 deformity of her hands. She could, however, do the market 
 ing, answer the telephone, and attend tolerably well to the 
 office. To be sure, in this latter capacity she " had no 
 knack," as Mrs. Sidney once said impatiently. She would 
 weakly permit the patients to go away when the doctor was 
 absent, whereas Mrs. Sidney had been known to keep them 
 waiting cheerfully three hours for the physician. In the 
 course of a week, however, the housekeeping began to show 
 some system, and if Beatrice Mott had not come to Kent 
 the summer might have passed with fair success. 
 
 The first effect of Beatrice s arrival was to stimulate 
 Agnes to an unwonted effort for appearances, but before the 
 guest had been in town a week Agnes not only lost ambition, 
 but fell away from her ordinary ideal of order. Beatrice 
 came in at all hours, sometimes scant in dress, sometimes 
 overdressed, always graceful and picturesque. When she had 
 time to wonder about it, Agnes used to ask herself why this 
 disorderly girl could attract, with strands of hair disdain 
 ing the loose coil, her silk jersey raveling, and her French 
 stockings showing holes in the heels as she drew them in 
 and out of her pomponed Turkish slippers. The uncon 
 sciousness with which Beatrice at one time bore her disha 
 bille, at another a mass of color and ornament, lent distinction 
 even to her shiftlessness. People in her company were apt 
 to let themselves go, too, feeling something large and friendly 
 in her unrestraint. Fits of tireless energy alternated in her 
 with days of languorous indolence. She would watch Agnes 
 lazily for half a day, following her around from room to 
 room and talking her thoughts aloud while Agnes worked. 
 
 39
 
 40 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Then suddenly she would beg to wash dishes, to comb Aunt 
 Mattie s hair, to sweep, to clear the table. " Why don t you 
 work quicker? " she would cry to Agnes, shaking the nap 
 kins on the floor and rushing to the kitchen with single 
 dishes, which she bestowed upon chair, table or stove. 
 
 So far as the ordinary eye could observe, Fred took his 
 sweetheart s moods with equanimity, but Agnes, who had 
 read from childhood his silences, nervous acquiescences, and 
 sensitive smiles, knew when he was troubled. She knew that 
 he frequently was hurt by Beatrice s free manners and conse 
 quent notorious popularity. More than once Agnes had 
 detected in him the Sidney brightness of eye which accom 
 panied suffering of the mind. She found herself secretly 
 questioning whether Beatrice Mott were heartless or only, 
 willful and thoughtless. 
 
 One morning Beatrice came in breezily as Agnes was mak 
 ing her father s bed. 
 
 " Agnes ! " she began at once, dropping her tam-o -shanter 
 on the high part of the bureau and dropping herself on the 
 low shelf before the long glass, " Tom s written to me 
 again ! " and she pulled an envelope from her pocket as she 
 spoke. 
 
 Agnes looked up attentively and saw a pleasurable excite 
 ment in her companion s face. It was the spark to her resolu 
 tion to have a talk with Fred s fiancee. Her nervousness lest 
 she should injure instead of help her cousin s cause made her 
 speak more aggressively than she had planned. " Beatrice, 
 you ought not to allow this. It s not honorable." 
 
 Beatrice waited a moment, then burst out laughing. 
 " What a saintly engagement you and Donald will have ! " 
 she exclaimed, and went off in another peal of merriment. 
 
 Agnes color heightened as she turned to her work again. 
 " Your hair is coming down," she remarked in her mother s 
 tone. 
 
 Beatrice reached around, tucked in her hair and pinned 
 it carelessly. Then she went on : " Agnes, you don t know 
 anything about life. You ve been mewed up in this town or
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 41 
 
 in that Presbyterian boarding-school ever since you were 
 born. I ve traveled all over and have had a good many ex 
 periences. If I want to have a little fun, there s no harm in 
 it. It s just for variety. There hasn t been a single thing 
 going on here for three weeks but congratulations and tally- 
 hos and tennis-parties and billing and cooing. This Sunday- 
 school life uses me up. I ve got to have a change. Tom 
 Ballington and I don t care a snap for each other, but we 
 can have more fun carrying on than any two people who 
 ever have lived. We make an artistic success of it. You 
 know if we cared for each other twouldn t be any more fun 
 to flirt with him than it is with Fred. There s always a 
 strife between Tom and me to see which can flirt with more 
 originality. He s the smartest thing that ever lived. He 
 never does it twice alike. He keeps me up to my best level 
 all the time. Now, Fred is as good as gold, and I m going 
 to marry him, but I do wish he didn t say the same things 
 over and over. He hasn t real originality, Fred hasn t 
 but he s the best man I ever knew." 
 
 Agnes listened to this artless exposition with indignant 
 dismay. It was followed by some moments of silence. Then 
 she said gravely, " Beatrice, if three weeks of Kent are 
 intolerable to you, how dare you think of passing your life 
 here?" 
 
 "Who? I? Pass my life here?" Beatrice s startled 
 tone changed to one of stifled amusement. " I suppose I 
 could join Fred s church and Mary Bucher s Dorcas society. 
 My dear," she rose and went over to place her hands on 
 Agnes shoulders " speaking about Mary Bucher, she s in 
 love with Fred as much as she can be. Now I shouldn t mind 
 how many letters he got from her. I m perfectly willing he 
 should go in and have a good time with her. They are as 
 safe a pair as Tom and I are. Fred has been too soft and I 
 have been too tame with him. We ll make the dullest kind of 
 a couple if we don t look out." 
 
 Agnes reached up and took Beatrice s hands down from 
 her shoulders. As she looked down at them she noticed how
 
 42 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 pale and weak her own hands looked beside the darker, heavier 
 hands of Beatrice. " See here, Beatrice," she said, " I want 
 Fred to be happy. You don t know how little he s had in his 
 life, as I do, and you don t know how these flirtations of 
 yours pain him. He isn t narrow. He s high-minded." 
 Agnes forced herself to say what she feared would incense 
 Beatrice, but the last words were lost on the girl. 
 
 The allusion to Fred s meager share of happiness turned 
 her mobile emotions into a new channel, and it was one which 
 must have been familiar to them. As she stood perfectly 
 still, struck by Agnes voice and looking down at her, her 
 face quickly sobered and she was betrayed into a look that 
 was new to Agnes, but which carried with it unmistakable 
 self-revelation. 
 
 " Beatrice ! " cried Agnes involuntarily, infinite relief and 
 joy in the exclamation. She knew now that Beatrice loved 
 Fred. 
 
 With a stiff military wheel Beatrice turned away to the 
 window. The look in her eyes, the gravity of her silence, 
 embarrassed and awed Agnes. 
 
 After what seemed a long pause, without turning around, 
 Beatrice spoke in a voice as unfamiliar as her manner. It 
 was rough and wavered curiously. " Nobody but an ass 
 would have wanted to keep up that nonsense with Tom. You 
 don t have to tell me Fred has had a lonesome life. A boy 
 who has earned his own living since he was twelve years old ! 
 He looked like a starved dog trying not to beg the first time 
 I saw him." 
 
 Beatrice dashed the tears from her eyes, and began to 
 tear up Tom s letter viciously, first lengthwise, then across. 
 " Don t you go getting a wrong idea of Tom. He does this 
 because he feels mean about a story that s gone around that 
 he jilted me. He s a straight fellow. He d rather have 
 people think that I had jilted him. So he says it himself. 
 There isn t any truth in it either way." 
 
 Beatrice threw the fragments of Tom s letter in a minia 
 ture snow-storm through the window. " As soon as I ve mar-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 43 
 
 ried Fred everything will be all right. He is not going to do 
 a tap of work for five years. I m going to take him out of 
 the bank where he handles other people s money year in and 
 year out, and give him enough of his own to keep him busy 
 spending it. We are going abroad, and when we come back 
 we shall have a town house as well as the country place here. 
 Fred says he wants to earn his own livelihood, but I tell him 
 I haven t had anybody to take care of since I was born, and 
 he s never had anybody to take care of him." 
 
 Agnes was beginning to see the explanation of Beatrice s 
 feeling for Fred. There was an imperative need in her large 
 nature of giving. She was not satisfied, as her father was, 
 to give money. She must give herself. Fred was the one 
 who had most appealed to her on her generous side, while 
 he satisfied her pride by being a distinguished object upon 
 whom to lavish the best she had to give. On the whole, Fred 
 filled a larger place in Beatrice s heart than any other man 
 could. 
 
 Agnes relief on this score, however, now transferred itself 
 into uncertainty about Fred. Was Beatrice as necessary 
 to him as he to her? Agnes was skeptical about his accepting 
 as much as Beatrice wished to give him. 
 
 " A man doesn t want a woman to take care of him. He 
 wants to take care of her," she said gently. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " returned Beatrice, her mind still intent upon 
 the future. " Look at your father and mether." 
 
 Agnes was startled. Beatrice s analysis of the relative 
 position of her father and mother in the family shocked her. 
 She always had thought of her father as the corner-stone of 
 the home. 
 
 " My father has always cared for and supported his fam 
 ily. He has done the man s part," she said with emphasis. 
 
 " Well, you must excuse me for speaking plainly, Agnes," 
 returned Beatrice promptly, " but I don t think much of this 
 matter of earning money. Your mother has done a good deal 
 more. She has run the home, and I guess the church and a 
 share of the town, and taken such good care of your father
 
 44 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 that he has been able to do the work of two doctors. Now, 
 has your father really supported the family? I say, non 
 sense! I m glad you brought this up. I m going to use it 
 as an argument to Fred. We ll be just such a couple as 
 your father and mother. Good-by ! " 
 
 With this prospect of ideal domestic life before her mind, 
 Beatrice whirled round the room in a vortex of spreading 
 skirts. On her way she caught up her tam-o -shanter and 
 pinned it on her head. " I can hardly wait to get married 
 when I think of the gorgeous family we two are going to 
 make!" 
 
 As she reached the door she paused on the threshold, look 
 ing over her shoulder impishly. " You didn t know I had so 
 much sense, did you? Neither did my General. He said he 
 was surprised I had brains enough to let Tom go and take 
 Fred." 
 
 Then she darted out, slamming the door behind her. 
 
 Agnes followed, dizzy with her guest s evolutions of mind 
 and body. When she reached the outside door Beatrice was 
 already disappearing round the corner a block away. She 
 looked after the retreating figure, saying to herself, " It s 
 all right! She has a warm heart after all! And she loves 
 Fred. All she wants for herself is to be able to do for him." 
 
 She waited a few minutes in the yard before returning to 
 her work, looked up into the heavens where it seemed as if a 
 soft, gray swan were brooding over the world, listened to the 
 twittering of the birds, watched the sunshine filter down 
 through the elms and checker the walk with light and shade, 
 felt the fall coming in the air. Her happiness was passing 
 into loneliness. She wished her father would come home, and 
 when she went into the house at last she let her work go while 
 she hunted up Aunt Mattie and asked her to come down and 
 sit in the kitchen while the dinner work was getting under 
 way. 
 
 There was a touch of tenderness in the relation of the two 
 girls henceforth. Even under Beatrice s most volatile moods 
 Agnes was yet aware of it. It salved her conscience for
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 45 
 
 spending more and more time in the whirl of social life whose 
 center was Beatrice. There were pricks of conscience, in 
 deed, but the time was drawing near when Beatrice must go 
 and when Mrs. Sidney was to return. It was the only chance 
 she ever had had for a good time unchecked by surveillance, 
 and Agnes told herself, with a thrill of lawlessness, she would 
 let herself make the most of it.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 IN due time the telegram came announcing the birth of 
 Helen Mabie s second son. Agnes sat in the sitting- 
 room, writing a letter of congratulation to her sister, when 
 Aunt Mattie came into the room. Agnes looked up as she 
 entered and was struck with the frowsiness of her aunt s 
 hair. 
 
 " Aunt Mattie ! " she exclaimed, reddening, " how long is 
 it since your hair has been combed? " 
 
 " Two days," replied the gaunt figure briefly. 
 
 " For pity s sake! Why didn t you remind me? " 
 
 Agnes gradually had slipped into shiftlessness in her 
 household duties. Aunt Mattie s hair, instead of being ar 
 ranged in the morning, had been twisted up at any time of 
 day or evening when it happened to be convenient, and finally 
 had been neglected altogether. Agnes had fallen into the 
 way of economizing labor by letting the kitchen fire go out, 
 and making meals of cold meats and vegetables, served with 
 iced tea or lemonade. Some steaks and chops which her 
 father had brought home and handed her occasionally had 
 spoiled in the refrigerator. Aunt Mattie, in trying to clean 
 the ice box one day, had found them and thrown them out. 
 When Dr. Sidney at last had expressed a wish for warm food, 
 Agnes took a new start. She soon back-slid, however, into 
 warming canned stuff once a day over a quick wood-fire, 
 shifting the one hearty meal of the week upon Mrs. Macy, 
 who came every Monday to wash. 
 
 Now, with a shock at her forgetfulness, she sprang up from 
 the writing-desk to attend to the hair-dressing. 
 
 " I do hope you ll forgive me," she said as she untwisted 
 the tangled coil. " I ll never forgive myself." 
 
 46
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 47 
 
 Her aunt did not reply at once. 
 
 Then she said, choosing her words, " When does this young 
 lady leave town? " 
 
 " What young lady ? " Agnes felt her heart sink. 
 
 " The one who made my hair look like a Chinese pagoda." 
 
 " In about a week, I think." 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 Then Agnes added, " Why? " 
 
 " Because I think all these picnics and parties worry your 
 father. He looks thin and tired. I think he needs regular 
 hours and warm meals." 
 
 " You mean I ought to stay at home and attend to him, 
 
 instead of " Agnes broke off. She was glad she was 
 
 behind her aunt, for she knew it would be mutually disa 
 greeable should their glances meet. 
 
 " Yes, my girl. That s what I mean." 
 
 " Well you re right. I shan t go any more." 
 
 She left her aunt and walked away, deterred by the instinct 
 of self-preservation from further talk. Her compunction 
 was aggravated by the realization that Aunt Mattie, like 
 her father, waited till a situation was unendurable before 
 blaming the guilty. She finished her letter, and then, con 
 trary to her engagement to spend part of the morning at 
 the Buchers , began to dust the room. 
 
 When Dr. Sidney returned to dinner he found the table 
 bountifully spread. There were fresh blossoms in the room, 
 and a quiet, but sweet daughter, in a clean dress, presided. 
 Agnes watched her father and was struck to the heart in 
 reading the surprise and pleasure in his face, though he 
 scarcely tasted the daintily-served food. 
 
 When she had done her dinner-work she went to her piano. 
 Then she realized that it had been many days since she had 
 practiced. The music was scattered over the top of the 
 instrument as it had been left since her last party. " What 
 a looking place ! " she exclaimed to herself, shocked at the 
 appearance of the room, and instantly picturing her mother s 
 consternation could she by any chance become aware of the
 
 48 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 state of things. " It looks just ready for the ostriches and 
 satyrs to dance here." 
 
 As she gathered up the loose sheets an envelope addressed 
 to " Agnes " fell from between the leaves. It evidently had 
 been placed upon the rack and inadvertently covered up. 
 She recognized her father s handwriting, and tore open the 
 envelope with fingers that trembled. Inside a folded sheet 
 of paper was a five-dollar bill, and written on the sheet these 
 words " To the sweet singer. From Father." The paper 
 was dated four o clock in the morning four days back. Agnes 
 dropped her music with a sob, and sank into the nearest 
 chair, covering her face with her hands. It had been Dr. 
 Sidney s custom to put missives from time to time on her 
 piano, and they occasionally contained money. One circum 
 stance only was now in the girl s mind, and it dominated her 
 thoughts. She at once connected the bill with words of hers 
 complaining about singing in the Presbyterian choir without 
 
 Pay- 
 After a little while, she stopped crying and resumed her 
 work. Presently she found another envelope with a paper 
 dated two days later, which read: 
 
 Will my dear daughter, when she has a little time, see if she can 
 arrange the inclosed words to music, and sing them some Sabbath day 
 in church? 
 
 There was inclosed another sheet containing the words of 
 a hymn. 
 
 Through the remainder of the afternoon until time to 
 prepare supper Agnes worked on the music for her father s 
 hymn. Generally she preferred secular songs to sacred, and 
 she had wondered rather peevishly why her father persisted 
 in composing hymns when he could write poems which were 
 clever and light-hearted. Now, some hitherto-concealed 
 spring of action in his nature attracted her notice. What 
 was it that drew that gifted mind to center itself upon re 
 ligious thought? Why was it that through all he said or 
 wrote or did, there sounded the motif of another world?
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 49 
 
 With what invisible friend was he communing during the 
 early morning hours which he spent at his desk or during 
 which he strolled about in his garden, as she sometimes had 
 seen him do through her window? 
 
 Agnes knew that Dr. Sidney had returned and was keeping 
 his office hours, but she did not attempt to speak with him 
 then, knowing that patients were coming and going. She 
 went about her supper preparations as noiselessly as possi 
 ble, and when the meal was ready she went to her father with 
 a grace that was new since morning. Her presence seemed 
 especially sweet to the doctor as she bent over him where he 
 lay on the lounge and kissed his forehead. 
 
 " I found your letters on the piano to-day, papa. Thank 
 you so much for the money. I shall sing your words on 
 Sunday." 
 
 As Agnes gaze met that of her father there occurred one 
 of those flashes of understanding which have it in them to 
 avert the tragedy of a life. It was as though to one who had 
 given his life for an ideal too exalted for his world to com 
 prehend there suddenly had appeared his beloved disciple, 
 aroused from sleep and come to watch with him. 
 
 Neither Dr. Sidney nor Agnes spoke as they went in to 
 gether to supper. Before it was over Dr. Sidney excused 
 himself and went back to the lounge. 
 
 Agnes was not quite through with the dishes when Beatrice 
 and Fred came in. She heard the sounds of merriment in the 
 hall and met her guests with an unusual dignity. They re 
 mained only a few minutes and asked Agnes to go with them 
 to a mesmerist s exhibition the following evening. The girl 
 had little heart for amusement, but she accepted the invi 
 tation, as it was to be Beatrice s last day in Kent. The two 
 went off, talking and laughing. As Agnes closed the door 
 behind them she heard Fred trip on the gravel walk, heard 
 Beatrice s mocking laugh, a little scuffle and then receding 
 voices. 
 
 She finished her work quietly, and returned to the parlor 
 with a book and a letter from Miriam Cass. Suddenly she
 
 50 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 heard her father s footsteps. He was walking back and forth 
 in the sitting-room beyond. As he passed and re-passed the 
 door of the parlor, she was struck with the pallor of his face, 
 the weariness of his movements. He did not notice her until 
 she spoke to him. 
 
 Then he turned, a flash of surprise on his face. He joined 
 her at once. " I thought I heard you go out with a party 
 of young people," he said. 
 
 " No. It was only Beatrice and Fred." 
 
 He paused in his walk, stood before her, and said, looking 
 down, " I am glad you did not go away without speaking to 
 me." 
 
 Her heart smote her, for she rarely had been at home of 
 late. 
 
 " You look worried, papa," she said. " Is there any trou 
 ble on your mind ? " 
 
 He walked across the room, paused, and said with peculiar 
 earnestness, " I am convinced that something will happen to 
 your mother. I wish I could go for her. But I have not the 
 strength." 
 
 Agnes was alarmed. "What do you mean, papa?" she 
 asked, hastily putting down her book and half rising. 
 " Mamma is well. She writes that she is perfectly well. 
 Have you heard anything? " 
 
 " No. I have that feeling." There was uncontrollable 
 anxiety in his voice and manner. 
 
 So the soldier, struck in battle, as he falls, sees with his 
 darkening eyes the sword that hangs over some unconscious 
 head far away. The blow falls there. He passes into peace. 
 
 Agnes made an effort to smile. " There is nothing to make 
 you feel like that, papa." 
 
 The weary steps began again. 
 
 " In the second drawer of my desk," said Dr. Sidney 
 presently, " there are some notes which I have written from 
 time to time. Most of them have been taken down early in 
 the morning before the rest of the house was astir. Perhaps 
 some time you will care to read them. Not now ! They may
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 51 
 
 bring you closer to your father s thoughts ; when you grow 
 older and have aches of your own in the head and the 
 heart (for they will come), they may help you a little. There 
 are many things I have wanted to say to you, but youth has 
 its rights, and I always have believed that the soul must first 
 hunger and thirst after righteousness before it can be filled. 
 That day will come." 
 
 " Yes. I know." 
 
 " There are qualities in my sweet daughter s disposition," 
 he said, smiling a little, " which I notice now and then, and 
 recognize as having come from me. They are not bad quali 
 ties, but they need others along with them, and I hope that 
 with my weakness she may develop something of her mother s 
 firmness of character." 
 
 Agnes tried hard to keep back the tears that scalded her 
 eyeballs. " Don t ! Don t, papa," she cried. " I didn t get 
 any weakness from you. I tell you never from you ! " 
 
 He came back and sat down near her, and held up the 
 volume of Cowper which he had in his hand. " These are 
 poems by a man who was heart-sick over all the pain and 
 sorrow in the world. It unsettled his mind at last. He once 
 took a wounded hare and tended it, saying that one creature 
 out of all the myriads should be cared for." 
 
 Agnes did not reply at once. Presently she exclaimed, 
 " What is it all for, papa? " 
 
 " Many a man has wished for the understanding heart," 
 the doctor returned thoughtfully. " But there is a better 
 gift. David knew it when he prayed Create in me a clean 
 heart, O God ! " 
 
 After a moment s silence his face changed and he began to 
 speak with unusual rapidity, following out the new train of 
 thought. One always was conscious of a dramatic intensity 
 beneath his somewhat austere manner, but to-night it trans 
 formed him. His language gradually took on the glory of 
 the Hebrew prophets. Many silent thoughts of his life 
 welled up into words. He seemed to forget Agnes presence, 
 to be communing with the spirit of the unseen world. Agnes
 
 52 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 felt an awe of her father stealing over her as she realized 
 how thin was the veil that divided him from the eternal. It 
 was flashed upon her that his face always was turned away 
 from time with its accidents towards the light and the pro 
 found brooding love which awaited him yonder. It was as 
 though some gentle denizen of boundless ether were caught 
 here and struggled, patient and undiscouraged, to wear its 
 fetters through and soar again. 
 
 When he ceased, it was with the same suddenness with 
 which he began. The two sat for some time in silence. The 
 silence seemed to grow into an immensity of crowding intui 
 tions and suggestions. Some of them the girl felt that she 
 must tell her father, but when she tried to speak she did not 
 know how. 
 
 " Papa, something has happened to me," she stammered 
 at last. " I never felt before how unreal the things are which 
 I have most longed for. I wish I could live in your world 
 with you." 
 
 The look which accompanied what she said, as well as the 
 words themselves, told the doctor of the understanding that 
 had come to her. 
 
 " You will live in that world more and more," he said, the 
 brilliance of his eyes settling into the usual quiet luminous- 
 ness. He took up his volume of Cowper, but did not open it 
 at once. Presently he added, " And though in a different 
 way from what you think, I doubt not with me." Then he 
 opened his book, an expression of peace upon his face. 
 
 As his daughter s eyes lingered upon him an answering 
 peace came into her heart, but it was accompanied by a feel 
 ing of foreboding wherein solemnity and aspiration and re 
 nunciation were mingled. 
 
 They spent the remainder of the evening in silence. 
 
 At last the doctor rose, walked to the piano, and opened 
 the hymn-book on the rack. Agnes smiled and complied at 
 once with his unspoken request for her to sing. He selected 
 a verse here and there, as was his custom, and she sang 
 them.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 53 
 
 Last of all he turned to his favorite hymn, following the 
 words through in his Cowper as she sang: 
 
 " God moves in a mysterious way 
 His wonders to perform; 
 He plants His footsteps in the sea, 
 And rides upon the storm." 
 
 He stopped her before she went on to the second stanza. 
 
 " That first stanza is one of the finest ever written," he 
 said. " The rest is not equal to it. The grandeur is gone. 
 Sing that one over." 
 
 And she sang it again. 
 
 When she turned on her stool she was arrested by the 
 radiance of her father s face. 
 
 " We soon shall have your mother back," he said, and he 
 bent down and kissed her, adding, " The Lord has better 
 things in store for you than you know."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 ]\/f RS. SIDNEY, in a blue and white gingham dress, was 
 washing dishes in the kitchen of the Mabies country 
 home. From time to time she moved about the room to pick 
 up a stray dish. At last they all were clean except one plate, 
 which contained the remains of tidbits that had been sent to 
 Helen during her illness. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney stood in indecision with this plate in her hand, 
 when Pleasant Mabie came into the room. He came in on 
 tiptoe, and shut the door noiselessly, for he had been well 
 trained as to how to deport himself in a house with babies. 
 A small mongrel dog with a clipped tail came close at his 
 heels. 
 
 As she saw who it was, Mrs. Sidney suddenly held out the 
 plate. " Here, Pleasant ! " she said briskly, " eat this ! It s 
 real good. I want to wash the dish." 
 
 Mr. Mabie took the dish awkwardly and ate the contents. 
 
 Then Mrs. Sidney washed the plate, and after putting 
 away her pans, went into the dining-room. Here Helen 
 Mabie was sitting in a rocking chair, her sleeping baby in 
 her lap. Three little children ranging from five to two were 
 playing with a box of toys on the floor. 
 
 "Where s grandma s baby?" said Mrs. Sidney in a full 
 buoyant tone, patting the smallest of the three on the head 
 as she passed. 
 
 " What s Kitty doing? " she asked, looking at the older 
 girl, who was standing, toys in hand, and who looked as 
 though she had been interrupted. 
 
 Kitty s manner was theatrical, and she threw out her arms, 
 as she answered that she was burying her doll, with a pas 
 sionate abandon which would have done honor to Niobe. 
 
 " Helen," said Mrs. Sidney, " that s the smartest child I 
 
 54
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 55 
 
 ever saw. You ll be a proud woman some day. I hope you ll 
 appreciate her." 
 
 " My kindergarten journal says it s better not to let 
 children know about death," returned Helen musingly. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said Mrs. Sidney, rocking ; " I don t ap 
 prove of any new-fangled ideas that start children in life 
 on a false basis. I ve meant to speak to you about that 
 kindergarten paper of yours before. You d put in your time 
 better if you d read your Bible, and use your common sense." 
 
 " It gives me a good many valuable suggestions, mother." 
 
 " What suggestions has it given you ? " asked her mother. 
 
 " Well, teaching by object-lessons. It gives a definite 
 picture to the mind." 
 
 " Of course it gives a definite picture to the mind," an 
 swered Mrs. Sidney disdainfully, " and that s the reason 
 Isaiah walked naked before the children of Israel, and the 
 reason Ezekiel lay on his side for four hundred and thirty 
 days. That s no new idea. No, sir! What mothers need 
 is to read their Bibles. You can t expect to bring up your 
 children in the way they should go, without the help of God. 
 I ve been sorry to see that you ve given up church-going. 
 You can t expect God to bless you if you go on like this." 
 
 Helen turned her face away, and looked wistfully out 
 through the window. " We are all so tired on Sunday," she 
 said gently. " And it s such a long way to town. The horses 
 are tired, too." 
 
 " Pleasant got in to see the seven Blondin sisters, though," 
 said Mrs. Sidney, looking sternly at the kitchen door, " and 
 you went to hear that Italian man sing. You didn t either 
 of you feel too tired, then." 
 
 Helen looked through the window some moments longer, 
 and then turned her delicate face toward her mother, with 
 a look of care-worn tenderness which would have come more 
 naturally from the mother to the daughter. 
 
 " Mother," she said, with a swift smile whose sweetness 
 had pierced Mrs. Sidney s heart years ago when she saw it 
 in a darker, sterner face, " something of the pines and rock-
 
 56 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ribbed mountains of Vermont was born in you. I think it is 
 easier for you mountain people to be good than it is for us 
 out here on the plains. Sometimes I wish " 
 
 Her thin hands clasped each other tensely, as she looked 
 out again over the wide level view to be seen from the window. 
 But her voice sank, the hands came apart again, and she did 
 not finish her sentence. 
 
 "Is our God only a God of the hills, then?" said Mrs. 
 Sidney, lowering her knitting and eyeing Helen over her 
 spectacles, a posture which lends authority to far less con 
 vincing gazes than those of Mrs. Sidney. " You aren t 
 thinking of encouraging Pleasant to go out to that mining 
 town in the Rockies, are you ? " she added keenly, before her 
 daughter could reply. " If Pleasant could get into a worse 
 place, he ll be sure to do it ! " 
 
 " Oh, no. I wouldn t want to go there." 
 
 " Did you tell Pleasant so? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Well, I m glad you did. I don t like the look of that 
 mining town. And I don t like the look of the hills either, 
 with all those prospecting holes dug along like so many 
 graves. It looks as if nature had broken out with a malig 
 nant disease." 
 
 Helen smiled again. This time it was her mother s smile, 
 open, cheerful, free from sublety, free from charm. 
 
 " I was always glad," went on Mrs. Sidney, " that Moses 
 talked about the brooks of water, and wheat, and barley, and 
 figs, and oil, and honey in the promised land, before he said 
 anything about the iron and brass. He put those last." 
 
 Pleasant s stealthy step and the dog s patter were now 
 heard approaching the door into the dining-room from the 
 kitchen, and Mrs. Sidney abruptly changed the conversation. 
 
 " Here, Kitty ! Come here. Grandma s got something 
 for you," she said, drawing some candy hearts out of her 
 pocket. As Kitty came up to her Mr. Mabie entered the 
 room. 
 
 " Please don t give them candy," he said, lifting his hand
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 57 
 
 with " a deprecating gesture. " I don t think it s good for 
 them." 
 
 " Nonsense ! Sweets are healthy for children. Baby 
 want one, too ? " She changed her voice with the last word, 
 and added with a beaming smile as she made eyes at the little 
 ones, " Yes, grandma will give her babies goodies." 
 
 Mr. Mabie smiled painfully, but he did not say anything. 
 He went into his bed-room and came out presently with his 
 shaving materials. He then began to shave himself before 
 the mahogany-framed looking-glass on the wall. During 
 this operation there was comparative quiet in the room. 
 Helen talked to him a little from time to time, receiving mean 
 ing grunts in answer. Mrs. Sidney rocked back and forth, 
 knitting and occasionally darting glances at her son-in-law. 
 
 When Pleasant gathered up his paraphernalia, returned 
 to the bed-room, and closed the door, Mrs. Sidney looked up 
 sternly at Helen. " Are those Blondin sisters in town yet ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 " I don t know." 
 
 " You may depend upon it, Helen, a man who gets himself 
 up as sleek as Pleasant does, when it isn t a habit with him, 
 has got something in the wind. It s wonderful the way a 
 man can run down when he gets away from civilization, and 
 there s no end in the downward career of a man who s only 
 worked upon by outside influences. The world can t hold him 
 up. Nothing but the Holy Ghost in his heart can do it. 
 What is Pleasant going into town for, anyway? Jenkins 
 did your marketing for you this week." 
 
 " There are a number of little things he wants to do. He 
 wants to get some chloroform to kill the kittens." 
 
 " Why doesn t he gird up his loins like a man and drown 
 the kittens?" returned Mrs. Sidney scornfully. 
 
 " These are the kittens of that favorite Maltese cat of his. 
 We all feel tenderly about killing the offspring of those we 
 love," said Helen, and she thought of her husband s visionary 
 schemes, which she always was chloroforming as gently as 
 possible.
 
 58 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Is that all he s going for? " 
 
 " No. He told Hetty he d buy her a new hat. She likes 
 his taste." 
 
 Hetty was the maid of all work of the Jenkins family, the 
 nearest neighbors, whom they had shared with Helen since 
 the baby came. 
 
 " So it s a hat that Hetty and he have been getting their 
 heads together over? I wondered what important undertak 
 ing Pleasant had got hold of now. Well, if that isn t ridicu 
 lous!" 
 
 " It s a little thing to give him pleasure, mother," said 
 Helen simply. " If it gives him variety and cheers him up, 
 why should I take the gratification away from him? He 
 doesn t get much pleasure. A farmer s life is a hard one." 
 
 " Let him get along with your associates," responded the 
 older woman uncompromisingly. 
 
 " I haven t any," answered Helen, unsuspiciously falling 
 into the trap. 
 
 " Yes, that s just it. You rather get along without." 
 
 Both women looked toward the bed-room door, at which Mr. 
 Mabie had unexpectedly appeared. He had on a clean shirt 
 and a starched collar, but he had not yet put on his coat. 
 He held out a letter to Mrs. Sidney, saying rather sheepishly, 
 " I just found this in my coat pocket. I got it last week 
 when I went to town. Guess I must have forgot to give it 
 to you." 
 
 " It s from Stephen," said Mrs. Sidney, catching the 
 envelope from his hand and tearing it open. " Here ! 
 There s something for you, Helen. Some poetry, I guess. 
 Keep still, Kitty. I want to read a letter. Pleasant, send 
 that dog out into the kitchen." She looked resentfully after 
 the cur, continuing, " I can t stand it to hear that dog s 
 toe-nails on the bare floor." Then she adjusted her spec 
 tacles and began to read. Presently she got up unsteadily 
 and left the room. 
 
 She returned when the baby wakened, with a shining face. 
 
 " I was reading over your father s letters when I was in my
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 59 
 
 room, Helen," she said as she laid the cloth on the table. 
 " There s been so much going on these last six weeks, I 
 haven t had a chance to call my breath my own. It seems 
 to me I see new things in his letters every time I read them." 
 
 She passed into the kitchen, and came back soon with the 
 plates. 
 
 " Oh, what a wealth of love his heart contains ! " she said. 
 
 Again the large figure disappeared. Back it came laden 
 with a tray of dishes. 
 
 " There was one passage which quite struck me in the last 
 letter. I read it while I was dressing the baby, and I was 
 so flurried, I didn t take it all in." 
 
 The voice died away in the kitchen. Then came the rattle 
 of knives and forks. 
 
 " He said he d been looking over his old college mementoes 
 and letters in the hair-trunk up in the attic," said Mrs. Sid 
 ney, returning, " and he came across a picture of his first 
 sweetheart a girl he loved when he first went to Williams." 
 
 " How can mother tell of it ? " thought Helen during the 
 pause. 
 
 " And he told how pretty and bright she was, and he said 
 that when he saw the little daguerreotype it brought it all 
 back again." 
 
 Another disappearance. 
 
 " And he went on to say that it made him feel young again, 
 and he asked me to forgive him for remembering, but it fairly 
 made him smell the little wild things, and see the poplar trees 
 sway, and the way the dragon-flies darted over the trout 
 stream." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney halted by the kitchen door, her hands upon 
 her hips. 
 
 " And he said that the little picture was so sweet to him 
 that he was going to get a little frame for it, and hang it up 
 in his office, and and " 
 
 " Don t cry, mother. Don t ! " exclaimed Helen, half ris 
 ing. " I believe it was all a joke. Father never loved any 
 body but you. Anyhow, that was thirty-five or forty years
 
 60 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 * 
 
 ago. If you could see the fat old thing now, you wouldn t 
 care." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s weeping changed into hysterical laughter. 
 She sat down and held her hands to her sides. 
 
 " Do control yourself, mother," said Helen in distress. 
 " Father says you ll break a blood vessel laughing some 
 day." 
 
 " But he said, Helen he said he wanted to to get it in 
 a little frame because because " 
 
 " Because what? " 
 
 " Because he wanted his children to know how their 
 mother looked when she was young ! " 
 
 Helen did not laugh. She hardly realized the incongruity 
 of her effort to console her mother. Her eyes were fixed on 
 a hovse far down the road coming toward the house at great 
 speed. She had been longing for some advent in that long 
 white road. It had come, and it struck a chill to her heart. 
 
 " It is John Cummings," she said. " He is coming here." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney hurried to the window. 
 
 " He is ! " she cried after a moment. " He s got a tele 
 gram. Your father s sick. Oh, I never ought to have come 
 away and left him." 
 
 Mr. Mabie came out of his room upon hearing their excited 
 voices. He held a set of papers containing statistics in re 
 gard to the adulteration of sugar, which he was preparing 
 for publication in the town paper. He started leisurely 
 toward the door, but by the time he reached it Mrs. Sidney 
 was back with the telegram in her hands. 
 
 Her own eyes took in the message before the sheet was 
 fairly opened, and she read it aloud: 
 
 Father very ill. Come immediately. Bring Helen if possible. 
 
 AGNES. 
 
 " What time is it? " asked Mrs. Sidney, looking at the 
 clock. 
 
 " Helen can t go," said Pleasant, disregarding the time.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 61 
 
 " The cow money has got to go on the mortgage. She s too 
 weak, anyway." 
 
 A strange expression flitted across Helen s face, but there 
 was no reproof in it. She knew too well the bitterness of 
 poverty that shuts in the sentiments of the heart, and then 
 gnaws their life away. Pleasant s reference to the money 
 necessary for her journey fell upon ears that were listening 
 to a remote voice which, in the light of this news, was tinged 
 with indefinable melancholy. 
 
 " I have had an inclosure from father s letter," she said. 
 " It is a draft for fifty dollars which he says came to him 
 unexpectedly. He told me to keep it for an emergency. It 
 seemed to me just now that I could hear him telling me to 
 come. I ll take the cow money, and Pleasant can cash this." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Mr. Mabie, and he appeared relieved about 
 his wife s weakness. 
 
 " It s half-past eleven," said Mrs. Sidney, who had been 
 listening with a pang, wondering if her husband had antici 
 pated this emergency. " That train goes at two." 
 
 " Can t make it," volunteered Mr. Mabie. " It would take 
 an hour and a half to drive to town with a good horse. Bet 
 sey is lame and I was calculating to drive her in slow and 
 get the veterinary to look at her. All the others are at the 
 mill." 
 
 " We have got to make it ! " exclaimed Mrs. Sidney in 
 stantly. " Jenkins horses aren t at the mill." 
 
 " Mebbe Jenkins might let me take Spitfire if I explained. 
 I ll run over and ask if it ll be convenient." 
 
 " You tell him we ve got to have her whether it ll be con 
 venient or not ! " cried Mrs. Sidney from the kitchen door 
 way, where she had rushed to see to her dinner. " And don t 
 you stop to explain, either ! " 
 
 " Mebbe I d better bring Hetty back," said Pleasant, 
 sticking his head in the door again, but not waiting for an 
 answer. 
 
 "Do you think Pleasant and Hetty can take care of the 
 other three ? " asked Helen. " I ll have to take the baby, of
 
 62 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 course." She looked anxiously at her mother, who was hur 
 riedly putting food on the table. 
 
 " I guess they can. We can generally do what we ve got 
 to do. Sit right down here and eat. I m going upstairs to 
 pack. When you get through, you can dress the baby. Then 
 I ll come down and help you. Pleasant can eat after he gets 
 back from the station." 
 
 She left the room, but was back again within half an hour, 
 dragging a handbag. 
 
 " I packed your things and mine in my trunk," she said, 
 " and the baby s things in this bag. Here s your dress ! " 
 She sat down with a groan. 
 
 " Eat something, mother," said Helen, taking the garment. 
 
 " Yes, yes, I will. Never mind the dishes. Pleasant can 
 clear them up afterwards." 
 
 When everything was ready, the clock-hand pointed to 
 half -past twelve, and Pleasant had not returned. 
 
 " I wish I do wish I could be in two places at once," said 
 Mrs. Sidney. " I d have had that horse here half an hour 
 ago. There he is now. Way down by the frog-pond. Helen, 
 we ve got time enough to pray. Kneel down here by me. 
 You kneel down, too, Kitty. Nellie, put that fork down. Put 
 it down, I say! Now, Helen. Just tell the Lord to keep 
 Stephen alive till we get home. Later on, we can ask Him to 
 let him get well." 
 
 " Mother," said Helen, with eyes full of agony, " we 
 mustn t tell the Lord what to do." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney fell on her knees with a sob. 
 
 " O God ! I m a miserable sinner. O God ! make me 
 humble! Thy will, Lord, Thy will! But, oh, let him live! 
 Let him live! O God, have pity on Thy servant, Thy mis 
 erable, miserable servant! But let Thy countenance shine 
 upon me. Oh, pity us! Let him live! Amen. Amen. For 
 Christ s sake." 
 
 She caught hold of the chair in front of her, pulled up her 
 heavy body, and took the baby, while the tear drops and 
 beads of perspiration ran in streams down her face.
 
 63 
 
 Pleasant was still some distance away, driving Spitfire 
 before Jenkins democrat wagon. Hetty and a strange 
 woman were riding with him, and the loyal dog was under the 
 wagon. 
 
 " If you can walk by yourself, Helen," said Mrs. Sidney, 
 " I ll carry that satchel. Pleasant won t be able to leave the 
 mare. Kiss grandma good-by, Kitty. Be a good girl and 
 God will bless you. Good-by, Dannie ! Good-by, Nellie ! " 
 
 Helen s knees trembled, but she kept pace with her mother, 
 and was the first to get into the wagon. 
 
 " I m Jenkins sister," said the strange woman. " I m up 
 for a visit, but I ll take turns with Hetty staying here." 
 
 " I knew the Lord would provide," said Mrs. Sidney in a 
 shaken voice, smiling through her tears, and she nodded re 
 assuringly at the friend. " Cast thy bread upon the waters, 
 madam, and it shall return to thee after many days. Look 
 out, Pleasant ! You ll trip on that cat." 
 
 The Maltese cat knew Pleasant would not step on her. She 
 brushed affectionately against his legs and purred content 
 edly. 
 
 " Now, take the baby, Helen, and I ll help Pleasant bring 
 out the trunk. Thank you, ma am ! " as Jenkins sister 
 stepped up to hold the mare. She turned and followed 
 Pleasant to the house. 
 
 " Does that dog belong to Mr. Mabie ? " asked the stran 
 ger, wishing to make conversation with Helen. 
 
 " Pleasant found it when it was a pup," replied Helen, 
 " It was sick, and he nursed it and took care of it. He s 
 always kind to sick animals." 
 
 Pleasant s kindness to sick animals was well-known 
 throughout the neighborhood. The farmers laughed at the 
 crop of weaklings on his stock farm, and were wont to say 
 that strong animals didn t stand much of a show with him 
 till they were run down. Some men grow bitter under defeat ; 
 some grow stolid. Pleasant developed an abnormal sym 
 pathy with everything else that was under par. It is a hard 
 thing for a man to behave admirably who realizes that he has
 
 64 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 made a failure of his life, and that he has lost the esteem, 
 once proudly possessed, of a woman for whom he was going 
 to conquer the whole world. Pleasant might have done worse. 
 Where many men crave drink, he craved only affection. His 
 little daughter Kitty looked down upon him, and since Mrs. 
 Sidney had come to live with them there was a similar tend- 
 ency on the part of Dan. Pleasant suffered under the atti 
 tude toward him which he saw developing in his children, 
 and he sometimes blamed Mrs. Sidney s talkativeness for it, 
 and sometimes blamed Helen s silence. It never occurred to 
 him that the one woman only pushed the hand of fate, while 
 the other labored to retard it, and that his only hope of 
 escape was that he himself could unclasp those iron fingers. 
 
 They rounded the curve by the station an hour later, and 
 as soon as the mare stopped Mrs. Sidney sprang out of 
 the wagon. " Give me the baby ! " she cried. " Here, quick ! 
 Pleasant can bring the satchel and help you. Never mind 
 the trunk. He can send it on." 
 
 She ran across the weed-grown road and reached the train 
 as the whistle blew. 
 
 " Hold on ! " she panted to the conductor who had pulled 
 her up on the car. " That lady over there has to get on yet." 
 
 " Can t wait," said the man gruffly. 
 
 " You ve got to wait. It s a matter of life and death. 
 Take your hand off that rope ! " 
 
 The man, startled by the dominant voice, involuntarily 
 obeyed, and Helen reached the steps almost fainting. 
 
 " There, my poor child, there ! " said Mrs. Sidney. 
 " Good-by, Pleasant." 
 
 Then, as the train pulled out, she turned to the conductor 
 with a long sigh. " I m much obliged to you, sir," she said, 
 with a wholesome smile. " Perhaps you d better give the 
 lady an arm. Now we ve got to make connections at 
 Chicago." 
 
 The suddenness of the departure stamped it all with un 
 reality, and as the afternoon wore away they seemed 
 plunging deeper and deeper into strangeness. Mrs. Sidney
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 65 
 
 soon fell asleep in her seat. Heroic action and profound 
 rest divided her time. There were no moments left for nerves 
 and dreams. Helen stayed awake with her head pressed 
 against the window sash, hearing now the mysterious whis 
 pers of the great cotton-woods as they approached and 
 passed them, now the sound of peepers from some pool, 
 following on the night wind. She thought of the forlorn 
 home she was leaving; of her husband, crestfallen, worried 
 in business, and diffident in heart. Gradually the light grew 
 paler, mists crept along the shallows, spirits beckoned and 
 saluted and waved farewells. They seemed to call mes 
 sages to her, and she sent many in return to the lonely ones 
 left behind. Who knows but that that night the phantom 
 couriers passed into the bare chamber of a little farm 
 house and kissed the occupants while they slept, and strewed 
 their pillows with amaranth and asphodel, the flowers that 
 are ever blooming side by side in the melancholy Paradise of 
 human love?
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 day after Agnes last long conversation with her 
 father, Dr. Sidney had come home late in the afternoon 
 and had gone at once to his room. Agnes left him unwill 
 ingly in the evening to go out with Fred and Beatrice. Her 
 uneasiness grew upon her until she excused herself in the 
 midst of the entertainment and came home alone. To her 
 alarm she found her father s horse standing still hitched to 
 the buggy where the patient animal had been left hours be 
 fore by its usually careful master. After caring for the 
 neglected beast, Agnes looked into her father s room. He 
 was still sleeping heavily but restlessly, as he had been 
 when she left earlier in the evening. Four days later she 
 sent the telegram to her mother and sister to come. 
 
 Fred Sidney met his aunt and cousin at the station and 
 drove them to the house. Mrs. Sidney had taken off her 
 wraps on the way to the house, and, as the horse stopped at 
 the office door, she took an apron from the satchel and tied 
 it about her waist. Then she walked into the office, equipped 
 for nursing. 
 
 As Agnes saw the familiar figure coming quickly through 
 the door toward the bed-room where she waited by her 
 father s side, she seemed to awaken from a nightmare; but 
 it came back upon her, as she looked down on her father s 
 face, which the grim sculptor was chiseling closer each hour 
 to the death s head we all carry about with us concealed. 
 
 " Mamma is here," she said, kissing his forehead before 
 she went to meet her mother. 
 
 She said but the one word, " Meningitis," as she kissed 
 Mrs. Sidney, and then stole out of the room to help Helen 
 with the baby. 
 
 When the two sisters returned, Mrs. Sidney was giving 
 
 66
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 67 
 
 her husband cracked ice. He had settled back more easily 
 upon his pillows, and there was a shade of contentment be 
 neath the ever-recurring expressions of suffering. 
 
 " You will see to things now, Kate," he said pres 
 ently, seeking to turn his head toward his wife, but failing 
 in the attempt. " I can t I can t any more." He closed 
 his eyes, then opened them toward Agnes, and added : " And 
 my poor little girl " 
 
 He did not finish, but she knew that he wished to speak in 
 her favor, and his effort to do so broke the girl s heart. 
 
 Sooner or later the time comes when fate brands us. Like 
 dumb, driven cattle, Agnes shrank with mortal agony and 
 terror, felt herself held under the iron that burns with the 
 fire which is not quenched, quivered forth marked with the 
 stamp time cannot wear away, and passed on into the in 
 numerable herd. 
 
 Very soon after the arrival of Mrs. Sidney and Helen the 
 terrible spasms of meningitis began, but it was not until a 
 week later that a physician said quietly, when leaving, " He 
 will not live out this night." 
 
 Agnes slept through the early part of the night. Mrs. 
 Sidney had promised to call her in case of a change. Toward 
 midnight she heard her sister s voice summoning her. Agnes 
 responded at once. 
 
 Helen was standing at the foot of the stairs, a candle in 
 her hand. As she lifted it to light the way, Agnes observed 
 the dignity and quiet of the waiting figure. The tenderness 
 and transfiguration in the dark face looking up at the un 
 happy girl irresistibly recalled Dr. Sidney himself. 
 
 " Is it over ? " Agnes asked. 
 
 " No," replied Helen gently. " I have had a wonderful 
 hour with him. I am sorry that you must see him as he is 
 now, not as he has been until now." She paused and said 
 earnestly, " It is but a struggle of the poor body now. His 
 spirit is at rest." 
 
 They went into the chamber and Agnes approached the 
 bedside. One of her father s hands was near her own. Helen
 
 68 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Mabie had inserted a handkerchief, before it clenched, that 
 the nails might not cut the flesh. 
 
 " How merciful it is," said Agnes, " that he is not con 
 scious under this. Dr. Crocker said he was not." 
 
 She sat down near the others, and the three women waited. 
 
 " Don t you think you should have let Dr. Quinn stay all 
 night, mother? " asked Helen. " He was ready to do so." 
 
 " There are others who need him more to-night." 
 
 They heard the timepiece as it ticked steadily on. 
 
 " I believe your father s aunt Aunt Uncle Samuel s 
 wife died with spinal meningitis," said Mrs. Sidney. 
 " What was her first name, Helen ? " 
 
 " I am thinking. Was it Edna? " 
 
 " No, it wasn t Edna, but I think it began with E." 
 
 " There is a man outside the window," said Agnes, sud 
 denly. " I saw his head through the blinds." 
 
 " It is only that young reporter from The Times" 
 answered Helen. She rose as she spoke and went out of the 
 room. 
 
 As she left it, Dr. Sidney s face relaxed. He moved his 
 arms a little, and seemed trying to speak. 
 
 Agnes sprang to his side, and leaned over close to his lips. 
 He was whispering. 
 
 " Her name was Eunice." 
 
 " Mamma ! " said Agnes, in a voice of anguish, " Dr. 
 Crocker was wrong. He is conscious." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney was already at her husband s side. 
 
 " Can you understand me, Stephen ? " she asked, bending 
 down. 
 
 His eyes answered her. 
 
 " I have been thinking of the smell of the little wild things, 
 and of the way the poplars swayed in the wind, and how the 
 dragon-flies darted over the trout stream, and and how 
 happy we were." 
 
 The brilliant eyes were fixed upon her. 
 
 " And I ve been thinking of the little home as it was at 
 first with just three rooms, and how we loved it. We loved
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 69 
 
 it. There are many mansions a house of many mansions 
 and a place is prepared for us, Stephen. But oh, we 
 loved it! " 
 
 He tried to move his hand toward her. 
 
 " And then the little baby came, and " 
 
 Agnes crept away and joined Helen in the kitchen. Time 
 had gone back now. A quarter of a century had slipped 
 away from her parents minds. She had no place in that 
 love which, with all her life-long knowledge of her parents 
 devotion to each other, had just come upon her as an 
 apocalypse. 
 
 When the sisters returned to the bed-room, Dr. Sidney 
 appeared to be sleeping, but his breath sounded loud and 
 labored. Mrs. Sidney was sitting in a chair by the bed 
 side. They had hold of each other s hands, but she, too, was 
 sleeping. As the girls entered, she sat up with a start. 
 " Where have you been ? " she asked. 
 
 Helen answered in a low voice. " In the kitchen with the 
 window open. I wanted to get a breath of fresh air." 
 
 " You wanted to get what? " 
 
 Helen spoke with a dry throat : " I said I wanted to get 
 a breash of freth air." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney laughed. 
 
 "Mother," said Helen painfully, "how can you?" 
 
 " You said breash of freth air. You left the sh off 
 of * fresh and put it on breath. Oh, how can I? How 
 can I?" 
 
 Helen sat down with a heartsick look in her face. 
 
 " Helen," said Mrs. Sidney, after a minute, " I m made 
 that way. It s terrible. I can t help it. When my own 
 mother was dying, she asked me for a glass of water, and 
 when I brought it to her she couldn t see very well. I be 
 lieve it was the blindness of death. She put up her hand in 
 a queer way, and said, What is it?* And I laughed! / 
 laughed! " 
 
 There was a long silence, until at last Agnes said, " I 
 think he is moving."
 
 70 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 The three women drew near the bed. 
 
 Dr. Sidney opened his eyes as if with a violent effort. He 
 moved one finger upward as he spoke, and he said in a thick 
 voice, " I say live ! not die live ! " Again the finger 
 pointed. 
 
 In a moment the heavy breathing was resumed, ever slower. 
 They stood motionless, listening and waiting for the beating 
 of the heart to stop. Slower and slower came the labored 
 breaths there was a pause another breath and the wait 
 the wait until the end of time, the wait. 
 
 As Mrs. Sidney raised her face, her daughters turned 
 away. 
 
 " He has gone to his long home," said the widow ; she 
 placed one hand over the sightless eyes, closing them tenderly, 
 while she placed the other hand beneath the chin. 
 
 "Helen!" 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 " Bring me a towel. Agnes ? " 
 
 " I am here, mother." 
 
 " Go into the kitchen and get the ironing-board. Your 
 father s clean clothes are laid out in the closet. Bring me 
 also his best broadcloth suit. Now, Helen, carefully." 
 
 Agnes turned away from the room with a sickening heart. 
 She did her duties, and waited to be told of more. Mrs. 
 Sidney went to the mantel-piece and poured something into 
 a glass. 
 
 " Helen and I will not need you any longer," she said. 
 " You had better get in bed with your Aunt Mattie, but first 
 drink this." 
 
 Agnes took the glass and drank what her mother had pre 
 pared. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney took the girl s head between her hands and 
 kissed her. " Try to sleep," she said. " He shall not come 
 back to us, but we shall go to him." 
 
 Agnes went out of the room and closed the door behind 
 her. As she was going through the dining-room she heard 
 the office-bell ring. She went to the door and asked who was
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 71 
 
 there. A voice said, " I am from The Times." The office 
 clock struck three as she answered, " Dr. Sidney is dead." 
 
 Then she walked back slowly through the dimly-lighted 
 offices. The gray afghan was thrown back from the back- 
 office lounge, as though her father had just left it. There 
 on the table lay the volume of Cowper. She took the book 
 up in her hand, and it fell open. Her father s pencil marks 
 drew her attention to the lines, 
 
 " One sheltered hare 
 Has never heard the sanguinary yell 
 Of cruel man, exulting in her woe." 
 
 She closed the book and put it back again, and went up 
 stairs to her aunt s room. Aunt Mattie was sitting up in 
 bed, hushing to sleep Helen s baby, who was lying in a cradle 
 close to the bed. " Who is it? " she asked as she heard the 
 steps coming. 
 
 " It is I Agnes. Papa died just before the clock struck 
 three." 
 
 " Can I do anything? " 
 
 " I think not. Isn t there something to do here ? Shall I 
 keep the baby ? " She went in, stood by the cradle and looked 
 down at the flower-like sleep of Helen s child. 
 
 " The baby is all right now. It was very kind of you to 
 think of taking him. I m sorry for you, Agnes." She put 
 out her hand and the girl pressed it. 
 
 Agnes did not get into bed with her aunt. She went into 
 her own room and looked at herself in the glass. She was 
 startled that her face had not changed. 
 
 Then, for the first time since she had heard her father s 
 words, " You must see to things now, Kate. I can t," she 
 forced herself to face the judge who would never pardon 
 her own soul. 
 
 " He wanted mother. He needed her. She spoke the 
 truth. I thought I loved him best, but she was necessary 
 here to take care of him, and to take care of me. I wanted 
 to get rid of her. It was not to make him happy it was to
 
 72 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 get my own way. I didn t take care of him the way she did. 
 It is I who have killed him" 
 
 She walked to the window and opened it. The ground was 
 covered with snow the first, light, unexpected fall of the 
 season. Far out in the still morning she heard the whistle 
 and rumble of a train. There came to her the words from 
 Lear: 
 
 " I might have saved her; now she s gone forever. 
 She s dead dead as earth." 
 
 She sat still looking out into the morning until Helen 
 came up, went to her boy, and after a time approached her 
 door. 
 
 " It is all done," she said, entering. " He looks very 
 beautiful," and she sat down by her sister. 
 
 " Where is mother ? " 
 
 " She is down with him." 
 
 After a long time Agnes said, watching her sister, 
 " What are you thinking about, Helen ? " 
 
 Helen raised her head. " I was thinking of the wild 
 flowers he used to bring me, and of how I never thanked him. 
 He spelled my name in forget-me-nots, one summer, and I 
 didn t pay any attention to it. I used to keep him waiting 
 in the cold when he called to get me with his buggy. I 
 never knew how to put myself in sympathy with him as well 
 as you did, Agnes. I think it was because he was away in 
 the war when I was little, and I was a little afraid of him 
 when he came back." 
 
 Agnes was silent. She looked at her sister and analyzed 
 her grief. " She feels remorse," she thought, " but she is 
 innocent. She can talk of it. There is no human soul whom 
 I can tell." 
 
 Presently she crept into bed and lay there cold and calm. 
 It was the first night since she could remember that she had 
 lain down to sleep without saying a prayer which she had 
 learned in childhood. The Garden of den was shut behind 
 her, and the angel with the flaming sword guarded the gate.
 
 PART II 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 TF one had walked into the Sidney house the day following 
 Dr. Sidney s burial he would have found everything going 
 on in much the same way as usual. Mrs. Sidney had opened 
 the windows, and fresh air and sunshine surrounded her 
 while she worked. Agnes again had filled the house with 
 flowers shaggy autumnal flowers, whose pungent and woody 
 smells were fast conquering the faint hot-house odors linger 
 ing from the day before; and her pupils were back again 
 reciting to her, as they had done regularly till her father 
 took to his bed. Aunt Mattie s quiet was as impregnable 
 as ever. Only the presence of Helen and the baby was out 
 of the common. That Dr. Sidney himself was absent would 
 scarcely have attracted notice. He was often away from 
 home at meal-time and in the night, and though he never 
 would come again Mrs. Sidney had no intention of permitting 
 life to succumb to death. 
 
 One who knew the family intimately would, in the course 
 of some weeks, have begun to notice changes in Agnes and 
 her mother. They were hardly discernible to the ordinary 
 eye. Mrs. Sidney was more active even than she had been 
 before ; she read her Bible still more, catching a moment now 
 and then to pick up a new verse or incident, which she would 
 meditate upon while working. And her Biblical quotations 
 had undergone the same tempering process that had softened 
 almost imperceptibly her uncompromising nature. She spent 
 less time with Elijah beneath the juniper tree, and with 
 Jeremiah in the pit. She rarely marched to battle with 
 Joshua. But she walked often with Moses up and down the 
 mountains of the wilderness, she mused with David in the 
 valleys and pastures. Every evening Mrs. Sidney led the 
 
 73
 
 74 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 family prayers, as her husband used to do, and her daughters 
 wondered that she could keep her face serene and her voice 
 steady. After they had said good-night, and she was left 
 alone downstairs in her bed-room, she would take up her 
 Bible again for her solitary devotions. It always opened 
 of itself, at a page in Ezekiel, and she always cried as she 
 read, 
 
 Son of man, behold, I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes 
 with a stroke; yet neither shalt thou mourn nor weep, neither shall thy 
 tears run down. Forbear to cry, make no mourning for the dead. 
 
 So I spake unto the people in the morning, and at even my wife died; 
 and I did in the morning as I was commanded. 
 
 Agnes was beginning to find herself less in sympathy with 
 many of her acquaintances, but she was coming into touch 
 with a widening circle of friends toward whom she but re 
 cently had been unsympathetic. She was generally cheerful, 
 but she no longer had the insolent cheerfulness which has 
 not known grief. 
 
 One day about a fortnight after the doctor s death Mrs. 
 Sidney and her daughters were sitting at the table eating 
 the midday meal. There had been a long silence and Mrs. 
 Sidney s face had relapsed into its occasional expression of 
 grief. But she knew she must not allow herself to think 
 too much, and she roused herself abruptly and looked 
 toward Agnes. " Haven t you a letter there, Agnes ? Who s 
 it from? " 
 
 " From Miriam Cass." 
 
 " Why don t you read it? Is she the girl who s going on 
 a sailing vessel? " 
 
 " She s gone." Agnes rebelled at this catechism, not 
 realizing, as her mother did, that a counter-irritant is a good 
 remedy for grief. 
 
 "Who s she gone with?" persisted Mrs. Sidney, trying 
 to keep her mind on the subject. 
 
 " She s gone with her father," replied Agnes shortly. Then 
 she added hastily, anticipating the next question, " Her 
 mother died when she was little."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 75 
 
 " It s a great misfortune for a girl to be left without a 
 mother." Mrs. Sidney heaved a weary sigh and took up a 
 glass of water. 
 
 Agnes watched her mother with rising impatience. Pres 
 ently she said irritably, 
 
 " Mamma, I do wish you wouldn t gulp that way when you 
 drink. It seems as if I should go crazy. I ve tried my best 
 to keep still, but I just can t do it." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s face involuntarily hardened into reproof, 
 then voluntarily softened. Agnes was surprised and morti 
 fied when her mother finally spoke, saying with an unex 
 pected smile, " Well, I ll try and not do it, and I hope you ll 
 never know what it is to be as thirsty as I am. Sometimes 
 it seems as if I could lap up the water like Gideon s men." 
 
 There was a little pause. Then Agnes said, " That was 
 nice in you, mother. Excuse me for speaking the way I did," 
 and she left the room and went upstairs. 
 
 There, amidst the mementos of her old Winston life, she 
 opened Miriam s letter. Her friend had passed through 
 Winston during Dr. Sidney s illness, and was now on the 
 water. The letter had been mailed from New York. It was 
 a plain note, written in the self -unconsciousness of Miriam s 
 deeper moods. It told about her mother s death and burial 
 at sea and the impression it had made upon her as a child. 
 When she came to speak of Agnes grief there was a quiet 
 in her words which recalled the hand of death itself. It 
 was the only one of all the Betters Agnes had received which 
 attempted no word of consolation, and it was the one which 
 brought it most, because everything she wrote was simple 
 and full of love. 
 
 When Agnes came down into the kitchen later to help her 
 mother with the work, Mrs. Sidney was washing dishes. The 
 wiping of them was left for Agnes. The girl often had been 
 touched of late by her mother s efforts to divide the labor 
 so that the daughter s hands might be spared the rougher 
 work. 
 
 As soon as the dishes were put away. Mrs. Sidney brought
 
 76 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 out the remains of a roast of mutton. " We had better cut 
 this up for a meat-pie to-morrow," she said. " Then we can 
 put on the bone for a soup to-night." 
 
 " Do let s have a change to-morrow ! " Agnes exclaimed 
 impulsively. " I can t eat mutton another day, really. Let s 
 kill a chicken." 
 
 " A live chicken keeps better than a dead sheep," an 
 swered Mrs. Sidney sententiously. " Those chickens are all 
 we ve got to depend upon for fresh meat now, till they kill 
 another calf at the farm. I shan t run in debt one cent from 
 now on. We ve got to pay as we go, and if we can t pay, 
 we ll eat beans that s all." 
 
 Agnes caught at the opportunity to suggest something 
 she had had in mind for some days back. " It seems to me 
 that we are trying to carry too much, mamma. We have this 
 place and the farm to keep going. Why can t we sell the 
 farm, and invest the money more profitably? The farm just 
 runs itself and doesn t bring us in anything but worry." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney stopped working and turned toward her 
 daughter. " I d worry a good deal more if we didn t have 
 a farm running itself," she returned. " If it comes to selling 
 any place, it will be this house. There s nothing like having 
 a piece of land in a good farming country to fall back on. 
 Banks fail, buildings burn up or rot down, and nobody knows 
 how long a business will be profitable ; but a few acres of land 
 will always raise potatoes and beans enough to feed us, and 
 keep hens and cows and sheep enough to clothe us. You can 
 spin and I can weave if we have to." 
 
 Agnes smiled unwillingly. " I d rather earn my clothes 
 singing or tutoring, mother. I think we d have more than 
 if we sheared the sheep and spun and wove our garments." 
 
 " Don t grow up with the idea of depending entirely on 
 other people, Agnes," Mrs. Sidney replied decidedly. " Much 
 as we love this home, it doesn t support us. We support it, 
 and please God we can keep it. But your father always 
 said the old farm where his father and grandfather lived 
 was the place to rely on; and my mother used to tell me, as
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 77 
 
 long ago as I remember, Don t you ever marry a man unless 
 he has got land, Kate. It s the only thing to be sure of in 
 this world ; and don t you ever let him mortgage it ! She 
 was a wise woman. When you have mortgaged anything, 
 you re improving other people s property at your own ex 
 pense. If you can t keep things going, sell em outright 
 before they run down, but a person with brains and self- 
 denial can always live on a farm and keep it thrifty. So we 
 will keep the farm, I guess." 
 
 She beamed upon Agnes for a moment, and then turned 
 back to her work. " Don t repine at the farm mutton, 
 either. You may be thankful enough to have your meat 
 provided. I m going to poach an egg for Helen to-night, 
 but the rest of us will have a good soup." 
 
 " Don t cook anything extra for me please," begged 
 Helen with desperate earnestness. " I don t know what s 
 going to become of us all. Papa has helped us so much 
 lately. I don t see how we can do without him, and oh, we 
 ought to be in a position to help you ! " She broke down 
 and began to cry. 
 
 " You ll rile your baby s milk, ! said her mother, not paus 
 ing in her work. " It isn t necessary he should be troubled 
 about his food. I guess the Lord will provide for His own." 
 
 Helen still continued to cry silently. 
 
 " Control yourself, Helen," her mother said again more 
 brusquely. " Haven t you got any grit ? " 
 
 " I used to have some, mother, but it s gone. I m tired 
 out. Hope long deferred maketh the heart sick." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney faced about toward her daughter and eyed 
 her watchfully while she wiped her hands on a hanging towel. 
 Then she glanced about the clean and tidy kitchen, felt of 
 some ears of corn which hung in golden rows above the 
 mantel-piece and sat down. 
 
 " You run in the sitting-room, Agnes, and bring me my 
 sewing," she said to her younger daughter, and then as 
 Agnes disappeared through the door she turned to Helen. 
 " You may think you are done for, Nellie," she said not
 
 78 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ungently, " but you re just at the end of your first wind. 
 You won t be able to keep up at the pace you ve been going 
 kindergartens and Italian concerts but you can keep up 
 a moderate gait." 
 
 She looked up as Agnes came back with her work, and 
 took it from her, continuing her talk in a different manner. 
 " Before the doctor died, you were all used up because things 
 were so bad then. Now you look back on that time and think 
 you were pretty well off. Just let that teach you a lesson. The 
 time may come when you ll look back to this day and think 
 you were a queen." 
 
 " Don t, mother ! " cried Helen. " Things are bad enough 
 now. I didn t tell you the worst of Pleasant s letter, but he 
 says the pigs aren t doing well. They ve got the scurvy and 
 he s afraid he ll lose them all." 
 
 " He won t if he does as I say," replied Mrs. Sidney, im 
 patience struggling in her face. " Why didn t you tell me 
 that before? You write a letter this very minute. Tell him 
 to wash the young ones off in kerosene in the morning, and 
 with soap and water at night. Or else he can put the kero 
 sene on at night and wash them off with soap and water in 
 the morning. It won t do the old ones any harm either. But 
 mind you tell him to be sure and not get the oil in their ears. 
 Don t you forget that. If he does, they ll hang their heads 
 around for a while and then die. I ve seen them. Dear me, 
 how I do wish I was there and could see to it myself ! " 
 
 Helen arose and went into the sitting-room. During the 
 cool days following Dr. Sidney s death they had formed the 
 habit of sitting in the kitchen and thus economizing fuel. 
 There was a return of summer now, but the habit remained. 
 
 " She s weak, poor child, and can t help herself," said 
 Mrs. Sidney to Agnes. " This has all been terrible for her 
 so soon after the baby came, but there s no excuse for you. 
 Don t you let me see you get down in the mouth." 
 
 " I m not down in the mouth, mamma." 
 
 " Why did you send Babbie Monks away in the middle of 
 her lesson, yesterday ? "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 79 
 
 " I got to thinking about papa, and I just couldn t give 
 it to her." Agnes spoke in a trembling voice and turned 
 toward the window. 
 
 "Why weren t you thinking about cube-root? That s 
 what you re being paid for." 
 
 The girl s quivering lips parted in a slight smile as she 
 looked back toward her mother. An intuition of the policy 
 behind these sallies came to her. " Mamma, I haven t words 
 to praise you," she said almost tenderly. 
 
 Then, with a certain embarrassment at her unwonted atti 
 tude toward her mother, she added quickly, pinching a leaf 
 of the rose geranium which stood with some other newly- 
 potted plants near the window, " I was all right while I was 
 teaching her. But this was when she took a long time work 
 ing out an example by herself, and I had to wait and think." 
 
 " The next time think that a cheerful heart doeth good, 
 but a broken spirit drieth the bones," returned Mrs. Sidney 
 sagely. " How much do you think you can make a week 
 now, with the offer they ve made you for singing? " 
 
 " About ten dollars, if I take the church money. You 
 know papa never wanted me to." 
 
 " Neither do I," commented Mrs. Sidney, " but the Lord 
 has put it upon us. Forty dollars a month. Many families 
 live on less than that. It won t buy us a stalled ox, but I 
 guess we can get a dinner of herbs on it." She interrupted 
 herself to remind Agnes that the sweet marjoram should be 
 picked and dried, and then went on : " We ll have to eke out 
 something for Helen. I never knew how things were till I 
 got out there. They ve got a mortgage on the farm. I had 
 to worm it out of them. I don t know what I shall do about 
 it yet." 
 
 Agnes made no reply. The change in her situation, which 
 she now suddenly realized when her mother referred to her 
 as the main support of the family, stunned her. Yet she 
 felt exhilaration in the shock. She was to take care of her 
 mother and sister and aunt and all the helpless children. The 
 faintness of the struggle was to come later.
 
 80 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " It s a good thing your father didn t leave any debts," 
 said Mrs. Sidney again. " I ve got enough on hand now 
 to clear up what few things there are. We won t collect a 
 quarter of what s on his books. Fred paid for the funeral 
 expenses out of his savings. That s got to be made up. 
 He ll need it to get married on. He was in here while you 
 were upstairs. He s just got a letter from Beatrice Mott, 
 and they re hurrying up with the wedding at the lake. They 
 have given up having a large one out of respect to your 
 father." 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 Then Mrs. Sidney went on. " Dr. Quinn is going to buy 
 your father s practice, and he ll take Peggy, too." 
 
 " Oh, don t sell Peggy ! " cried Agnes. " What would old 
 Peggy think? After she went through the war with papa, 
 and then to sell her only child ! " 
 
 " I know it cuts to the quick," answered Mrs. Sidney, 
 wiping her eyes with the corner of her apron. " I m glad 
 it s going to be Quinn. You can trust Quinn. He s a little 
 slow of speech, but so was Moses. He ll have a room here, 
 too, and I ll board him." 
 
 " Oh, that s good ! " Agnes felt her load lightening now 
 that she saw some addition to her own earnings in their 
 income. 
 
 " He offered to buy the library, but I shan t sell that. He 
 can use it, but we ll keep the books. Maybe you ll marry a 
 doctor." 
 
 " I won t marry Quinn, if that s what you mean." 
 
 " I guess Quinn don t want you. He didn t say anything 
 about you just the mare. I guess we ll get along. We 
 aren t foundered yet." 
 
 She put her hand in the work-basket and handed Agnes 
 her thimble, which suggestion the girl accepted and went 
 into the sitting-room for her share of the sewing. During 
 the conversation with her mother the thought of Donald 
 Ballington had come repeatedly to her mind, and she appre 
 ciated the fact that now that a marriage with him might be
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 81 
 
 an ignoble temptation, her mother had not mentioned him. 
 Helen had finished her note, and was nursing her baby when 
 her sister came into the room. Agnes sat down on the sofa 
 near her, and took up a black skirt which her mother had cut 
 out for her from one of her own. 
 
 " Agnes," said Helen presently, " there s something I 
 want to say to you before I go. I want to caution you to be 
 very kind and considerate to mother. She s a wonderful 
 woman in keeping up, but we don t either of us realize what 
 this has been to her. I know you don t see it, but at heart 
 she s very sensitive. Won t you try to be more affectionate 
 to her? " 
 
 " I do try, Helen. I don t know why it is. I can t be 
 affectionate to mamma. I just can t make myself. I said 
 before I came downstairs this morning that I d go and kiss 
 her when I came into the room, and I stood in the kitchen- 
 door two or three minutes trying to make myself go up to 
 her. She turned around and asked me why I was waiting, 
 and, oh, Helen, she didn t ask it crossly. She was just sur 
 prised and kind. When she turned away again, I felt as if 
 she knew what I was trying to do, and I couldn t do it. It 
 was just the same at the dinner- table. When she was so nice 
 to me about my miserable fault-finding over her drinking, I 
 wanted to throw my arms around her neck, or go down 
 on my knees, and so, of course, walked upstairs. What on 
 earth is the matter with me? " 
 
 Helen Mabie sighed. 
 
 After a little while, Agnes took the initiative with her. 
 " Helen," she said, reddening, " do you think respect is 
 enough to marry on? " 
 
 " It depends. I wouldn t have said so once." 
 
 " Do you think a woman could be just as happy as though 
 she fell in love ? " 
 
 " Happier, if she d only know it. But she wouldn t know 
 it. So I think she d be cheated out of something. Girls 
 always think there s some romance coming, and they ve a 
 right to their castles in the air."
 
 82 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes sewed on for some time without speaking. 
 
 Then she said, " If a man is a good man, is that enough? 
 Do you think it makes any difference if he isn t her equal 
 mentally ? " 
 
 Helen laid down her baby tenderly, arranged her dress, 
 and stood looking away from Agnes as she answered, " It 
 makes all the difference in the world. Don t ever do that. 
 It isn t possible for a woman to be married to a man beneath 
 her intellectually without henpecking him. No amount of 
 self -discipline can prevent it." 
 
 She took up a bit of crocheting, some soft work with a 
 baby sweetness in its color and form, and the room was quiet 
 again. 
 
 Agnes was the first to remember that Mrs. Sidney had 
 been left alone in the kitchen, and she suggested to Helen 
 that they take their work and join their mother. 
 
 As Helen collected her zephyrs, she said hesitatingly, 
 " When mother came to us, she told me something about Mr. 
 Ballington. Do you are you " 
 
 " No," said Agnes, rising and turning away. " I think I 
 never shall marry, Helen. Anyway, a woman can t depend 
 upon marriage to form her life for her. She must do it her 
 self. I am going to try to be good to mother and take care 
 of her." She waited, then added in a broken voice, " There s 
 nothing I long for so much as to be good to mother. My 
 future can look after itself."
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 second week in November Helen Mabie went back to 
 the plains. A young man with spectacles and sandy 
 hair sat in the doctor s office, used his horse and buggy, and 
 ate his meals with the doctor s family. Agnes taught daily 
 and sang in the church on Sundays. The family managed 
 to get along upon her earnings, the little income which came 
 from Dr. Quinn, and the produce of the farm. There was 
 also a deposit in the bank which grew slowly as Mrs. Sidney 
 took in hand the collecting of the doctor s outstanding bills. 
 
 Agnes now had given up all hope of returning to college, 
 but since she had tasted the salt of adversity her thirst for 
 knowledge had become unquenchable. She gratified the crav 
 ing in her scant leisure by solitary study, as her father had 
 done. She, too, began to rise early, read or write in quiet 
 and loneliness, walk about meditatively in the back garden 
 among the stripped vines and bushes. She found her father s 
 books and papers marked, as if definitely for her. And there 
 began to grow up during that winter, which to outsiders 
 appeared to be so barren and forlorn, a mental and moral 
 companionship with her father. 
 
 Another mind, too, was exerting an increasing influence 
 upon Agnes. Miriam s letters had grown frequent, and 
 Agnes turned more and more earnestly to the stimulating 
 mental outlook which her friend kept persistently before her. 
 The correspondence put a sustained glow of eagerness into 
 her otherwise hard-working and introspective existence. 
 
 A few days before Christmas, in answering a ring of the 
 door-bell, Agnes found herself face to face with Donald 
 Ballington. It was the first time she had met him since June. 
 He had answered her dismissal with a kind note, and had sent 
 her some lilies with a card of sympathy shortly after Dr.
 
 84 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Sidney s death. What had touched the girl more was the 
 memory of Donald among a group of Kent men who stood 
 on the walk with bared heads as her father s casket was car 
 ried from the house. 
 
 As they met each other, now, each recognized at once the 
 difference in their relation. The intense sympathy which he 
 felt for Agnes relieved his manner from bashfulness, and she, 
 now out in a world where all are striving, achieving, failing, 
 was less conscious of herself and her effect upon him. 
 
 After they had talked on impersonal matters, he said with 
 a recurrence of timidity, " Like all men who want something 
 very much, I have kept a little hope that I might get it after 
 all. I have no reason to speak of love to you again. It might 
 be possible, however, that among the other changes grief 
 has brought you, you might have come to feel differently 
 about me." 
 
 Agnes was moved. Yet, at his words, the kindliness in her 
 heart for him froze upon her lips. She felt herself harden 
 ing once more into the willful, capricious, but honorable girl 
 who had repulsed him the summer before. 
 
 " I wish I could love you," she said. " I am afraid there 
 is something wrong with me that I don t ; but in order to 
 marry you I ought to feel something for you which I do not." 
 
 " I won t urge you," he replied gravely, " I did not come 
 here to do that. But there is a saying, you know, that man 
 loves before marriage, and woman after. I sometimes have 
 thought that with a woman of your spirit there might be 
 some truth in the latter part of the statement." 
 
 " Still, I could not take the step feeling as I do," she 
 answered. " I must do with myself what I can, and make the 
 most of my life here." She looked up with a smile that meant 
 to be brave, but was only pitiful. 
 
 His heart ached for her, but how could he help her? He 
 looked down at the floor and waited for her to speak again. 
 
 Presently she resumed, with a frankness that relieved the 
 situation and placed them at once upon a basis of friendship. 
 " During the last week an opportunity has presented itself
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 85 
 
 which my mother and I are considering. We have not yet 
 spoken of it to anyone else. Would you care to hear? " 
 
 " I should thank you ! " 
 
 " Mr. Stoddard, from the Schubert Conservatory of Music 
 in New York, has been visiting in Kent. He heard me sing in 
 church two summers ago and remembered my voice. He was 
 interested in it at that time, but knew that my parents pre 
 ferred a quiet life for me. Now that I am obliged to earn my 
 living, he felt at liberty to come to see me. I liked his 
 straightforwardness. He said he had heard better voices, 
 but never so good a voice in combination with so good a mind. 
 He compared me not unfavorably with Caroline Holt, whom 
 he brought out in oratorio two years ago. He has made me 
 a generous offer. It is to teach me for three years, and then 
 to bring me out in oratorio. He offers to take me into his 
 own family, and to get me a church position in New York 
 at once with a salary of eight hundred dollars a year ; and he 
 will ask me nothing for my lessons until I appear in ora 
 torio." 
 
 Agnes paused. Donald said nothing. 
 
 " Of course," Agnes continued, " if it were anything but 
 oratorio my mother never would consent, or if I were to go 
 among strangers. Although I am anxious for the oppor 
 tunity, both for the money and because I love to sing, I 
 should not go without her approval. I shall not leave any 
 way until the new term of the Conservatory opens in Febru 
 ary. My mother is to decide before that time." 
 
 The solemnity which hangs about decisions that are to 
 turn the course of lives was upon them both as she finished. 
 For a little time he did not speak, but only looked at her, 
 loving the erect, strong pose he knew so well, but which now 
 was suffused with something he never had seen in it before 
 humility which softened without weakening its vigor. 
 
 " I hope that whatever you decide will be for the best," he 
 said at last as he rose and stood looking unhappily toward 
 her. 
 
 Agnes, too, rose. She was oppressed with a feeling that
 
 86 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 this parting meant the severing of another link that held 
 her to her girlhood. Real grief and affection were in the face 
 she lifted. She drew a short breath and then stood quiet, 
 her hands loosely clasped before her as she waited for his 
 good-by. 
 
 " You will not be at your cousin s wedding, I suppose? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " No, we are not going." 
 
 " I hear from Miss Mott, that, when they return here, 
 there is to be a supper party to open their new home. Pos 
 sibly you will be present? " 
 
 " Possibly." 
 
 " I shall hope to see you there, then." 
 
 His hand was on the door. Then, turning, he said with a 
 dignity which she never had seen in him before. " This is 
 my good-by to you as a lover. But I am your friend now, 
 and always. If I ever can help you, command me. I want to 
 say to you, also, that I feel deeply your kindness to me to 
 day. I thought as I saw you sitting there that I never saw 
 before so womanly a grace and dignity. God bless you ! "
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 and Beatrice were married soon after New Year s. 
 Agnes heard repeatedly from Beatrice meantime. She 
 wrote gayly of her trousseau, of the house General Mott was 
 furnishing in Kent for their country home, of her quarrel 
 with Fred over his refusal to leave work long enough at this 
 time for a European trip, of her concession for the nonce 
 in order to bring him to terms when once his wife. There 
 were occasional flighty references to Tom, to Donald s admi 
 ration for Agnes, and now and then some innuendos respecting 
 Ferdinand Ballington. On Christmas Day the letter which 
 came contained a twenty-dollar bill with the words pinned to 
 it : " Buy yourself some knickknack and think of Bee." But 
 with all the good-will and unrestraint of the letters there was 
 never a repetition of the intimate confidence which Agnes on 
 one occasion had known from Beatrice. Indeed, since the day 
 Beatrice had cried and looked her love for Fred against her 
 will, Agnes never had seen her off guard, and she wondered 
 at the reserve underneath Beatrice s apparent candor and 
 carelessness. 
 
 Fred and Beatrice went to New York after their wedding, 
 and an unusual quiet settled down in Kent. Agnes did not 
 notice it, for she was absorbed in her work and study. She 
 wrote twice a week to Miriam Cass, narrating her life and 
 thoughts and hopes with that simplicity and honesty which 
 she had shown to Miriam alone of all the world. 
 
 One evening early in February Agnes was attending choir 
 rehearsal at the church. She was standing in the loft with 
 the other singers, waiting for the organist to strike into the 
 last anthem, when she noticed the vestibule door open and a 
 man s dark figure enter and quietly take a seat in the rear of 
 the church. Although the auditorium was so dimly lighted 
 
 87
 
 88 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 by the few gas jets in the choir that the man s face was in 
 shadow, she felt an instant shock of recognition. She sang 
 through her recitative in a voice that seemed to her to be 
 telling the curious dread and happiness which she felt, and 
 it was a relief to her when other voices swelled and covered 
 her own. It was not unusual for escorts to call for the sing 
 ers, and no one in the loft gave more than a passing glance 
 at the man near the door. 
 
 When the rehearsal broke up he rose and came forward to 
 meet Agnes. As her eyes rested upon the advancing figure 
 there swept across her memory the odor of linden blossoms. 
 She saw a man standing by the pillars of the Ballington 
 house, looking after her and Donald as they followed Miriam 
 and Tom down the path to the gate. 
 
 " Why, Mr. Ballington ! " said Agnes as they met in the 
 aisle, and she could not control a shake in her voice, " is it 
 possible that you have remembered me? " 
 
 Ferdinand Ballington did not answer her immediately. 
 Instead he took the plaid which she carried on her arm, 
 opened it and folded it to a cape, and then wrapped it around 
 her fall jacket. Their eyes met as he drew it across her 
 shoulders, and she noticed that he was looking at her with a 
 deeper intensity than that which she had observed in his eyes 
 the summer before. 
 
 Then he said, " Yes. I have remembered you." And he 
 added, with a smile which subtly challenged her perversity, 
 " You are to come home with me. Your mother said I might 
 call here for you. Are you ready to go ? " 
 
 Agnes had a whim to stay where she was, at least long 
 enough to say, " Perhaps I won t go with you even if my 
 mother did say so," but both her humor and her shyness were 
 only playing over a flattered acquiescence which was imme 
 diate and instinctive. 
 
 They left the church. She took his arm and they walked 
 some distance in silence. 
 
 "When did you come to Kent? " she asked, speaking first. 
 
 " An hour ago."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 89 
 
 She waited some seconds for him to take the initiative in 
 conversation, and then asked again, " It is unusual for you 
 to come here, isn t it? " 
 
 " Somewhat." 
 
 Again there was a long wait, during which Agnes listened 
 to the crunch of the snow under their feet, held up her face 
 to the drifting flakes, and promised herself that she would 
 walk the remaining blocks in silence rather than speak 
 first again. Ferdinand s content, however, over what he had 
 already accomplished, and ardent determinations for the 
 future which were going on in his mind were so satisfying 
 that he was unaware of the girl s uneasiness. He came sud 
 denly to the realization of it when he felt her withdraw her 
 hand from his arm, and, looking at her in inquiry, was 
 answered by a glance half roguish and half petulant, which 
 said as plainly as words, " I can walk alone, too." 
 
 " Put it back again," said Ferdinand, standing still in the 
 street. 
 
 Agnes laughed and replaced her hand. " Why don t you 
 talk to me? " she asked. 
 
 " That isn t necessary," he replied. 
 
 " Then I will give in and talk to you. There are many 
 things I want to ask you. I hope Mrs. Ballington and her 
 sons are well." 
 
 " I believe they are. I haven t been in Winston for a 
 week." 
 
 He was returning to his home then. That accounted for 
 his passing through Kent. 
 
 While she was thinking of something else to say, a remi 
 niscent smile came to Ferdinand Ballington s lips, and pres 
 ently he looked down upon her in amusement. " Your an 
 them," he said, " made me think of the time my mother made 
 me commit the twenty-third Psalm to memory. I was six 
 years old, and the only thing that aroused any interest in me 
 was the phrase, Thou anointest my head with oil. 
 
 Agnes looked up and caught his expression. She was con 
 scious of a disagreeable sensation, but she answered natu-
 
 90 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 rally, " I learned it too, when I was little. It s a lovely 
 psalm. I like to sing it." 
 
 " What do you find lovely in it? " pursued Ferdinand, 
 still regarding her. 
 
 Agnes hesitated, then tried to tell him what he had asked. 
 " I think it is the quiet. Then there is a lovely landscape. 
 But, most of all, it s the something underneath the quiet the 
 rapture of gratitude. Every time I read it I can feel the 
 same thing welling up in me, as clear and full as the still 
 waters." She lifted her face with an eagerness of look which 
 Ferdinand had early noticed in her, and exclaimed, " How 
 surprised the shepherd David would have been if he could 
 have looked on all the peoples who should sing his song ! It s 
 a wonderful thing for a song to fill the whole earth." 
 
 Ferdinand watched her, enjoying the effect which the Sid 
 ney eyes and the naivete of mind which he felt in Agnes 
 made upon him. " She has the eyes of a strange woman and 
 the heart of a child," he reflected, pleased at his Biblical 
 phraseology. 
 
 Her enthusiasm for David, however, was a little trying, 
 and he could not help replying, although indulgently, " David 
 had all the attributes of a good musician, so it is only right 
 that his song should fill the earth; but it s rather hard on 
 the Deity that such a man should be spoken of as after the 
 Lord s own heart a man who committed every crime in the 
 calendar." 
 
 " The times were different then," explained Agnes earnestly, 
 " and he sincerely repented." She was surprised and hurt 
 at her companion s levity in speaking of the sweet singer of 
 Israel. 
 
 The gentle dignity which came over her with the words 
 and the open look she gave him as she raised her cold-flushed 
 face to his stirred the young man s longings. She drew her 
 plaid closer about her throat, and the movement called his 
 attention to the fact that it was the only bit of color she wore. 
 He was not ordinarily intuitive, but he could not fail to 
 see the poverty which strove thus to supplement the mourn-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 91 
 
 ing garments which were insufficient against the winter cold. 
 He drew her arm more firmly within his own, and saw 
 visions of sealskins which he hoped one day to bestow upon 
 her. 
 
 The silence between them became so grave that Ferdinand 
 aroused himself and asked her if she still kept up her interest 
 in Winston College. 
 
 The girl s expression changed instantly. " Yes, indeed," 
 she replied ; " my class graduates this year." 
 
 " You lose little by not being among them," Ferdinand 
 returned considerately. " The college is too old-fashioned 
 and Puritanical. Those Puritan ancestors of ours are a 
 nuisance." 
 
 Agnes looked up again disturbed. Why should he speak 
 like this ? " How can you say that of men who did what 
 they have done ? " she demanded with quick rebuke. " Think 
 of living your whole life for duty and principle." 
 
 " But supposing there were no such thing as principle, 
 only custom? " he queried. 
 
 " No such thing as principle ! " exclaimed Agnes in aston 
 ishment. Unconsciously she stopped walking, and her next 
 words were accompanied by a gesture that implied finality. 
 " You don t know my mother ! " 
 
 Then she resolved to bring the conversation up out of deep 
 water. " Does Tom Ballington play the flute now? " she 
 asked determinedly. 
 
 Ferdinand preferred the Puritans to Tom as a subject of 
 conversation, but he answered with patient courtesy, " I 
 believe he has given it up. Metal work is his fad, now." 
 
 " I think you said you are not a musician," Agnes con 
 tinued in a business-like tone. 
 
 " No, I never have been able to afford that luxury." 
 
 " You are fond of music, though, aren t you? " 
 
 " I like to watch you sing." 
 
 " Thanks," she said with some hauteur. " But I didn t 
 mean that. I meant really good music." 
 
 " Don t you consider your own music good? "
 
 92 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 He thought of her abandon in singing at Winston as he 
 spoke, and immediately afterwards of the quiet with which 
 she then had met his compliment. The fire and vitality of 
 the girl stimulated him, but those moods of dignity and con 
 trol which unexpectedly crossed her spirits checked and baf 
 fled him. 
 
 She spoke in one of these now as she answered him. " No. 
 I used to, but I ve learned better. I know I have an uncom 
 mon voice, but it needs much work upon it." 
 
 There was a purpose in her words which moved him to say, 
 " You speak as though you were ambitious to become a 
 singer? " There was a certain hardness in his tone, and 
 involuntarily he checked their pace in order to gain time for 
 argument, for they were approaching Agnes home. 
 
 " I am. It is my talent. I don t want to wrap it in a 
 napkin." 
 
 They reached the gate as she replied, but he delayed to 
 open while he still held her hand within his arm. " The walk 
 has been too short," he said, with unmistakable regret. " I 
 wish it had been long enough for me to convince you that the 
 career of a professional singer is too hard and too thankless 
 a one for you. Perhaps we may continue the conversation 
 some other time." 
 
 Agnes made no reply, and Ferdinand opened the gate and 
 allowed her to precede him up the steps. 
 
 As she turned at the top to speak to him, he carefully 
 removed her shawl from her shoulders and was folding it up, 
 when the front door opened and a party of callers just leav 
 ing blocked the doorway. As Agnes stepped past them into 
 the hall she was embarrassed to recognize in the callers John 
 Talbot, his wife Molly, and their three-year-old boy. Talbot 
 was a brakeman, and had been a member of her father s Sun 
 day-school class. Before ninety-nine people out of a hundred 
 Agnes was rather proud than otherwise to greet the humbler 
 of her acquaintance. Unfortunately she had with her to 
 night the hundredth man, and she was mortified by the inevi 
 table introduction. Mrs. Sidney, however, was untroubled
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 93 
 
 by incongruities, and took the occasion to tell Mr. Balling- 
 ton that if he were as good a man as Talbot by the time he 
 reached the brakeman s age he might be satisfied with him 
 self. 
 
 " Get a lump of sugar for Sidney, Agnes," said Mrs. Sid 
 ney as the child was ready for the evening ride home. " I 
 always let my children have sweets, Mr. Ballington. Chil 
 dren need sweet things, and it does them good." 
 
 " I believe Herbert Spencer says the same thing," re 
 sponded Mr. Ballington. 
 
 " Does he ? Well, he is right. Good-by , John. Good- 
 by, Molly. We ll be out to dinner on Wednesday. Agnes, 
 John and Molly have asked us out to a boiled dinner next 
 Wednesday. Kiss Auntie Sidney good-by, Sidney ! " 
 
 Agnes closed the door behind the visitors with a feeling of 
 relief, and returned to the parlor in time to hear her mother 
 saying to the hundredth man, " Yes, I like a boiled dinner, 
 and so does Agnes. A little pork cooked with the corned- 
 beef improves it." 
 
 Agnes did like a boiled dinner with a little pork cooked 
 with the corned-beef, but now she blushed at her tastes. She 
 was desperate to change the topic under discussion. 
 
 Ferdinand observed her embarassment, and with a conver 
 sational inspiration came to her relief. He felt it desirable 
 to get on friendly terms with Agnes mother as soon as possi 
 ble, and he combined chivalry with business by remarking, 
 " Your old-fashioned church building has a dignity which 
 the new churches nowadays can t get. I am surprised that 
 your congregation had the wisdom to keep it as it is." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s face kindled. " How glad I am to hear you 
 say that ! " she exclaimed. " It was Stephen and I who saved 
 the old church. Most people like the new ones best. Did you 
 notice the walnut wood-work? " 
 
 Ferdinand replied mendaciously in the affirmative, and 
 then described his mother s fruitless struggle to save the old 
 church building in Winston. 
 
 Agnes felt a fascination in the gravity and directness of
 
 94 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 this controlled man. She knew that there were strong emo 
 tions underneath, and something told her that these were for 
 her. -She sat a little back of her mother and watched their 
 caller as he talked to Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 When he rose to leave, Agnes went with him into the hall. 
 
 He put on his ulster with its heavy cape, and then said, 
 as he stood hat in hand, " I shall remember this evening. 
 Have I your permission to come again ? " 
 
 " Come whenever you are in town," she answered, and as 
 she said the words she felt them to acknowledge even then a 
 bond. 
 
 " I shall make it a point to be in town," he returned with 
 out smiling. Then he said good-night and opened the door. 
 
 Agnes stepped forward to close it, and as she did so he 
 turned upon the veranda and looked at her. Then he put on 
 his hat, and she heard his footsteps, with a very slight drag 
 of the left foot, going down the path. 
 
 " Come here, Agnes," called her mother from the sitting- 
 room. " I want you to read the letter I have written to Mr. 
 Stoddard. I ve told him you can come to New York." 
 
 For weeks Agnes hardly had dared to hope for this news. 
 Now she hesitated, then excused herself from her mother, and 
 went at once upstairs. She retired in the dark, re-living his 
 last look. She felt a fire flare through her veins, and with it 
 stole a strange faintness the fever and languor as old as 
 human love.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A WEEK passed, and Ferdinand came again. Agnes soon 
 ^ began to look for him every Thursday. She put off 
 going to New York until the following fall, and meantime 
 life in Kent had taken on splendor. Ferdinand was ac 
 customed to call for her at the church at the close of the 
 early choir rehearsal, and they would walk home together. 
 There they would find the shades drawn, the lamps lighted, 
 a back-log blazing in the old-fashioned brick fire-place, where 
 they toasted bread and cheese and roasted chestnuts in the 
 ashes. They could hear the wind and snow and hail outside, 
 and sometimes Winter would come in to stand before the open 
 fire in the square person of Dr. Quinn, covered with icicles 
 from a long country ride. 
 
 Sometimes they would talk and read until late, but com 
 monly they gave up part or all of the time to another enter 
 tainment. Mrs. Sidney long ago had sat in judgment upon 
 popular games. " We ll have to keep a close rein on Agnes. 
 She s hankering after gambling games," she once had warned 
 her husband, whereupon the doctor exhibited a characteristic 
 method of his in dealing with dangerous allurements, namely, 
 the substitution for them of something more attractive 
 which was at the same time innocuous. The result was that 
 he introduced into their circle in Kent the Rajah of amuse 
 ments, which stands with a smile of oriental subtlety equally 
 aloof from vulgar chance or stupid mathematics, the only 
 game worthy of great men chess. 
 
 Agnes was a brilliant chess-player. Singularly enough, 
 chess happened to be the one indoor recreation which Ferdi 
 nand professed to enjoy, and he proposed the game himself. 
 Agnes brought out with pride the unique set of antique 
 
 95
 
 96 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ivories, which had been given to her father along with other 
 curios, by a Chinaman whose family he had attended for 
 years. Evening after evening Ferdinand and she sat op 
 posite each other, silent as idols, while between them a mimic 
 war was waged by warriors yellow with age. Powers ad 
 vanced and laid down their lives in defense of their sovereign 
 and his courtiers ; knights challenged each other haughtily ; 
 perilous intrigues were carried on between bishops and 
 queens ; castles were stormed ; even kings now and then made 
 an independent strut under cover of their retinue; and 
 through it all the idols sat huge and impassive, watching 
 each set of puppets play out their desperate game, and then 
 sweeping them from the board to watch another campaign 
 on the same field between the same warriors in another gen 
 eration, with other plots covering the same passions. 
 
 At first Agnes held her own, but soon she began to be 
 afraid of that firm hand encircled with the stiff cuff-rim, as 
 it moved slowly back and forth over the board, and before 
 long she acknowledged to herself her inability to cope with 
 its owner. One thing consoled her pride: that although Fer 
 dinand now usually won, he never showed a disposition to 
 give her points, or to offer her any other advantage, and she 
 interpreted this as courtesy. 
 
 Perhaps owing to her realization of his superior mental 
 discipline, Agnes cherished the more her power over him. 
 She knew that if she wished she could with a glance discon 
 cert him for the moment, and cause hesitation in his speech. 
 But he never showed confusion. His pauses were at times 
 conspicuous, but when that indomitable voice began again, 
 it always was under command, the train of thought never 
 suffered, the man s mental vision never blurred. 
 
 One evening in May when they had been standing by the 
 open window to smell the budding grape-vines, Agnes said to 
 him, " My cousin Fred and his wife returned yesterday. 
 They are to have a supper party Monday at their home on 
 West Hill. Beatrice told me to tell you that she would be 
 happy to have you come. Your cousins are coming over from
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 97 
 
 Winston." She waited a moment and added one sentence 
 more, " I hope you can come," and she colored vividly. 
 
 Ferdinand hesitated. She thought that he was about to 
 decline. Her suspicion of antagonism between him and 
 Beatrice recurred to her, nor was this suspicion entirely dis 
 pelled when a moment later he asked, " I may accompany 
 you?" 
 
 " Yes, thank you. That will be pleasant." 
 
 All day Monday a storm threatened. Light thunder 
 rumbled fitfully from time to time, and lightning flashed, 
 but the rain waited for the ominous afternoon to pass. 
 
 Ferdinand came for her with a carriage, and although the 
 drops were not yet falling, he held his umbrella over her as she 
 hurried down the path. As he opened the gate a gust of 
 wind tore the honeysuckle vine from the veranda. The 
 horses were pawing and tossing their heads. Ferdinand 
 helped her into the coupe and entered it after her. 
 
 She shivered as the door of the carriage shut with its 
 clean click, and drew her cape close. " I like this," she said 
 with tingling nerves. " You are early, though. We shall 
 be the first guests," and her tawny eyes darkened as she 
 looked at him. 
 
 " I did so purposely," he answered. 
 
 The driver touched up his horses, and they rode straight 
 into the storm. A black pall rose higher up the sky as they 
 advanced. Now and then a flash of lightning pierced the 
 gloom. To the south along the horizon a bank of clouds 
 rolled up like flame. They and the drifting rain above them 
 looked like a prairie on fire. Suddenly the first gust whipped 
 the windows ; there was a dash of water, a salute of thunder, 
 a hiss of rain driving against them, and then they seemed 
 plunged into a wild tumult. A pair of crows passed, driven 
 on heavy wings before the wind. As they approached the 
 base of the hill a drove of horses in a meadow were rush 
 ing panic-stricken hither and thither, and night was clos 
 ing in. 
 
 Now they had reached the fork of the road. Off to the
 
 98 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 left Fred and Beatrice were waiting for their guests. The 
 horses veered to the right and raced along the road that 
 skirted the foot-hill. 
 
 For a delirious second Agnes did not correct the driver s 
 mistake. She let herself give up to an ecstatic fancy that she 
 was being kidnapped and carried away in mad flight to the 
 fortresses of the mountains. The next second she exclaimed, 
 " Stop him ! He is going the wrong way." 
 
 She was struck with the strange sound of her voice, and 
 recollected that neither of them had spoken during the ride. 
 
 " Are you afraid ? " asked Ferdinand, in a low tone. 
 
 " No," she said after a moment. 
 
 It was the only time they had been alone together except 
 during the walks from choir rehearsal. Mrs. Sidney s inde 
 fatigable presence when her daughter received callers had 
 been turned into a maxim by Fred, who once said that for a 
 man to make a success of business he must stick to it as Aunt 
 Kate did to the parlor when Agnes had company. 
 
 " The driver is following directions," said Ferdinand. 
 " He will take us to your cousin s in time. I have something 
 to say to you and I wanted you alone." 
 
 * Yes ? " said Agnes, quivering. 
 
 There was a very long pause. By a sudden flare of light 
 ning she saw that his face was drawn hard with emotion. 
 
 " I cannot live without you ! You are like light and air ! " 
 he said, and he put out his arms and drew her to him pas 
 sionately. 
 
 She did not resist. The carriage, the hills, the whole world 
 reeled, as she felt the violence of his embrace. When she 
 heard his voice again, there was a new tone in it, a vibration 
 which thrilled her from head to foot. 
 
 " When will you marry me? " he asked. 
 
 " I don t know. My mother must say." 
 
 "Let it be soon." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 He sat now with one arm about her, the other tense hand 
 holding hers. Her cape became disarranged, and one by one
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 99 
 
 the petals of the orchids he had given her, and which she wore 
 at her breast, fell upon their clasped hands. 
 
 After a time the driver turned and started back the way 
 they had come. The rain fell in a steady downpour around 
 them. 
 
 "What are you thinking? " Agnes whispered. 
 
 " That I should like to kiss you. Will you let me? " 
 
 He felt her face lifting to his, and presently he said, 
 " That is the first love-kiss I have ever given a woman, and 
 no other than you shall ever know one from me." 
 
 " When did you first care for me? " 
 
 " When I was born." 
 
 At last they heard the splash of another carriage passing 
 them; they felt the tug of the horses as they ascended the 
 incline of the driveway; there were sounds from the porte- 
 cochere ; the carriage stopped, and the door was opened from 
 the outside. 
 
 Agnes stepped out, and went through the hall and up the 
 stairs ahead of her escort. She let the maid remove her wraps 
 as in a dream, and did not speak to some acquaintances who 
 were leaving the dressing-room. Ferdinand waited for her 
 impatiently in the upper hall. They passed along the heav 
 ily-paneled corridor between the rows of palms. The orchids 
 were gone ; nothing relieved the black of her attire. 
 
 Beatrice, with arms and neck heavy with topazes, came for 
 ward affectionately. " Agnes ! " she cried eagerly. 
 
 Her expression changed as she saw the look on the girl s 
 face. Her manner was more subdued as she kissed Agnes 
 and her eyes rested upon her questioningly as she released 
 her. 
 
 Then she turned to Ferdinand with a frank stare. " To 
 think you actually came! Of course I am delighted to see 
 you." 
 
 Immediately upon the last words she took Ferdinand by 
 the elbow with one hand, made a large gesture with the other, 
 announced with intolerable effusiveness, " An old family 
 friend, Ferdinand Ballington," and then suddenly turned
 
 100 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 away, leaving Ferdinand in the midst of a stiff bow to a 
 semi-circle of ducking people in front of him. 
 
 One man in the semi-circle grew into prominence from the 
 fact that he did not bow. Agnes recognized him, caught the 
 glance which passed between him and Beatrice, a glance 
 which spoke unmistakable dislike of Ferdinand, and a con 
 sternation which she instinctively felt was for herself. The 
 man was Tom Ballington.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 T ATER that evening, after her guests had said good-night, 
 Beatrice drew a breath of relief and strolled into the 
 conservatory off the drawing-room. Fred was outside seeing 
 the last carriage away from the house. The conservatory 
 faced the village in the valley and from its window Beatrice 
 could see the lights of the town. The storm was over and the 
 moon showed dark clumps of wet foliage upon the hillside. A 
 syringa bush moved its dripping branches just outside and 
 brushed against the lattice. Above her hung a tropical 
 creeper over-trailing its moss cage, and its florid, yellow 
 flowers just touched her hair. 
 
 She stood in relaxed content waiting for her husband. 
 The evening had gone successfully. Fred s looks had satis 
 fied her pride and it had given her pleasure to present him 
 to his townsfolk as the master of her luxurious establishment. 
 Fred had behaved irreproachably in acceding to every sug 
 gestion she had expressed so far as to the arrangement of 
 their domestic affairs. The time was ripe at last, she felt, 
 for her to broach the subject of his leaving the bank. She 
 was congratulating herself on her patience and self-control 
 in having let that matter rest until she was sure of conduct 
 ing it to a happy issue, when she heard her husband s voice 
 calling her. 
 
 " Here I am in the conservatory ! " she returned buoyantly. 
 
 A moment later Fred entered. His face lighted with 
 pleasure as he caught sight of her before the window. The 
 tropical glow of color in the creeper and the topazes, the 
 shining folds of her satin gown, the drift of laces that fell 
 from arms and bosom, the rich tints of hair, face and shoul 
 ders, the grace and latent strength of the young figure, filled 
 him with the triumph of possession. To-night it was accom- 
 
 101
 
 102 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 panied by an anxiety which he tried to disguise from himself. 
 He approached her, and stood looking at her thoughtfully. 
 
 Beatrice did not seem to notice his silence, however, and 
 presently she put a hand on his arm. 
 
 " Come over here, Fred. I want to talk to you," she said, 
 drawing him over to the bench under the window. 
 
 The window-sill was banked with violets, whose damp odor 
 in after years always brought with it a fleeting memory of a 
 moon-lit conservatory with palms and tropic creepers and a 
 dark woman in amber jewels. 
 
 Beatrice slipped down to a stool at Fred s feet and threw 
 an arm over his knees. 
 
 " How wonderful Agnes looked to-night," she said remi- 
 niscently. " That was a made-over dress she had on, too. 
 How she carries those plain things." Beatrice looked down 
 at her own jewels. 
 
 Then she took down her arm and leaned her head against 
 his knee. Both were preoccupied, and for some moments 
 they waited in quiet. She was thinking how she would sug 
 gest that they travel for a time, when he had left the bank, 
 then perhaps go into diplomatic life. For Beatrice loved 
 the world: its excitement, brilliance, intrigues and display. 
 She was not morally sensitive, although she had shrewdly 
 pitched her affections upon a husband who would not have 
 to be watched. That would leave time and energy for other 
 things. She felt sure that no amount of freedom or even 
 extravagance would corrupt Fred. The question was how to 
 launch him. 
 
 Fred was thinking that he had missed getting hold of that 
 serious-mindedness in his wife which he had divined in his 
 betrothed. A turmoil attendant upon the building and fur 
 nishing of the great house had swept them apart in the weeks 
 preceding and following the wedding. Their attention had 
 been focused on material things. His longing for a closer 
 intimacy in the noblest sense had been disappointed. There 
 was no time for it. He saw a hereditary impulse in Beatrice 
 to indulge herself and those whom she loved without stint in
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 103 
 
 the good things of this world. In time it would become all 
 of life to her, as it was to her father. She never had had the 
 discipline of self-denial as a preliminary to attainment. The 
 trend of her life had been toward enjoyment of easily-gotten 
 luxuries, an enjoyment which in weak natures easily de 
 generates into monstrous riot ; but Beatrice was not weak, and 
 Fred saw that in her the tendency was not toward intemper 
 ance of the senses, but rather in the line of craving for emo 
 tional excitement. Restlessness was growing upon her. He 
 must touch in her the dormant longing for the real things of 
 life end awaken her from the phantasmagoria which she had 
 hitherto regarded. He thought of a way to lead up to the 
 subject, and he was unconscious that the way he chose was 
 a peace-offering to his own hurt pride. He leaned over and 
 tried to put into her hand a roll of bills. 
 
 "What is that for, Fred?" she asked, drawing her hand 
 away sharply. She was on the alert at once and looked up 
 keenly to meet his answering look of determination. 
 
 In a flash the benevolent schemes of both for the future 
 were lost sight of in the clash of will over something near by. 
 The trifle which Fred had intended to introduce a spiritual 
 union all at once became ultimate. 
 
 " For my tuxedo," he replied briefly. 
 
 Beatrice made a gesture of dissent. " That s all right," 
 she said nonchalantly ; " I gave it to you. You didn t really 
 need it, as you said. I wanted you to have it." 
 
 Fred s expression was gentle. He, as well as Beatrice, 
 was endeavoring to conciliate. " It is natural for you to be 
 generous, Beatrice, and I know you mean it kindly. But we 
 must understand each other before it gets any harder. I 
 didn t say anything at first. Buy what you like for yourself 
 besides what little I can give you. Nobody knows how glad 
 I would be if I could have given all this to you." His gesture 
 took in their surroundings. " As it is, the only thing that can 
 give me any self-respect is to stop being a pensioner and live 
 within my salary." 
 
 " Salary ! " Beatrice spoke with unrestrained but not
 
 104 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 irritable feeling. " Oh, Fred, why do you talk about salary ? 
 This is all yours as much as it is mine. Look at the money 
 we have, dearest, my General and you and I ! What is the 
 use of your spending your youth in Bucher s penny-bank? 
 You belong to our family now." 
 
 Fred s color rose. " I never should have asked you to 
 marry me, Beatrice," he replied still gently, " if I had not 
 promised myself a different relation. I felt that I had some 
 thing to give, as well as you; but so far I have been only a 
 receiver." 
 
 " Nonsense, Fred ! " said Beatrice heartily. " You have 
 given me everything you had. In spirit you have given me 
 the whole world, and that is the whole thing. Don t let s 
 haggle over details. What does it matter whether a few 
 thousands of dollars come from the Mott side or the Sidney 
 side ? It s all in the family." 
 
 There was reserve in Fred s tone as he rejoined, " I can t 
 consider myself as having any right to your father s money, 
 Beatrice. That is all in your family, not ours." 
 
 Beatrice sat up and wheeled round to face him. " I am 
 my father s only child," she said crisply. 
 
 She caught a curious flicker on Fred s face, and her own 
 darkened instantly. 
 
 " Don t you ever dare to put that thought in words ! " she 
 said with suppressed fury. " I ll not listen to one word 
 against my father from you, of all men in the world." She 
 sprang to her feet and stood over him threateningly. 
 
 After a moment Fred spoke in a deprecating tone. 
 " Surely you don t think me capable of that, Beatrice." But 
 his look had probed to the sore place under Beatrice s 
 loyalty. 
 
 " To think a thing is as bad as to say it ! " she flared out. 
 " You have lived all your life here and you are as narrow- 
 minded as a woman. My father has his faults, but he is a 
 prince among men as you find them out in the world. I m 
 proud to be known as his daughter anywhere even in this 
 saintly town," she said scornfully.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 105 
 
 Fred s face grew stern but his voice was quiet as he replied, 
 " It is quite true I look at some things the way women do, and 
 I was thankful that, although with no credit to myself, I 
 could offer you something I prize more than anything else 
 in the world. That is a name that for many years, at least, 
 has been stainless. It was all I had to give you, and I am 
 sorry if you think I overrate it." 
 
 For a moment the vehemence of Beatrice s feelings pre 
 vented her from speaking. Fred was shocked at the look she 
 gave him. A bewildered warning of danger ahead cooled 
 his resentment. A feeling of compunction at having unin 
 tentionally hurt her feelings softened his mood. 
 
 "Your father is a generous and straightforward man, 
 Beatrice," he hastened to add. " I respect his good qualities 
 and I am very grateful for his treatment of me. I hope we 
 may never recur to this painful conversation. You and I 
 are concerned alone with our own family life. The dearest 
 ambition I have is to live in perfect harmony with you in a 
 family life in which each shall keep self-respect while loving 
 and respecting the other." 
 
 At last Beatrice s conflicting impulses struggled into 
 words. " Just what kind of a life do you propose ? " she 
 demanded. 
 
 Fred hesitated, desiring to make it as attractive as pos 
 sible. 
 
 " Much the kind of life that we are now living," he replied 
 at length, " you to have the exclusive possession of your own 
 property, allowing me, if you see fit, to look after it as some 
 small contribution to the support of my family; allowing 
 me, in addition, to do what I can for you out of my own 
 salary." 
 
 He looked at her wistfully. He had not said one word of 
 that which had filled his mind when he started out. The con 
 versation had all come back to money. The best he had 
 offered was to take charge of her property and live a life 
 much like their present one. 
 
 Beatrice returned his regard for some moments in silence.
 
 106 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Then she burst forth with mingled rage, disappointment, 
 and tenderness. " Fred, you re an ass ! You ll have to learn 
 to manage me better than this. You d better take lessons of 
 my father." 
 
 " Do you wish you had married a man like your father ? " 
 Fred asked with his heart in his throat, for fear of a second 
 explosion. 
 
 But his wife s mood had changed. " No," she said list 
 lessly ; " I took you because you were different from all the 
 men I ever knew. I didn t care whether your family was good 
 or bad. We mustn t quarrel any more. It doesn t lead to 
 anything." 
 
 Fred s heart fell as the meaning of the words grew upon 
 him. How futile had been his effort to arrive at a better under 
 standing ! He had succeeded only in making the future look 
 less attractive to them both than it had looked before. 
 
 A moment later Beatrice sank down on his knee and put a 
 hand on each shoulder. " Fred," she said with an entire 
 change of manner, "Agnes and Ferdinand Ballington are 
 engaged." 
 
 Fred started. "Who told you that?" he exclaimed in 
 astonishment. 
 
 " My own eyes," she replied bitterly. " To think she would 
 pass over Donald and take him ! Why, if she didn t like 
 Donald, why couldn t it have been Tom ? " 
 
 A look of disappointment followed her last words. " What 
 a lovely situation that would have been ! " she exclaimed 
 regretfully. 
 
 " What would have been ? " queried Fred. 
 
 "Oh, Agnes refusing Ferdinand and marrying Tom." 
 
 " Beatrice, I have wanted to know for a long time what 
 you and Tom Ballington have against Ferdinand," Fred said 
 earnestly ; " I have always heard him very highly spoken of. 
 If he isn t the right kind of man, Agnes mustn t be allowed 
 to marry him." 
 
 " Well, he isn t the right kind of man," exclaimed Beatrice 
 impetuously, rising to her feet. " You can put up your bot-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 107 
 
 torn dollar on that. I have hated him ever since I was a child. 
 He is a mean, hard man." 
 
 " If you know anything definite, I think you ought to tell 
 me," Fred objected. "You must have some reason for hat 
 ing him." 
 
 "Definite! Reason! I knew you wouldn t understand an 
 antipathy. Well, here is something you can understand, but 
 it is really nothing to my constitutional hatred. When Tom 
 and I were going together, he gave Tom a long lecture one 
 day warning him that he would be a fool to marry me. And 
 after I became engaged to you, he said that I did it out of 
 pique because Tom had followed his advice and thrown me 
 over." 
 
 A black look passed across Fred s face. "Did he say 
 that?" 
 
 Beatrice s face lightened as she saw her husband s anger. 
 " Don t let it worry you to that extent," she said with 
 returning good humor. " I am not the only one he has tried 
 to injure. He tried to get the best of Father on a railroad 
 deal, and he would have done it only one of his tools at the last 
 minute couldn t bring himself to ruin my father. So he went 
 back on Ferdinand and told the whole scheme in time for us 
 to get out without losing very much." 
 
 "Who was the tool?" 
 
 " The banker, Balch. We lent him some money a couple of 
 years before when he couldn t give security." 
 
 " Balch a tool in an underhand deal ! " exclaimed Fred 
 incredulously ; " Balch is an honorable man ! " 
 
 " Of course. I don t suppose there ever was a word 
 exchanged between him and Ferdinand on the subject. But 
 you may be sure there was a silent pressure brought to bear 
 on Balch that he didn t dare resist." 
 
 Beatrice dwelt upon this part of Ferdinand s career with 
 satisfaction, but Fred s brow did not clear. " I am going to 
 tell Aunt Kate. I wish we had known this was going on." 
 
 " So do I," assented Beatrice, " but it is too late to change 
 Agnes opinion now. She is the important one."
 
 108 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " No, she isn t," said Fred with conviction ; " Aunt Kate 
 is the one." 
 
 " Well," said Beatrice impatiently, " you won t find out 
 anything against Ferdinand. He is too smart. He has an 
 excellent business reputation. When he does anything a bit 
 risky he does it through other people. His workmen get the 
 highest wages and every municipal improvement counts on 
 him for a moderate subscription. You might as well save 
 your breath. What good will it do to tell Aunt Kate I don t 
 like him?" 
 
 She turned away from him petulantly. " I am going to bed. 
 I wish you would see if Saunders has locked up the silver. 
 Good-night." 
 
 " Good-night," replied Fred, looking after her with pre 
 occupied eyes. 
 
 Saunders was turning off the lights. 
 
 For a moment Beatrice gleamed down the alley of over 
 arching palms. Then the lights went out. Fred thought 
 she had left the conservatory, when her voice came to him 
 once more. 
 
 "Fred!" 
 
 "Yes. What is it?" 
 
 "You ll let me give you that tuxedo, won t you?" The 
 voice was pleading under its pride. 
 
 Fred was reluctant to answer, but he told himself that he 
 must be firm. Concession now would place him in a worse 
 position than his old one had been. 
 
 " Let s not open that discussion again, Beatrice," he said 
 kindly. He thought she had gone again, when her voice came 
 out of the darkness a second time. " 
 
 " I was going to ask a greater favor of you, Fred. I ll 
 ask nothing now but the tuxedo. It means a good deal to me. 
 Don t be stubborn." 
 
 Fred s discomfort was passing into irritation. " See here, 
 Bee," he said, rising and groping his way toward her. He 
 tried to make his tone cheery, half- jesting. " I d like to have 
 an impartial witness as to which of us two is more stubborn."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 109 
 
 "You make a big mistake to-night," her voice came back 
 to him instantly. " You ll be sorry some day you didn t com 
 promise." 
 
 There was a soft rustle of satin trailing away. A feeling 
 of loneliness gathered upon him as he felt his way into the 
 great drawing-room. Huge pieces of carved furniture 
 blocked his way. Rugs impeded his feet. When he reached 
 the doorway into the hall his fingers touched a curtain of 
 Gobelin tapestry. The newel-post of the staircase had been 
 plundered from a moldering Venetian palace. Fred groaned 
 as he touched its traceries. What wealth was this in which 
 he lived ! He could give her nothing that she needed. What 
 a mockery his position was ! He had no authority. He was 
 a guest in his own home. Would he always be a welcome one? 
 Ferdinand Ballington had said she married him only for 
 pique ! His heart was heavy with grief and foreboding. The 
 deep gong of the hall clock struck one. The solemn tone 
 vibrated off into the dark, and he slowly began to mount the 
 stairs.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 Agnes, accompanied by Ferdinand, reached 
 home again after Beatrice s supper-party, Ferdinand 
 left her at the door. 
 
 Agnes found her mother sitting up for her, as was her 
 custom. Mrs. Sidney was nodding as she sat beside the sit 
 ting-room table, and woke with a start when her daughter 
 came into the room. 
 
 Agnes went up and kissed her. "Mother," she said, 
 " Ferdinand has asked me to marry him, and I have said I will. 
 He didn t come in because it was so late, but he is going to 
 see you." 
 
 The news had come sooner than Mrs. Sidney expected, but 
 she took it quietly. She put out her hand and drew up to the 
 table beside her a chair which had been turned toward the 
 wall. Aunt Mattie s shoes were still on the floor in front of 
 it, where Mrs. Sidney had removed them. 
 
 " Sit x down, Agnes," said her mother. " I want to talk to 
 you." 
 
 Agnes took the seat with foreboding. The solemnity in 
 her mother s face drove away the afterglow of Ferdinand s 
 presence. 
 
 " Agnes," said the elder woman, looking at the girl with 
 anxious care in her steady gaze, " I saw when Ferdinand first 
 came here to see you that he loved you, and I asked God to 
 direct him and to direct us. If God had meant me to root out 
 this love-making I think He would have made it clear to me. 
 The Ballingtons are good people. Your father knew them 
 and respected them. Ferdinand is known to be an upright 
 and moral man. l might have been a man we didn t know 
 about and a stranger to your father. On the other hand, 
 Agnes, Ferdinand isn t a Christian man. He who is not 
 
 no
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 111 
 
 for Me is against Me. Have you thought of all these 
 things?" 
 
 " We have talked of them before, mamma," said Agnes in a 
 low voice, knowing as she said the words that though she had 
 talked of these things with her mother, she never had felt 
 them fully till to-night. Even now, it was not anxiety about 
 Ferdinand s religious views that turned her faint with appre 
 hension, but fear lest her mother should ask her to give 
 him up. 
 
 In the wait before her mother spoke again the irrevocable- 
 ness of what had happened came over the girl. She felt her 
 self hardening against renunciation, but along with this she 
 recognized the selfishness of her instinct, and there was a 
 shock in the sight of herself as she now knew herself, abso 
 lutely fixed on holding to Ferdinand Ballington. She put her 
 hand on the table to support herself. For some moments 
 she could not command her voice to speak. She remembered 
 that six months before she had groveled in anguish of soul, 
 beseeching God to vouchsafe her some way to expiate her 
 sin any way He would. Then this thing had come, not 
 slowly so that she could reason about it, but, as it seemed, 
 suddenly, full-grown. And now was this the way to 
 expiate? to give up this? 
 
 Agnes recognized her situation. She knew, too, that for 
 her there was but one outcome to that struggle, that she had 
 been bound over by generations of stern and righteous fore 
 fathers to the more than Spartan law, " If thy right hand 
 offend thee, cut it off. It is better to enter into life maimed 
 than having two hands to be cast into hell." 
 
 "Mother," she said, and her face was ashen, "there is 
 something I must say to you, in spite of feeling that I do not 
 mean a word of it. I am hooting myself in derision for say 
 ing it. Yet I will hold to what I say. Tell me to give up 
 Ferdinand if it seems right to you, and I I promise you, on 
 the memory of my father, I never will marry him. I never 
 voluntarily will see him again. I will give him up." 
 
 She dropped into her chair again, her head sank upon her
 
 112 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 clasped arms on the table, and shook with the convulsion that 
 followed the agony of soul. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney sat still and waited until the spasm had spent 
 itself, but to herself she kept repeating fervently, " O God ! 
 I thank Thee." 
 
 Then she leaned over and laid her hand, which still had a 
 thimble upon one finger, on her daughter s arm. " No, 
 Agnes, I don t ask that of you. If I had been going to ask 
 that I should have stopped Ferdinand s coming here before 
 this. I have been sore troubled all these weeks. If it had 
 been Donald, the way would have been clear. But God s ways 
 are not our ways. I have talked to Ferdinand when we have 
 been alone. It may be that God is using this way to touch 
 Ferdinand s heart. Have you ever asked him to come out and 
 make a stand for Christ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 It had, indeed, often occurred to Agnes to speak to Ferdi 
 nand upon this subject, but every time she had come near 
 to doing so an uncontrollable reluctance had taken posses 
 sion of her. She never had doubted that in time he would take 
 this all-important step. All the good people she had known 
 sooner or later professed religion, and she had consoled her 
 self for her hesitation by thinking that after marriage con 
 versations which now seemed difficult would shape themselves 
 naturally and easily. She would have marveled, indeed, had 
 anyone told her that men and women often live their lives 
 together in the closest of relationships, and find it easier to 
 confess an ideal, a yearning of the soul, to a passing stranger 
 than to that other who has learned intimately the humdrum 
 current of every-day companionship. During all these weeks 
 wherein she was thrilling with the exquisite reticence that 
 surrounds young love, it would have been hard for her to 
 believe that there comes a time between wife and husband 
 when a second tragic reticence exists concerning the early 
 confessions of heart and soul they once exchanged; a reti 
 cence which covers on the part of each in finer natures the 
 pitiful acknowledgment of unattained ideas of self-re-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 113 
 
 proach, and of mortification, which shields itself in silence; 
 while ignobler natures expose themselves in jest and mutual 
 raillery concerning their dreams of youth. 
 
 "Will you ask him? " continued Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 Agnes hands clasped each other. She drew a painful 
 breath. "Yes." 
 
 " Then, I will leave it to you. You can do, Agnes, what 
 God requires of you. You have shown to-night that you can 
 pluck out your right eye and cast it from you. I am not 
 afraid to trust Stephen Sidney s daughter anywhere the 
 Lord may send her." 
 
 Agnes felt a soul-cheer that went out from her mother s 
 gaze. It was as if a veteran in a sublime warfare had fallen 
 upon the unexpected heroism of a recruit, and had called 
 out, " Hail ! brother." 
 
 A joy so great that it was pain rushed over the girl. " You 
 mean, mother ?" and the color surged back to her face. 
 
 She stopped. She was shocked once more with the selfish 
 ness at the bottom of her impulse. It was consent to the 
 marriage which she craved, not Ferdinand s soul. She 
 looked at her mother helplessly, saying nothing, alarmed at 
 what she thought her own hardness of heart. 
 
 "We must leave that in God s hands," said Mrs. Sidney. 
 " * In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct thy 
 paths. Good-night, Agnes. God bless you, dear child. I 
 trust you." 
 
 The tears flowed down both faces as mother and daughter 
 kissed each other. Agnes took her candle and went to her 
 own room. Her load was immeasurably lightened by her 
 mother s conditional approbation of the engagement. She 
 again saw divine approval in the joy that was hers. Yet in 
 spite of her returning faith that the happiness in store for 
 her was a promised land, her direct heritage from God, the 
 signal in the distance was no longer a pillar of fire illumi 
 nating a quiet night with supernatural glory, but it was 
 changing to a pillar of cloud brooding over a day-weary 
 earth. There it hung ahead of her, an ominous guide waiting
 
 114 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 on the outskirts of the wilderness whither we all must go for 
 our temptation or our years of wandering. 
 
 When Agnes reached her own room she set the candle 
 down on the floor by a chintz-covered chest in one corner. In 
 this chest were the papers she found in her father s desk, of 
 which he had spoken to her. One, a sealed envelope, had 
 borne the direction, " For my daughter Agnes to read when 
 she is thinking of marrying." This package had consumed 
 her with interest for months, but she never had felt justified 
 in opening it until now. 
 
 She found the envelope and had untied the string which 
 her father s fingers had fastened, when she heard her mother 
 speaking to her from the foot of the stairs. She arose and 
 went into the hall to answer. 
 
 " Don t sit up reading to-night," said Mrs. Sidney. " We 
 shall both have a hard day s work to-morrow. Go right to 
 bed, and try to go to sleep." 
 
 Agnes acquiesced. There was a kind of peace in obeying 
 her mother in the smallest detail. She put aside the letter 
 which now seemed of such absorbing interest to her, and went 
 to bed. 
 
 But not to sleep! Ferdinand had come and gone. His 
 presence haunted the room, his voice was in her ears, his face 
 met her in the dark wherever she looked. No more renuncia 
 tion to-night! Let it come in the future years long! but 
 now let her give up her thoughts to all that could make 
 absence and heart-hunger endurable! She had lived much 
 since that morning. It was sweet to think of him. He was 
 thinking, too, of her, and this thought was so lovely that she 
 was almost in tears at the certainty of it. After it all she 
 was not satisfied, no, not to-night. What she wanted was 
 no brief moment stolen from a jostling crowd, but a long 
 communion in quiet like the night about her. Then, perhaps, 
 she might tell him all that consumed her; then perhaps he 
 might read her soul, and she might feel that he opened the 
 secret chamber of his and took her in. The foundations of 
 the great deep had been broken up. She was tossed from
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 115 
 
 billow to billow, and she longed for the heart that could 
 understand as the storm-beaten sailor longs for the quiet 
 harbor. She thought of their union as no longer if if, but 
 when when! Hour by hour she lay unvisited by sleep, her 
 wide eyes gazing on the visions that allure in the delirium of 
 that fierce, sweet fever. 
 
 As she sank at last into slumber that shadowy world that 
 had wavered before her waking eyes came nearer in vaguely 
 remembered harmonies. The last thing she realized before 
 passing into dreamlessness was a chorus of women s voices 
 singing through the night out of distance. To her it was only 
 an echo from the buoyant college years that formed so large 
 a part of her memories. Tannhauser was but a name to her ; 
 the Venus-music was a girl s part-song led by a German music 
 teacher. Yet to-night as it eddied around her it filled her 
 darkening senses with uncontrollable longing, and she was 
 borne out to oblivion on its tumultuous tide. 
 
 Naht euch dem Lande 
 Naht euch dem Strande, 
 Wo in den Armen 
 Gliihender Liebe, 
 Selig erwarmen, 
 Still cure Triebe.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 Agnes asked Ferdinand full-heartedly, upon their 
 return to her house, to come in with her and tell her 
 mother of their love, he had with some difficulty resisted. It 
 was a new and sweet indulgence to him to give up his will, 
 for the time being, in response to a woman s influence, and 
 only his long and habitual regard to policy saved him from 
 presenting himself to Mrs. Sidney in his relaxed condition. 
 
 Upon leaving Agnes he did not go to the hotel immedi 
 ately, but dismissed his carriage and walked for an hour or 
 two through the still, wet streets of Kent, allowing himself 
 to feel to the full the poignance of the emotions which pos 
 sessed him. He did not think, he only felt, abandoning him 
 self to passion in order to get all there was out of it. Again 
 and again he called up to his mind two pictures of Agnes: 
 the first, as she came down the steps of her mother s house 
 to the carriage, her hair wind-blown across her eyes as she 
 met his look; the second, as she met him again with her 
 orchids gone, in the upper corridor at Fred Sidney s. His 
 cheeks burned as he persistently held this view of her in his 
 memory pale, beautiful, a star-like luminousness in her 
 eyes, an unearthly grace in her motion. He knew that she 
 was consumed with th? memory of what they had experienced 
 during their ride together and that the experience had 
 transformed her. He remembered how she had stood a mo 
 ment breathing deep, her beautiful neck and arms defined 
 by the lines of her black dress, her face and manner suf 
 fused with unconscious feeling. He knew, and the knowl 
 edge thrilled him, that the flood-gates of her nature had 
 opened, and that all the fullness of her vitality was pouring 
 out toward him. It angered him to recall the memory of 
 
 116
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 117 
 
 Beatrice which followed hard upon this, but he was unable 
 to banish Fred s wife completely from his mind. 
 
 After a time Ferdinand checked himself and began to 
 notice the houses he was passing, now and then one standing 
 out from the rest with some show of town importance, others 
 thriftily struggling to hold themselves, their yards, and their 
 barns to the standards of local dignity. Ferdinand smiled 
 as he looked at them and quickened his steps toward Agnes 
 home, which he thought he should like to pass on his way to 
 the hotel. He felt a sense of satisfaction that he had been 
 discerning enough to overlook much in Agnes circumstances 
 which would have deterred the ordinary man of his position 
 from making her his choice, and he relished the anticipation 
 of eventually displaying his discovery when he had relieved 
 her of her prejudices, cultivated her mind, and given her 
 person its proper setting. She was full of health and life, 
 of richness and roundness. Her very lack of development 
 attracted him, for it meant that she had but few false notions 
 to be rid of, and then he could freely train her into the per 
 fect woman for a man. She would be an ornament and a 
 comfort to his house, would stimulate and reward his efforts, 
 and, more than that, she could thrill him, at least for a time, 
 and a longer time than most husbands enjoyed. 
 
 Ferdinand s cup of contentment continued to fill as he 
 walked and thought, until at last he paused before the Sidney 
 house. It was a nice little house, he told himself, as he looked 
 at it, rather pretty with its vine-draped porch, old-fashioned 
 blinds, and little tucked-up office in one wing. He felt a 
 certain kinship with the poets who have sung of simple houses 
 and loves and hopes. They were not so far astray, after all ; 
 they only did not understand themselves so well as he under 
 stood. Ferdinand did not deceive himself in the least ; of that 
 he felt quite sure. 
 
 When at last he was once more indoors at the hotel he 
 put aside emotional and poetic, and therefore childish, things, 
 and set himself seriously to the manly business in hand, that 
 of surmounting the final and critical obstacle between him
 
 118 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 and the accomplishment of his purpose. Before he fell asleep 
 that night he had resolved how he should approach Mrs. 
 Sidney. 
 
 Ferdinand called upon Mrs. Sidney the next morning. As 
 he went up the steps of her home he drew out his watch, and 
 seeing that it lacked but a few minutes of noon, he appeared 
 satisfied. As he expected, he found Mrs. Sidney alone and 
 busy. Agnes was at the Buchers , giving a lesson to little 
 Alfred. 
 
 " Sit right down in the parlor and wait," said Mrs. Sidney 
 cordially. " Agnes will be home to dinner in half an hour 
 now. I ll just put on another plate for you. We re going 
 to have a roe shad. Old Peter Osgood brought it in this 
 morning." 
 
 " Thank you," answered Ferdinand, " but I am in haste. 
 I have only a few minutes in town. It is you whom I wished 
 to see." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney had stood waiting for his answer, and so 
 Ferdinand had not accepted her invitation to be seated. Now, 
 however, they both sat down, and each of the two strong 
 faces settled at once into seriousness. To his straightfor 
 ward request for Agnes hand Mrs. Sidney frankly stated 
 the one objection she had to an engagement. 
 
 " It would be hard for me to attend to my duties while in 
 a state of uncertainty as to my relations with Agnes," Ferdi 
 nand said after a pause, and she read in his face that what he 
 said was true. " I am not sure that we are so far apart as 
 you think in regard to religion. In fact, I have often thought, 
 Mrs. Sidney, that had our education been similar, we should 
 have been in entire accord. Am I to understand that the only 
 hesitation you have in accepting me, is in regard to my re 
 ligious views ? " 
 
 " Yes, Ferdinand, that s all," said Mrs. Sidney, meeting 
 the young man s gaze with friendly eyes. 
 
 Ferdinand regarded her not unkindly and said respect 
 fully, " When we last spoke of these matters, Mrs. Sidney, 
 you asked me to make an effort to bring myself into sym-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 119 
 
 pathy with the Christian religion. I may say I have since 
 done so." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney looked up quickly, and surprise gave way to 
 gratitude and joy in her expression. " God will bless you, 
 Ferdinand ! " she said at length fervently. " Knock and it 
 shall be opened unto you, seek and ye shall find. God s 
 promises are true." 
 
 " I cannot say that I am prepared to make a profession 
 of faith," continued Ferdinand carefully, " but I can say 
 this: if you will consent to this marriage, I promise you 
 now that it shall be the conscientious effort of my life to come 
 into sympathy with Agnes in all views, and most especially 
 in those pertaining to religion. I have for some years owned 
 a pew in the Presbyterian Church of Winston, but I have 
 rarely attended church. I will, however, do so from now on 
 with her. Until she and I are entirely in sympathy and I 
 may say that I have no doubt eventually we shall be I will 
 not permit myself to put the matter out of mind, or to relax 
 my efforts in seeking this unison of feeling." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s eyes were now overflowing. Surely God 
 had answered her prayers. " I can ask no more than that, 
 Ferdinand," she said, holding out her hand. " I would not 
 want you to join the church till your heart is dedicated to 
 the service of the Lord, but if you seek Him, you will find 
 Him. He has said so, and His words are true." 
 
 " I have your consent, then, to the marriage? " 
 
 She thought a moment, and then said, " You have my con 
 sent, Ferdinand, and my prayers. She is a good girl. She 
 was always like Stephen. He used to wake her up in the 
 night and take her out in the dining-room to play with her 
 when she was a little baby. When Helen was a baby he was 
 away in the war. Agnes hasn t got any money, Ferdinand, 
 but she s worthy of any man. She s been very good to me 
 since Stephen died." 
 
 During the pause which followed Mrs. Sidney s reminis 
 cences Ferdinand s quiet bearing suggested deference to 
 them.
 
 120 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Then he said, " I should like to marry her in a month." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney awoke to the present. " In a month ! " she 
 exclaimed involuntarily. 
 
 He waited again for her to adjust herself to his wishes, 
 then added, " I should like to take her to Europe, and my 
 business will let me off in the summer better than in the 
 winter." 
 
 " You want to marry her in a month. Four weeks ! " 
 
 Ferdinand went on with soothing impassivity. " I have 
 traveled considerably myself, but a trip of this sort would 
 be of inestimable advantage to Agnes. I shall, of course, 
 be able to provide for her abundantly. It will not be neces 
 sary for you to give yourself any trouble about prepara 
 tions." 
 
 " Agnes shall have everything a girl needs," answered 
 Mrs. Sidney briefly. " I wasn t thinking of that. A month 
 seems pretty soon, but Stephen never believed in long en 
 gagements." 
 
 She waited. It cost a struggle to say the word. 
 
 " I should like to engage our passage without delay," con 
 tinued Ferdinand, a slight urgency coloring his voice, and 
 he rose and took up his hat from the floor. " We shall cross 
 on the English line. It is the safest." 
 
 He stood waiting. Still Mrs. Sidney said nothing. Ferdi 
 nand saw that her mind was occupied. She was praying, 
 although her eyes were open. At last the answer came. 
 
 " Be good to her, Ferdinand," she said, and she looked up 
 to him with something of beseeching that indescribably sad 
 dened her face. " She was the apple of Stephen s eye." 
 
 " I shall make it an object of my life to do well by her," 
 he replied earnestly. 
 
 He went to the door alone, for she remained where she was 
 still silently praying. 
 
 Ferdinand waited an instant outside the gate. He felt 
 a strong pull toward Mr. Bucher s house. " Self-denial for 
 the present is the key of future success," he said grimly, and 
 he turned and walked to the station.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 MRS. SILAS BALLINGTON sat by her library table 
 fingering a blue-covered book with lettered edges. Her 
 hair rose in stately rolls from her forehead, and her face was 
 judicial. Tom Ballington was sitting at the other side of 
 the table. He looked straight before him at the floor; his 
 legs were stretched stiffly in front of him and his hands were 
 shoved into the pockets of his short morning-coat. Donald 
 stood in front of the empty grate, one foot nervously press 
 ing and re-pressing the crumpled corner of a handsome rug. 
 His face showed his distress, and he looked uneasily from his 
 mother to his brother. 
 
 " Here it is, Donald," said Mrs. Ballington, referring to 
 a page near the front and another near the middle of the 
 volume. " Here, in the front, it says the letters a-b-c, 
 * n-m-p, x-y-z, all mean slow payment. Now, over here in 
 the B s I read this : * Ballington Thomas F., Clerk in Bal 
 lington & Ballington Mnfrs. Car Springs x-y-z. Now, 
 Donald, doesn t that mean what I said, that your brother has 
 been advertised as a dishonest man ? " 
 
 " Well, hardly that, mother," Donald answered slowly. 
 " You take this a little too seriously. These trust-books are 
 issued every six months. I ve never seen Tom advertised in 
 one before. You haven t been, have you, Tom ? " 
 
 " Damned if I know ! " 
 
 Donald spoke again instantly. 
 
 " This doesn t necessarily mean any disgrace, mother. I m 
 sure I don t know who could have reported Tom, but we ll 
 see that " 
 
 " I tell you ! " exclaimed Tom, drawing up his knees sud 
 denly, " I know who did it ! It was " 
 
 121
 
 122 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Sh ! " said Donald, frowning. " You ve no right to say 
 that. Whoever he was, he shall be paid, mother. I m sorry 
 you should have found the book." 
 
 " I m very glad I found it," answered Mrs. Ballington 
 significantly. " I mean to see this matter cleared up. What 
 is the distinction in these letters * a-b-c, n-m-p, * x-y-z 
 all mean slow payment ? Why is the * x-y-z by Tom s 
 name? " 
 
 Tom jumped up, and thrust his fists deeper into his 
 pockets, curling in the edges of his jacket. " Oh, a-b-c 
 means * slow payment, " he said looking full at his mother, 
 " and n-m-p means * slower yet, and * x-y-z means 
 really, too damned slow, you know ! : 
 
 " Donald," said Mrs. Ballington, rising, " do you think 
 it s proper to allow your brother to use such language? You 
 are just as irresponsible as your father was." 
 
 Donald left the grate to open the door for his mother, but 
 as she was passing through he remarked with a worried ex 
 pression, " I don t like Tom s swearing any better than you 
 do, mother." 
 
 When the door closed after Mrs. Ballington he added to 
 Tom, " Since swearing is so inexpensive, I should think you 
 might drop it, Tom." 
 
 Tom made no reply. His gorge was rising, as it always 
 did on the periodical occasions when he had to ask Donald s 
 help. 
 
 Donald waited a moment, then inquired shortly, " How 
 much do you owe him? " 
 
 Tom turned on his heel instantly. " Owe whom? " 
 
 " You know." 
 
 " So you do think he did it ? " exclaimed Tom with exasper 
 ated triumph. 
 
 " I don t know who did it," Donald answered cloudily, 
 " but I think he d better be paid." 
 
 " Well," said Tom airily, " there s just one thing hinders 
 me from paying my debts, Donald." 
 
 " How much do you owe him ? " repeated Donald, unmoved
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 123 
 
 by his brother s attempt to introduce a little cheerful ease 
 into the conversation. 
 
 Tom s dogged manner came back upon him. " Somewhere 
 in the neighborhood of five hundred dollars." 
 
 " In the neighborhood of? Well, what does that mean? " 
 persisted Donald. 
 
 " It s eight hundred and fifteen without interest." 
 
 " And interest for how long? " 
 
 " About two years." 
 
 " Give it to me in months." Donald had taken his note 
 book and pencil from his pocket. 
 
 " Oh two years and nine months," exclaimed Tom vin 
 dictively. 
 
 The elder brother jotted down the figures. Then he went 
 up to the table, and made out a check to his brother s name. 
 
 " Now, Tom," he said earnestly, handing it to him, " you 
 let me see the receipt for this to-night. Don t buy any more 
 old jewelry until you have the money to pay for it, and let 
 this be the last time you go out of the family to borrow. 
 Not that I want to keep lending you money," he added on 
 second and wiser thought as he left his brother. 
 
 " You re a brick, Don," said Tom with the unction of 
 relief, and he folded and pocketed the check. Then the spirit 
 of the repentant moralist came upon him and he added, 
 " You re the wisest of us after all, Don. You always keep 
 out of trouble." 
 
 " God knows I have troubles enough," answered Donald 
 as he went out into the hall. 
 
 Tom stood by the table for some moments following his 
 mother s example in examining the trust-book. He let his 
 eyes run through the two names above his own. 
 
 " Ballington, Donald S. firm of Ballington" & Balling- 
 ton Mnfrs. Car Springs. H. G." 
 
 " Ballington, Ferdinand firm Ballington & Ballington 
 Mnfrs. Car Springs. G." 
 
 " H. G." muttered Tom, referring to the front page. " H. 
 Here it is prompt payment. G. G pays cash. Yes, I
 
 124 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 might have known it. The old spider would pay cash, of 
 course." He shut the book together spitefully, and carried 
 it to his own room. 
 
 When he again emerged he was dressed for the street. In 
 the lower hall he passed Donald, who was brushing his hat. 
 
 " Is Ferd to be at the office this morning ? " Tom asked in 
 a virtuously business-like tone, pausing near his brother. 
 
 Donald continued to brush. " I think not," he replied 
 with a preoccupied air. After a pause he added, " You ll 
 probably find him at the farm." 
 
 " Well, Don," said Tom benevolently, " if you brush that 
 hat any longer, you ll have a hole to hang it up by," and he 
 went out the front door whistling. 
 
 Donald flushed slightly and hung up the brush. He had 
 been turning over in his mind a thought that had troubled 
 him for some time and which was forced home upon him in 
 a new light by Tom s suspicion that it was their cousin 
 Ferdinand who had been the anonymous informer against a 
 member of his own firm. He was startled to see how in 
 stinctively he had felt the necessity of Tom s paying Ferdi 
 nand first of all his creditors. From Tom s relations with 
 Ferdinand, his mind leaped with growing anxiety to a 
 trouble that had lain in the background of his mind 
 for several weeks. He had observed the regularity of 
 Ferdinand s trips to Kent. Ferdinand always had shown so 
 little attention to women that this new development was all 
 the more noticeable. Donald knew, too, that there was no 
 doubt about Ferdinand s business promptitude in whatever 
 he did. This particular business was peculiarly harassing 
 to Donald; for, aside from his disappointment in the loss of 
 Agnes, he found himself looking forward with a foreboding 
 to the consequences to her of a closer than business relation 
 with his partner. 
 
 Ferdinand and he had been boys together, and he had 
 watched the growing apart of his own ideals and methods 
 from those of his cousin. They now had arrived at the point 
 where they were opposed along lines of religious thought
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 125 
 
 and in matters of sentiment. Even on questions of business 
 policy the partners were not rarely uncomfortably at vari 
 ance, and Donald realized that nothing except his own con 
 trol of a large part of the firm s money enabled him to com 
 pete with Ferdinand s iron will. He dreaded a situation for 
 a woman where Ferdinand s will would meet with no financial 
 check. Ferdinand s agnosticism, too, assumed even graver 
 proportions than was its wont. So did his utilitarian at 
 titude on questions of sentiment. These things always had 
 worried him, but now he found himself speculating upon 
 other things which he never had allowed himself before to 
 think about. In short, Ferdinand s character had been 
 assuming in Donald s mind a vital significance as it ap 
 proached Agnes Sidney. This anxiety was now overshadow 
 ing his brotherly worry about Tom. 
 
 Meantime Tom went whistling on his way to the farm, 
 but as he neared it his whistling dwindled and died away. 
 His relief at being able to pay his cousin began to be counter 
 acted by several chronic grudges. Added to these, he natu 
 rally thought of a new one. He, too, had noticed Ferdinand s 
 trips to Kent, he remembered the advent of Ferdinand and 
 Agnes together at Beatrice s supper party, and he now 
 worked himself up to quite a state of disinterested indigna 
 tion. Donald s late generosity added fuel to his wrath at 
 Ferdinand s success where Donald had failed. 
 
 As he drew near the old Ballington homestead where Ferdi 
 nand lived, his feelings reached an inflammable state. The 
 place had been originally a farm, and, although it had lost 
 most of the signs of its rural origin, it was still outside the 
 city limits. Tom remembered it as it had been when Ferdi 
 nand s father was living. The brick wall that shut it out 
 from the road had been overgrown with a tangled luxuriance 
 of woodbine, wild grape-vine, wild buckwheat, wild clematis, 
 wild morning-glory. Climbing honeysuckle and bitter-sweet 
 had also dropped down and rooted in the interstices. Wasps 
 nests gave a pleasing excitement to certain parts of the wall. 
 Humming-birds whirred and drummed around it in the
 
 126 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 summer. Tom remembered the rapture with which he 
 had watched their green and bronze wings and the fruit 
 less searches he had made for their tiny nests. He remem 
 bered the big, poppy-colored wings of the butterflies that 
 used to flutter aimlessly over the blossoms and the blunder 
 ing humble-bees stumbling around the stamens and pistils, 
 so loaded with pollen that they could hardly walk, but work 
 ing with an intensity that put the sweating plowman to 
 shame. In the angle of the wall some sumachs had started, 
 and Tom remembered how his Uncle Tom had watched them 
 spread with the meditative remark that he supposed he ought 
 to cut them out before they took in the whole door-yard, 
 but that it was written that the wicked should flourish and 
 that he thought such wickedness was rather ornamental. The 
 unkempt walls, the sumach thicket and all the wealth of insect 
 and bird life that they harbored were like a fairyland in the 
 background of Tom s memory. Now as he approached the 
 familiar spot and saw the bare bricks with a row of iron 
 spikes along the top, a straight stone walk between the 
 avenue of cedars leading to the house where once an old dirt 
 path had straggled, carpeted by cedar needles which muffled 
 the tread, and a symmetrical, artificial seat where the old 
 broken willow had swayed with the breeze, his anger burned 
 within him to think of all that sweetness and grace banished 
 by the hand of law and order. 
 
 One sole apple-tree remained to welcome him of all the 
 original fruit-trees which formerly had occupied the yard. 
 This was a concession to the tears and entreaties of Miss 
 Margaret Ballington, Ferdinand s aunt and foster-mother. 
 The tree had been planted when she was born, and she, like it, 
 was now the only survivor of her generation. The little old 
 lady felt real kinship with the gnarled but stately and spread 
 ing branches which brushed the eaves of the house, sending 
 an odorous breath through the south-side windows the fra 
 grance of flowers in springtime, and the more than Arabian 
 Spitzenberg perfume in autumn. 
 
 As Tom lifted the latch of the freshly-painted iron gate
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 127 
 
 which now interposed a barrier where formerly ingress and 
 egress had been hospitably free to all, he caught sight 
 through the bars of his cousin Ferdinand superintending the 
 clipping of his cone-like cedar trees, which were being re- 
 trimmed into symmetrical smoothness. The ground was 
 covered with the newly-cropped twigs and the aromatic odor 
 of resin filled the air. Tom stopped, picked a long grass, 
 mechanically placed it between his teeth, passed inside, 
 and closed the gate with a vicious click behind him. As he 
 approached Ferdinand the latter looked up, but they evi 
 dently felt no necessity of saluting each other. Tom paused 
 by Ferdinand s side and the two looked on in silence at the 
 gardener. 
 
 At length Tom made an indignant gesture toward the 
 trees. "Do you like that?" he asked shortly. 
 
 " Do you mean the trimming ? " inquired Ferdinand im 
 passively. 
 
 " That s what I mean." 
 
 Ferdinand eyed his companion gravely a moment, noting 
 his ill-humor. Then he said quietly, " Evidently." 
 
 " Well, I don t ! " 
 
 Ferdinand walked away a little and pointed out to the 
 gardener a sprig which projected beyond the others. Then, 
 returning to Tom s side, he asked without seeming interest, 
 " What is your objection to it? " 
 
 " It s like slitting a dog s ears and docking a horse s tail 
 and tattooing the human body. It s a mark of barbarism. 
 This used to be the finest row of double trees in the Atlantic 
 States, and you have made them look like a lot of funeral 
 dunce-caps." 
 
 Ferdinand did not answer. 
 
 Presently Tom said again, " Seen Field s Trust-Book this 
 month?" 
 
 " No," said the other, a flash crossing his steady eyes. 
 
 After a moment Tom continued with rising color, " You 
 ought to look at it. You d find something there that would 
 interest you, although it s about only me."
 
 128 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " How so ? " inquired Ferdinand. 
 
 " I guess you know as well as I do." 
 
 The other made no reply. 
 
 " Nobody would ever take you to be the son of a Balling- 
 ton," Tom declared, his face still hotter as his eyes traveled 
 again from the cedars to the row of spikes along the wall. 
 In his mind these objects were irrelevantly connected with 
 the trust-book. " No Ballington would ever do such a dirt- 
 mean trick as you ve done me. You lured me into borrowing 
 that money in the first place. It gave you a handle on me. 
 Well, it didn t work, did it! So you took it out of me. If 
 you didn t have my Uncle Tom s blood in you, I d punch the 
 head off of you ! " 
 
 The subject of these belligerent remarks remained in his 
 place a few seconds, surveying his cousin coolly. Then he 
 turned and walked toward the house. 
 
 " Hold on there ! " cried Tom, overtaking him. " Here s 
 your money. I ll go inside and take a receipt ! " 
 
 It was the first time for years that Tom had allowed him 
 self the luxury of using the kind of language to Ferdinand 
 he always wanted to use. The check in his pocket gave him 
 the feeling of financial independence necessary to proper 
 self-expression. 
 
 Ferdinand hesitated. " Very well," he answered, resuming 
 his walk at the same gait. 
 
 As they went up the steps to the old-fashioned front door 
 Tom remarked with sardonic surprise, " I see you ve left on 
 grandfather s old brass knocker! What did you do that for? 
 Nobody uses it, since you ve got the electric button." 
 
 " It s a valuable piece of brass," said Ferdinand indiffer 
 ently. " You know as well as I do that they re putting 
 knockers on all the new houses." 
 
 Ferdinand opened the door as he spoke and went in. They 
 passed down the wide hall and turned into the library. The 
 heavy furniture was arranged symmetrically along the walls, 
 as Tom always had remembered it. It was the arrangement 
 that Ferdinand s mother had inaugurated, and it had stayed
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 129 
 
 the same during the easy-going years following her death, 
 when Ferdinand s father had been in control, only because 
 it couldn t grow into change as the yard had done. 
 
 Tom stood looking on darkly while Ferdinand sat down 
 and made out a receipt. 
 
 He took the paper when it was completed and read it osten 
 tatiously before folding it up and putting it in his pocket- 
 book. " I wanted to be sure the date was right," he said. 
 " I see you neglected to put down the hour of the day." 
 
 Ferdinand said nothing as he passed around the table on 
 his way to the door. 
 
 " They ve reported me in Field s this month. You re at 
 the bottom of that ! " Tom exploded. 
 
 Ferdinand paused, turned round. 
 
 " You re mistaken about that," he returned coldly. 
 
 " No, I m not mistaken, either, and you know it ! " said 
 Tom, chafing under the futility of words to express his 
 feelings. 
 
 Ferdinand s face grew a shade paler. " I m glad you are 
 reported," he said, keeping his unwinking gaze on the young 
 man s flushed face. " But I had nothing to do with it." 
 
 He turned away as he spoke, went into the hall and up the 
 stairs. Tom was left alone with the receipt in his pocket. 
 Ferdinand had the better of him again in manner, and he also 
 had his money. Tom felt the loss of the money more keenly 
 than he did the loss of his temper. A new exasperation 
 rushed in upon him. Why had he not asked Donald to give 
 him a little more, while he was about it? The sting of poverty 
 followed too closely upon his late affluence. He ejaculated 
 something under his breath, jammed his hat down over his 
 eyes, and went out doors, taking care, however, to close the 
 front door gently behind him. He knew Ferdinand was 
 expecting it to slam.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 next day after Tom s interview with Ferdinand 
 Donald was sitting in the neat office of Ballington & 
 Ballington trying to work. At last he gave it up with a 
 sigh and leaned back in his chair. What was the use of 
 working when he had something else to do and it was only a 
 fewminute^ now before it must be done? Over night he had come 
 to the decision that it was his duty to talk to Ferdinand upon 
 a subject from which he shrank with inexpressible reluctance. 
 It was upon the vital question of the relations which might 
 exist between his partner and Agnes Sidney. To the natural 
 delicacy he would have felt toward such an interference 
 under ordinary circumstances there was added the objection 
 that his motives would probably be misconstrued, thus 
 vitiating any success he might hope to have. He feared 
 that it never had dawned upon Ferdinand that a girl brought 
 up as Agnes had been would suffer intensely in endeavoring 
 to relate her own standard of conduct to different ones of her 
 husband. Donald had appreciated a deepening and develop 
 ing in Agnes following upon her father s death. He remem 
 bered her manner and the look she gave him when she refused 
 him finally. If he had not seen that look his duty would by 
 no means have been clear to him, but now there seemed laid 
 upon him the moral responsibility of pointing out to Ferdi 
 nand what it was which he was about to take into charge ; of 
 suggesting to him that the inevitable adjustment which must 
 be made between two persons who are to live together must 
 be a mutual one. 
 
 Donald almost had worked himself up during his night s 
 vigil to the point of going to Kent and expounding his 
 cousin s character to Mrs. Sidney, but with the first rays of 
 the rising sun he realized the impracticability of such an act. 
 Moreover, a sincere concern for Ferdinand himself had warned 
 
 130
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 131 
 
 him from interfering in a series of events which might lead 
 to his cousin s religious awakening. To Donald s knowledge 
 Ferdinand never had come under the influence of love, and 
 Donald often had used this to explain in the other what he 
 did not admire. 
 
 He was nervously turning over in his mind the best way 
 of opening the subject when he heard Ferdinand s character 
 istic step approaching the door. With the feeling that a 
 crisis was upon them he turned in his chair as his cousin 
 entered the room. 
 
 As he lifted his troubled but resolute face to greet Ferdi 
 nand he met in the other an expression of justified self-satis 
 faction, the look of one who knows himself to be a true 
 prophet. This look of Ferdinand s checked the words which 
 were already on Donald s lips. 
 
 Ferdinand walked over to his desk, seated himself, and said, 
 tilting his head backwards to look at Donald, " Well, the 
 bank s shut down ! " 
 
 " Is that so ? " Donald exclaimed with reaction of mood. 
 
 " Yes. It came a little earlier than I thought it would. I 
 thought Balch would hold out another month. Well, we got 
 out just in time, didn t we? My prophecy wasn t far off." 
 
 Donald looked at the floor thoughtfully. It was true 
 Ferdinand had prophesied this, and he himself had yielded 
 unwillingly to Ferdinand s insistence that they should with 
 draw all the firm s funds from the bank. He was about to 
 acknowledge frankly his cousin s superior judgment when a 
 second thought stopped him. 
 
 Presently he spoke, " Balch will say that it was our with 
 drawal that broke him." 
 
 " I suppose so." 
 
 " He expected to tide over his difficulty. Our move proba 
 bly caused the run." 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 Then Donald continued with feeling, "I do think we 
 might have helped him. The use of a moderate sum very 
 likely would have pulled him through, and it wouldn t have
 
 132 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 hurt us any. I m sorry for Balch. I didn t think this really 
 was going to happen. He s an honorable man, and I ve 
 always thought he was a good manager. You thought so, 
 too, two years ago, when you put our money into Balch s 
 hands." 
 
 An unpleasant expression crossed Ferdinand s face. " I 
 saw he had a chance to add twenty-five per cent, to his capi 
 tal without the slightest risk. He failed to do it with his 
 eyes open. I saw he was no business man and made up my 
 mind then." 
 
 Donald did not reply. He was thinking that the announce 
 ment of Balch s failure was especially ill-timed as a prelude 
 to the conversation he intended to have with Ferdinand, 
 because it had apparently demonstrated Ferdinand s good 
 sense. His own dissatisfaction with the methods employed 
 by this good sense would count for nothing in face of their 
 practical results. 
 
 " Is that Ferguson s new brand of cigars over there ? " 
 Ferdinand asked after a moment. 
 
 Donald glanced at the box absent-mindedly, "I believe 
 it is." 
 
 There was another pause. 
 
 " They say Balch has been running his affairs on bor 
 rowed capital at the rate of nine thousand a year for four 
 years. I suppose Mott has been behind him." Again Ferdi 
 nand s voice prevented Donald s beginning on the subject 
 uppermost in his mind. 
 
 " That s bad ! " Donald said with real distress in his voice. 
 "It doesn t seem like Balch." He added after a moment, 
 "What is the talk in town?" 
 
 " Sympathy for the college mostly. Isn t that just like a 
 sectarian institution, to put all its eggs in one basket ? " 
 
 " Doesn t Balch expect to meet his creditors after a little? " 
 asked Donald with growing hopelessness. 
 
 "There s no telling," replied Ferdinand indifferently. 
 
 He did not turn to his work, and presently he remarked, 
 " I believe I ll try one of those cigars."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 133 
 
 Donald passed him the box and his cousin selected a cigar 
 carefully and lighted it. 
 
 " Ferguson knows a good cigar," he said, after puffing for 
 some moments. " Curious what poison most people will draw 
 into their circulation, isn t it?" 
 
 Donald sat looking at Ferdinand without saying any 
 thing. 
 
 Ferdinand observed it, and, leaning forward to knock the 
 cigar ash into a silver tray, said with a slight hardening of 
 tone, " There is something else I wanted to speak to you 
 about." 
 
 An intuition that he had lost his opportunity flashed across 
 Donald s mind. "What is it?" he asked briefly. 
 
 " I suppose you know why I have been going to Kent 
 lately," said Ferdinand, still needlessly tapping his cigar on 
 the edge of the tray. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Agnes wanted you to know it at once. We are engaged." 
 
 A wave of bitter rebellion surged up in Donald s breast. 
 His emotions checked his utterance; the primeval instinct of 
 jealousy, the protective instinct toward Agnes, and a feel 
 ing of helplessness in the hands of fate. It took him some 
 time to master himself. 
 
 Ferdinand watched him not unkindly, and as soon as he 
 thought that he could finish, he added, " I am going to marry 
 her in about a month." 
 
 Donald felt that his mouth was closed. 
 
 Ferdinand, out of consideration, continued to bear the bur 
 den of conversation. " Yes. I want to get her away from 
 there. She has to work hard, and in addition her mother is 
 very exacting." 
 
 As Donald s expression did not change, Ferdinand ended 
 more slowly, " I think you ought not to feel that I have taken 
 any advantage of you. I did not approach her until your 
 attentions to her had ceased." 
 
 "I have nothing to complain of in that respect," said 
 Donald with dignity ; " she never would have married me."
 
 134 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 After a pause Ferdinand began speaking again. " I am 
 expecting to take her to Europe for three or four months," 
 he said. "I think I can be absent just now without causing 
 much inconvenience." 
 
 " Yes," said Dqpald slowly, " business is dull this time of 
 year." 
 
 " I wouldn t care to go again myself," Ferdinand went on. 
 " I saw all I wanted to see when I went over two years ago, 
 but it will mean a good deal for Agnes. It will broaden her 
 out amazingly. She needs culture." 
 
 Donald was stung at this unequivocal language concerning 
 the girl they both loved. " It s rather strange you should 
 have been attracted by so crude a girl," he said bitterly. 
 
 Ferdinand regarded him seriously, and answered after a 
 pause, " No. Agnes is a wholesome girl and she has charm. 
 You can see from her mother that her health is likely to last. 
 These cultured town girls won t be able to compete with 
 Agnes in a few years." After a moment he added with a 
 shrewd smile, " A man ought not to pick out his wife for five 
 years when the chances are he ll live with her forty. Agnes 
 may start handicapped, but she ll win out in the long run. 
 She s sound." His satisfaction deepened upon reflection. 
 " Mrs. Sidney is a hale old lady still, a good deal better pre 
 served than most women fifteen years her junior. Agnes 
 comes of good sturdy stock. This little New York girl Staf 
 ford has married will be about as animated as a piece of chalk 
 by the time she s thirty. By that time Stafford will be bank 
 rupt. Why can t people use some business sense in getting 
 married ? " 
 
 There was a moment s silence. 
 
 Then Donald turned to his companion with a gravity which 
 at once caught the other s attention. " I believe you never 
 met Agnes father, Dr. Sidney ? " 
 
 Both of them were conscious that Donald s voice had a 
 tenseness unusual to it. 
 
 Ferdinand fell on guard. " No, I never did. He treated 
 my father at one time. I never happened to meet him."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 135 
 
 Donald leaned forward. He realized that he had let slip 
 the chance of influencing events before they had come to 
 pass. He had tried to speak several times, but circumstances 
 always had thwarted him. It would have been worse than 
 useless to open the subject when Ferdinand was in certain 
 moods, and on two occasions, when his cousin seemed especially 
 open to appeal, vexatious interruptions had come between 
 them. Donald had tormented himself, too, with self -accusa 
 tions of procrastination and cowardice. He had rebuked him 
 self for not making opportunity, for his ineptitude in deal 
 ing with hindrances as they arose. The burden of Agnes 
 future had come to rest heavier and heavier upon him until 
 he almost morbidly regarded himself as responsible for her 
 happiness. His decision to speak now was the result of a 
 reckless impulse to ease his conscience at any cost. It took 
 this form toward Ferdinand. It was to take a more delib 
 erate form toward Agnes. 
 
 "There s something I want to say to you, Ferdinand, 
 about Agnes relations v,ith her father. As you never met 
 him, it s impossible that you should know how much he stands 
 for in Agnes life, how largely he has formed her character. 
 Her ideas of conscience and duty are bound up with her 
 memory of him, and there is therefore something peculiarly 
 sacred and sensitive about them. Of course you have found 
 out that the way she and her mother look at things is opposite 
 to your own in many respects." Donald paused and grew a 
 shade paler as he nerved himself for the next sentence. "I 
 have always known you, Ferdinand, and, much as I admire 
 you in many ways, I think you have it in you to make a woman 
 like Agnes as miserable as it is possible for her to be, unless 
 you treat her with more sympathy than I ever have observed 
 in you." 
 
 Ferdinand sat still, looking through the window. 
 
 Donald continued deliberately, " You are in love with 
 Agnes now, and I believe that that has led you to disguise 
 from her and her mother some of your most cherished 
 theories. Otherwise I don t believe that Mrs. Sidney or even
 
 136 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes herself would consent to this betrothal. It would 
 make me very happy," Donald continued in a gentler tone, 
 " to believe that they see deeper into you and know you bet 
 ter than I do ; and that is, of course, quite possible." 
 
 He paused, but Ferdinand still looked through the window. 
 
 Presently Donald drew a long breath as he resumed, " Well, 
 Ferdinand, I ve just one excuse for saying this to-day. It 
 ought to have been said before. God knows I ve tried enough 
 times. I dread the effect upon Agnes of awaking from an 
 illusion. If you have allowed one to arise," he said slowly 
 and significantly, "let it continue." Then, shocked at. his 
 own cynicism, he added hurriedly, "Live up always to what 
 you feel now." 
 
 Ferdinand turned his face long enough to give Donald a 
 glance. 
 
 Donald s heart beat heavily. 
 
 Ferdinand made as though he were going to reply, then he 
 turned resolutely to the window again. Had he spoken, what 
 he would have said is this : " In other words that is, in plain 
 words you are a jealous man using Christian terms." 
 
 The sound of a carriage driving up outside arrested Ferdi 
 nand s attention. He walked over to the window, then turned 
 back to Donald. " Here comes your mother," he said, and 
 he tossed his cigar into the ash-tray. 
 
 The door was opened by Mrs. Ballington in great excite 
 ment. Her state of mind was further evidenced by her attire, 
 of which she was ordinarily scrupulous. She had thrown on 
 hurriedly an amorphous cape over an elaborate morning- 
 dress. 
 
 " Did you know the bank has failed ? " she asked in a flurry 
 of her son. 
 
 " Ferdinand has just told me so," answered Donald. 
 
 " What about the firm ? " she continued breathlessly. 
 
 " We withdrew our funds Friday." 
 
 " So that s true ! " She sank into a chair with an expres 
 sion of relief. Then she sat up again, demanding, " Why was 
 this kept from me? "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 137 
 
 " It wasn t kept from you, mother," said Donald with an 
 unhappy gesture. " I intended to tell you, but I ve had a 
 good many things on my mind. Besides, we had no idea this 
 would come so soon." 
 
 " It looks very much as though you did know it. They are 
 saying all over town that Balch made the firm a preferred 
 creditor. There s a crowd around the bank now. When I 
 drove by some of the men called out at me." 
 
 Donald flushed and reached hesitatingly for his hat. " I 
 never would allow the firm to benefit at the expense of the sav 
 ings of workingmen." 
 
 " I wouldn t go over to the bank now," Ferdinand remarked 
 with a slight smile. " Some bright person in the crowd will be 
 sure to recollect, if he is given time, that a bank can t make 
 preferred creditors." 
 
 Donald still hesitated. 
 
 " It s always rash to face a mob," Ferdinand continued. 
 He flicked some cigar ashes from his light trousers. 
 
 Donald sat down again. 
 
 " Of course disagreeable things will be said about the firm," 
 finished Ferdinand. " I don t see that that need worry us." 
 
 " How did you know Balch was going under ? " asked 
 Donald. 
 
 Ferdinand met his cousin s gaze easily. " By having eyes 
 to see, and seeing. I believe I keep Scripture better than 
 you, Donald." 
 
 " He didn t mention anything of the kind to you, did he? " 
 Donald persisted. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " I was intending to call at the bank to draw some money 
 on McMaster s check," said Mrs. Ballington. " Can you cash 
 it, Donald?" 
 
 "For how much?" 
 
 " Two hundred." 
 
 " I can," volunteered Ferdinand, as Donald hesitated. He 
 went into an inner room where the safe was kept and soon 
 returned with the money.
 
 138 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 During his short absence Donald had striven to force him 
 self into communicating the other piece of news to his mother. 
 It was not till his cousin s return, however, that he succeeded. 
 " Ferdinand has just told me, mother," he said stiffly, " that 
 Agnes Sidney and he are engaged." 
 
 "Indeed!" said Mrs. Ballington with a cool stare at her 
 nephew. He returned her gaze civilly. Unwilling as she 
 had been that Donald should marry Agnes, she was nettled at 
 its being prevented by this means. 
 
 Just as she was leaving the office she turned back. " Does 
 Margaret know ? " she asked significantly. 
 
 " Donald is the first one I have told," returned Ferdinand, 
 and he stepped forward to open the door for her. 
 
 After Ferdinand closed the door behind her the two men 
 without any further conversation seated themselves at their 
 desks and began to write. The minds of both, however, were 
 busy with other thoughts than business. Ferdinand, with the 
 triumphant satisfaction of the successful lover, was again 
 dwelling upon that first look of passion and self-surrender 
 with which Agnes had met him in the corridor at Fred Sid 
 ney s house. Donald, on the other hand, continued to brood 
 upon the look of awakened conscience and self-abnegation he 
 had caught in her face the first time he had seen her after her 
 father s death. As the two wrote on with automaton-like 
 regularity nothing was heard in the office but the ticking 
 of the clock and the scratching of pens. 
 
 Meantime Mrs. Ballington went out to the carriage, where 
 she found Tom talking familiarly with the coachman. He 
 included her genially in the discussion as he stepped forward 
 to help her into the carriage. 
 
 " Well, mother, John tells me the bank is bust ! " 
 
 Mrs. Ballington made room upon the seat and beckoned 
 him into the carriage. After an instant s hesitation Tom 
 entered and his mother directed the coachman to drive around 
 the block. 
 
 After they had started, she said in a low but impressive 
 voice, " Tom, Ferdinand and Agnes Sidney are engaged."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 139 
 
 Tom sat silent while his face turned a dark crimson. 
 
 " Well, I wish her more j oy than she s likely to get," he 
 said at length. " A girl that will turn down Donald for 
 Ferdinand deserves Ferdinand." The last words came out 
 with a vindictive click. A moment later he added more 
 calmly, " My sympathies go to Aunt Margaret. You mark 
 my word, she ll be put out somewhere to board." 
 
 Mrs. Ballington considered. This was a new idea. The 
 position of Ferdinand s aunt and foster-mother had seemed 
 a natural and permanent one in the family. 
 
 " Tom," she said finally, " Ferdinand never would dare 
 to turn Margaret out of doors. Why, she was born in that 
 house ! " 
 
 " What if she was born there ? " replied her son moodily. 
 "Ferdinand owns the house. The idea of his owning that 
 house! It might as well be a car-barn for all the sentiment 
 he has toward it. Here are Aunt Margaret and I, who 
 really love it, and we have to see the vines dug up and the 
 trees dug out and the walk weeded and stoned and the fence 
 spiked as though it were a prison court-yard. I declare it 
 just drives me to the devil to think of that! And he knows 
 it ! He knows it ! He only keeps the house because Donald 
 tried to buy it, and so he can clip those evergreens. When 
 I went there yesterday and walked up the avenue to the front 
 door, it was exactly as though I were going through the 
 graveyard up to the family vault. I wonder if I ever shall 
 have the privilege of attending Ferd s funeral there? " he 
 ended, in a kind of black reverie. 
 
 They finished the circuit of the block in silence, and drew 
 up again in front of the office door. 
 
 " Well," said Tom philosophically, as he left the carriage, 
 " it must be a relief to you, mother, to get Agnes Sidney 
 married. Don s safe now, at last." 
 
 Then he turned to the driver and added, " Drive home by 
 Linton Avenue, John. Don t go past the bank." 
 
 Mrs. Ballington settled back on her cushions, raised her 
 lorgnette to her near-sighted eyes, and passed in state up
 
 140 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Linton Avenue. But the state was only outward. Within 
 she was upset. It was even more humiliating to have Donald 
 refused by a country doctor s daughter than to have him 
 marry one; it was especially bitter to her to reflect that 
 Agnes had achieved a double victory. She not only had re 
 fused Donald, but by marrying Ferdinand she would still 
 attain a social prominence equaling that of Mrs. Ballington 
 herself. 
 
 As they reached a wide curve of the road which led toward 
 the eastern suburbs, a thought came to her. " John," she 
 said, " you may drive me out to the farm." 
 
 The man turned obediently and presently drew up in front 
 of the old Ballington residence. 
 
 " I should think, with all the other improvements," Mrs. 
 Ballington muttered as she descended from the carriage, 
 " that Ferdinand would have a drive-way put in here." 
 
 She went up the walk to the front door, noticing with un 
 willing approval the alterations in the place which had so 
 infuriated Tom. She mounted the front steps clumsily, im 
 peded by her morning-gown. The door stood ajar. She 
 stood a moment to breathe after her hasty walk from the 
 carriage, then pushed open the door and entered uncere 
 moniously. 
 
 " Margaret ! " she called in the voice of one who bringeth 
 tidings. 
 
 An inner door was opened hastily in answer to the sum 
 mons and Miss Margaret Ballington, with a startled look on 
 her face, stepped out into the hall. " Is that you, Sarah ? 
 Why, what s the matter? " 
 
 Of the two women a stranger easily would have taken Miss 
 Margaret to be the mother of Donald Ballington, had it not 
 been for an unmistakable air of withered maidenhood about 
 her. Her face had the same fair symmetry and her eyes 
 and hair were like his grown old. She was a fragile creature, 
 as transparent as a frosted flower, and withal she had some 
 thing of the flower s unconscious innocence. 
 
 " Is there anybody around here? " asked Mrs. Ballington.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 141 
 
 "No. Why? What is it?" said Miss Ballington in a 
 flutter of nervous surprise. 
 
 " Margaret Ballington, will you promise not to let anyone 
 know I ve told you, if I tell you something now? " 
 
 The widow spoke with such solemnity that Miss Mar 
 garet s nervousness became trepidation. " Yes. I won t 
 speak of it. What is it? Sit down somewhere. Let s go in 
 here." . 
 
 She turned and led the way into the green parlor. It was 
 the room in which she had been born. 
 
 " What is it? " she repeated breathlessly, sitting down on 
 a green lounge with a rustle of her lawn skirts. 
 
 Simultaneously her visitor seated herself upon the edge 
 of a large rep chair, and punctuated the ensuing conversa 
 tion with dabs and fluent waves of her lorgnette. 
 
 " You ll probably hear it from Ferdinand to-night. You 
 know that girl I ve been afraid Donald was going to marry? 
 Well, Ferdinand is going to marry her." 
 
 Miss Margaret leaned forward with a horror-stricken 
 face and began to tremble. " Ferdinand ? Ferdinand ? " she 
 said confusedly. " Is Ferdinand going to marry? How do 
 you know he is? He d never marry a variety singer such as 
 you said she was. No, Ferdinand wouldn t. He doesn t like 
 music." 
 
 The satisfaction which Mrs. Ballington felt in the success 
 of her communication acted as a healing balm. She settled 
 herself back more comfortably in her chair to enjoy Miss 
 Margaret s dismay. Her lorgnette made an almost benevo 
 lent circuit through the air as she replied, " Yes, he is, Mar 
 garet. He is. He s told me so himself. I thought of course 
 he had told you first. I came out at once to find out what 
 you are going to do about it." 
 
 Little Miss Ballington sat as one stunned. She had 
 looked forward vaguely to something of this kind, but it 
 had come without warning. She was more hurt by the fact 
 that Ferdinand had not given her his confidence than she was 
 by the engagement, dreadful as that seemed to her.
 
 142 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 After a moment she spoke with trembling lips, with a 
 pathetic effort at dignity. " There is but one thing for me 
 to do, Sarah. That is to receive Ferdinand s wife." Then 
 she broke off with a look of indecision and entreaty. " What 
 should you think I ought to do, Sarah? Perhaps the girl 
 isn t all bad. I ve always said that when it came to it, I 
 should greet Ferdinand s wife kindly. It shouldn t make 
 any difference with my staying here here where I was born. 
 Should you think it ought ? " 
 
 The lorgnette was folded portentously. " What 7 think, 
 unfortunately for you, Margaret, isn t going to regulate 
 this matter. I think you are in a very painful position." 
 
 Miss Margaret s distress approached a tearful state. 
 " Ferdinand has always been very considerate to me, very. 
 You know that everyone has said that we get along together 
 wonderfully. I ve always thought no one else quite under 
 stood Ferdinand. You know I love him as though he were 
 my own child. I ve learned how to take him, too. Can you 
 smell that chicken cooking in here? " 
 
 The last sentence was spoken with an abrupt change of 
 voice. The fussiness of the housekeeper for the moment put 
 to flight less immediate troubles. 
 
 " I don t think I can perceive it," answered Mrs. Balling- 
 ton, sniffing, and then she started on a new tack suggested 
 by the last remark. 
 
 " When the household gets a new mistress, things won t 
 be as they are now. The piano will be all littered up with 
 
 music and she will be " Mrs. Ballington hesitated for an 
 
 effective word. " Carousing," she said at length, " with her 
 mother and that deformed aunt, all over the house in here, 
 in the sitting-room, in the spare bed-room." The lorgnette 
 located the scenes of future dissipation. 
 
 Miss Ballington winced. Presently she rallied bravely. 
 " I have considerable hope for the young girl," she volun 
 teered. " General Mott spoke very highly of her father. He 
 called him a most estimable man a most estimable man a 
 man of very great skill in his profession, though a little im-
 
 143 
 
 practical in a business way. But many of us are impractical, 
 Sarah. I should not look down on Dr. Sidney for that. It 
 was his nephew whom Beatrice married, you know." 
 
 " Yes, I know it was. These Sidneys seem to have a 
 faculty for wriggling into rich families." 
 
 " You don t think the girl is going to marry Ferdinand 
 for his money, do you ? " cried Miss Ballington in alarm. 
 
 Her sister-in-law laughed unpleasantly. " What else 
 would she marry him for? " 
 
 A look of shocked bewilderment greeted this last remark. 
 "What else would she marry him for? " Miss Margaret re 
 peated vaguely ; " why, love, of course. If I were a girl, I 
 can understand how " She stopped in painful embar 
 rassment. 
 
 Miss Margaret had taken care of her nephew from the 
 time of his mother s death, when he was but six years old. He 
 never had been a dependent child, and upon his father s death, 
 when he was but halfway through his teens, he quite naturally 
 had succeeded him as the head of the house, Miss Mar 
 garet becoming a mere figurehead. Miss Margaret, quite 
 as naturally, gave him all she had to give, and loved him 
 the more for it. She lavished upon him all the wealth of 
 maternal sentiment of which her starved heart was capable, 
 and, in addition, idealized him with the unfulfilled longings 
 of her girlhood. 
 
 A moment later she was struck by another thought, and 
 exclaimed, " You don t think Miss Sidney is in love with Don 
 ald still? 
 
 " I judge not. Tom says it s probable she never was in 
 love with him. It might have been just his money. But I m 
 inclined to think there was a passing infatuation." 
 
 " How happy you must feel for Donald ! " Miss Margaret 
 said sadly. 
 
 There was no reply. 
 
 " Do you know how soon how soon Ferdinand will be 
 married ? " she asked with difficulty. 
 
 " No. But I presume it will be soon." Mrs. Ballington
 
 144 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 spoke with the cool impartiality of a judge sentencing a 
 criminal to hang by the neck till he is dead. 
 
 " Do you think that he is that he is happy ? " persisted 
 the wretched woman. 
 
 " I presume he feels a satisfaction in being the successful 
 rival for Agnes Sidney. Difficulty adds a good deal of zest 
 to courtship." 
 
 Miss Ballington half rose. " You misjudge him, Sarah. 
 He wouldn t enjoy hurting Donald. You never understood 
 Ferdinand." 
 
 " He s just like her," replied Mrs. Silas, with a wave of her 
 lorgnette at an old-fashioned portrait hanging over the 
 lounge upon which Miss Margaret sat. 
 
 Miss Margaret always spoke of Ferdinand s dead mother 
 as " Estelle." Mrs. Ballington rarely mentioned the name, 
 but everyone in the family knew of whom she was speaking, 
 when, with a peculiar intonation always employed in this con 
 nection, she said " she " and " her." 
 
 " Estelle was misjudged, too," Miss Ballington said in a 
 low voice with a twinge of memory. 
 
 " You know you never liked her," insisted Mrs. Ballington 
 acrimoniously. "You were always complaining of her." 
 
 " I did not mean to complain of her." 
 
 " Oh, well, it s what would have been called complaining 
 from any of the rest of us. Of course you never complain." 
 
 "Perhaps I do. I have long thought that I misjudged 
 her, too. She wasn t like other women. The Landseers are 
 all different from other people. But Estelle was a very bril 
 liant woman. Thomas, you know, said his wife had more 
 brains than all the Ballington family put together. Per 
 haps he was right, Sarah. Perhaps he was right. We were 
 not qualified to appreciate her. Just the invention of the 
 car-spring, now " 
 
 Mrs. Ballington rose. " I never did believe that story," 
 said she grimly, backing toward the hall door. " Thomas, 
 no doubt, talked to her about his inventions. It was childish 
 the way he always courted her opinion. Well, good-by, Mar-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 145 
 
 garet," she said, pausing a moment in the doorway, " I will 
 send the carriage for you whenever you want it, you know. 
 I suppose Ferdinand will get one now he s going to be mar 
 ried." A moment later she was sweeping down the walk 
 toward the carriage. 
 
 Miss Margaret remained where she was on the green 
 lounge, helpless despair hanging like a pall over her gentle 
 inconsequent spirit, and here Ferdinand found her an hour 
 later with slow tears coursing down her withered cheeks, in 
 a very different grief from the impulsive hysterical kind to 
 which he was accustomed.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 A MONTH later Margaret Ballington lay in a reclining 
 ^* chair, a light rug wrapped about her little form, and a 
 moist cloth tied about her head. She had been ill for some 
 days, and now was sitting up for the first time. Now and 
 then she closed her eyes, as an expression of sickening pain 
 passed over her white face. Sometimes she raised herself to 
 a sitting posture and listened intently. In the next room 
 Ferdinand was dressing to leave for Kent, where he was to 
 be married that evening to Agnes Sidney. As Miss Balling- 
 ton heard his slow footsteps going back and forth in his 
 preparations she passed the most agonizing hour of her life. 
 
 After some time Ferdinand s door opened, and he stepped 
 into the hall. Miss Margaret heard him approaching. She 
 fell back in her chair and closed her eyes, while a gray pallor 
 crept over her face. He rapped gently, and, hearing a low 
 summons to enter, came in. He was dressed for traveling, 
 and he held his hat and gloves in his hand. She had heard 
 him set down his portmanteau in the hall. 
 
 " I am just leaving," he said, coming up to her and stand 
 ing quietly near her chair. 
 
 Her eyelids fluttered, lifted, and she looked at him with 
 misery in her gaze. 
 
 He felt that it would be easier for both his aunt and him 
 self if he could get away without exciting her ; and, with this 
 in his mind, he laid down his hat and took out his pocketbook 
 in a matter-of-fact but not inconsiderate manner. 
 
 " I have made a list here of certain things which will need 
 attention during the next three months," he said, turning to 
 lay a slip of paper on her desk. " I have given Sam his direc 
 tions about the yard. He will need watching. I have told 
 
 146
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 147 
 
 Eliza that she is not to leave you alone evenings. Is there 
 anything else you would like to have me mention ? " 
 
 She shut her eyes again and answered in a faint voice, 
 " No Ferdinand. Thank you." 
 
 He regarded her a moment in silence and then took out 
 another paper. 
 
 " Here is my check for next month s expenses," he said 
 gently, " and here is the dime you paid the messenger boy. 
 You may hold the accounts till my return. We probably 
 shall be back in three months. I have arranged with Donald 
 that he is to have an eye to you from time to time, and I will 
 send you my check so that you will receive it by the first of 
 each month. I am leaving a card here which contains the 
 address of my bankers. I should like to hear how affairs are 
 during my absence." 
 
 She made no reply at first. He waited, uncertain whether 
 or not to repeat what he had said, when the same voice 
 answered, " Yes dear." 
 
 " I think that is all, then," he said, the restraint of his 
 words covering an uncomfortable realization of her suffer 
 ings. " Is there anything else? " he continued, trying his 
 best to be kind, although his voice did not relax. 
 
 " No, nothing else." 
 
 " Then I will say good-by. I am sorry to leave you in 
 this condition. I have left word for the doctor to call 
 regularly." 
 
 He was waiting for her to open her eyes before offering to 
 kiss her good-by. But she answered again with them closed, 
 "It doesn t matter, dear." 
 
 Then he stooped down and kissed her worn face lightly. 
 Before he could rise again the thin arms went up and 
 clasped his neck, while the sick woman burst into hysterical 
 crying, every other instant giving a high wail in her struggle 
 to speak. 
 
 He extricated himself gently, and said, looking uneasily 
 down at the palpitating little heap on the chair, " Tliis cry 
 ing will make you ill, Aunt Margaret. I wish you wouldn t
 
 148 
 
 do it. There isn t any occasion for grief. Why can t you 
 take my word for it ? Agnes will be a companion for you." 
 
 She heard hie words, but they were stones for bread to her. 
 She wanted no companion but him, and the thought that she 
 was losing him convulsed her body now as it had been con 
 vulsing her mind for days past. 
 
 He looked down at her in distress, took out his watch, 
 glanced at it, and then spoke to her again. " You will soon 
 adjust yourself to the new conditions, Aunt Margaret. You 
 are ill now. Things will look brighter to you in a day or two. 
 I must go, but I will send Eliza to you." 
 
 He laid his hand for an instant on her forehead, but 
 furtively, so that she could not catch hold of him 
 again. Then he took his hat and gloves and walked to the 
 door. 
 
 "You will hear from me before I sail," he said from the 
 doorway, " and I will write regularly afterwards." 
 
 Then he went out of the room, and she heard him go down 
 the stairs and speak to someone in the hall below. 
 
 Donald was down there waiting for him. Donald had 
 wished to spare himself the anguish of being present at 
 Agnes wedding. He soon saw, however, that in case he de 
 clined the invitation Ferdinand would have no representative 
 from his own family. Mrs. Ballington had refused to go. 
 Tom had gone off on a fishing excursion on purpose to be 
 absent, and Miss Margaret s nerves could not carry her 
 through such an ordeal. Therefore, in spite of his own tor 
 ture and his mother s ridicule, Donald had resolved to go. 
 
 " The carriage is at the door," he said, as Ferdinand 
 appeared. " We have just twenty minutes." 
 
 They passed down the walk together, each busy with his 
 own thoughts, and entered the conveyance. Neither spoke 
 during the ride to the station, and when they boarded the 
 train they occupied different seats. 
 
 Each one of the little group of guests who met in Mrs. 
 Sidney s parlor to witness Agnes wedding felt less of the 
 joy and more of the solemnity than is usual on such an occa-
 
 149 
 
 sion. Even Beatrice, when she arrived, was subdued into the 
 prevailing mood. Helen Mabie could not afford to come, and 
 the only guests were Fred and Beatrice, Aunt Mattie, Donald, 
 and Dr. Quinn. Agnes moved among them, greeting each 
 with a grave fullness of sympathy which removed her inde 
 finably from the girl of yesterday. 
 
 As Donald watched her, meeting from time to time the 
 friendly earnestness of her eyes, he felt his distress and mis 
 giving slipping away from him, while in its place sprang 
 up a trust in the future, out of which he did not wish to 
 reason himself. He let her pass him several times, therefore, 
 before he brought himself to do what he had determined upon 
 several days before. 
 
 When he could no longer postpone his intention, he went 
 up to her almost regretting his pertinacity. " I wish you 
 would take me to see your presents, Agnes. I have brought 
 my own little gift, and I should like to give it to you in 
 person." 
 
 Agnes willingly preceded him into her father s back-office, 
 and they stood together looking at the gifts which had 
 pleased and flattered her mother s appreciative heart. 
 
 " Mother has given me papa s cherry desk, and see, it is 
 filled with things which his friends have sent in," she said. 
 " There are the Ballington gifts ! " and she pointed to a 
 table near by loaded with silver and cut-glass. 
 
 She turned back to the desk, opened one of the little 
 drawers, and took out an inlaid box which she unlocked and 
 opened. Inside, reposing on a satin lining yellow with age, 
 was a long gold chain with carved links of Renaissance fret 
 work, joined hands forming the clasp. "Miriam gave me 
 this," she said, and took another box from the same drawer. 
 " This is Ferdinand s." The latter was a little casket of 
 ivory, and inside was a set of diamonds. 
 
 Donald looked at them, too preoccupied to speculate on 
 the suggestiveness in the two gifts, and as Agnes replaced 
 them in the drawer he drew a package from his pocket and 
 balanced it in his hand as he said gravely, " Here is mine. It
 
 150 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 is something I have thought over ever since I heard you were 
 engaged. I want you to promise me not to look at it for 
 three months, and I want you to promise up to that time 
 to keep it a secret." 
 
 Agnes drew back slightly with clouding eyes. 
 
 Donald went on. "And, after three months, you are at 
 liberty to speak about it or even to return it to me. I want 
 you to consider that I am giving it to you with your father 
 perhaps more than you in my mind." 
 
 The gentleness and kindly affection in his face and manner, 
 with the quiet and assured reference to her father, overcame 
 Agnes reluctance to receive a gift so mysteriously given. 
 Besides, nothing seemed strange to her on such a day. She 
 took the package Donald held out to her and acknowledged 
 it simply, " I will take it, Donald," and, with a look of trust 
 and confidence, turned away from him to return to her 
 mother. 
 
 The childlikeness of her reply moved Donald profoundly. 
 He turned away to the door opening out of the office into the 
 back garden. It seemed to him as if he could not return to 
 the others and go through with the ceremony. Grief and 
 apprehension choked him and blinded his eyes. As he stood 
 in the doorway the memory of Dr. Sidney pervaded the 
 little office and the garden, not accusing, but gently warning 
 and entreating him. The same gentle presence seemed to per 
 vade the little sitting-room when he returned for the marriage 
 ceremony. 
 
 Mr. Carter married them with a bare, Puritan brevity 
 against which his soul impotently rebelled. It seemed to him 
 heathenish in Mrs. Sidney to hold out against the wedding- 
 ring. When he began to speak, however, memories of the 
 Spartan weddings at which he had been present in boyhood 
 came back upon him, and there was a simplicity and dignity 
 in his tones which he vaguely realized were more impressive 
 than any he ever had been able consciously to achieve. 
 
 After the little collation, which had been prepared by 
 Mrs. Sidney s hands, Agnes dressed for traveling.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 151 
 
 She said good-by to the little group, and then followed 
 her mother into the office. 
 
 " Good-by, mother," she said, feeling faint. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s voice shook as she replied, " Good-by, 
 Agnes. God bless you, my child." 
 
 Agnes put out her hands instinctively. "Don t, mother! 
 We shan t be separated long." 
 
 " No. No. But all the evening I ve been seeing you as 
 you looked in your little white dress with the tears in your 
 eyes, when your father went off to the war, and he said to me, 
 Take good care of the little baby, Kate. 
 
 " But I wasn t born then, mother. That was Helen." 
 
 " So it was ! So it was ! " and a smile broke over Mrs. Sid 
 ney s face. 
 
 " I ll write you from New York, mother," Agnes con 
 tinued unsteadily, "and you can depend on me to send you 
 something, too. I know that Ferdinand expects to help you." 
 
 " I ll get along alone," said Mrs. Sidney, mastering her 
 emotion. " When you re abroad, Agnes, remember to have 
 proper respect for your father s family. You are leaving 
 as good a family as you are marrying into," the old lady 
 added with dignity. 
 
 As Agnes looked at the older face she appreciated as she 
 never had before the fine pride and power apparent there. 
 She threw her arms around her mother s neck with a thrill 
 of gratitude and devotion. " I m not leaving this family," 
 she said, " and I want you to know that I honor you more 
 than I do anybody else in the world." 
 
 The two remained for a moment in each other s arms. 
 
 Then Mrs. Sidney released her daughter. Agnes picked 
 up her little handbag and joined her husband at the door. 
 
 As they opened it, a straggling crowd waiting outside 
 broke into a hearty cheer. There were old and young faces, 
 mostly from the common walks of life, care-worn women, 
 sturdy laborers, hard little newsboys, half -grown girls ; and 
 their good wishes followed Agnes as she went down to the 
 carriage. A little rice was timidly thrown, but more flowers.
 
 152 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 As Ferdinand held open the carriage door for her, Agnes 
 turned suddenly, with bursting heart, untied the ribbon from 
 her bride bouquet, and flung the great sheaf of roses broad 
 cast over the motley crowd. She knew that their feeling 
 toward her was because she was her father s daughter, and 
 she tried to thank them in her father s name, but her voice 
 broke, and she turned and entered the carriage weeping. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney, standing in the door, the tears streaming 
 down her face, called out in a ringing tone as the carriage 
 drove away: 
 
 " Agnes appreciates this and so do I." 
 
 At the station a similar but smaller group greeted Agnes 
 arrival. 
 
 As she reached the car steps John Talbot came running 
 up to them. " God bless you, Agnes ! " he cried, shaking her 
 hand in his two hard ones. " God bless you, too, Mr. 
 Ballington ! " 
 
 His loud tones caused a smile on the faces of some standers- 
 by who watched the little group of three sympathetically. 
 
 " Oh, I m so glad to see you, John ! " said Agnes eagerly. 
 " I wrote a note thanking Molly for your lovely present, but 
 I feel better to tell you yourself how much Ferdinand and I 
 will enjoy it. Won t we, Ferdinand?" and she turned con 
 fidingly to the tall figure beside her. 
 
 Ferdinand bowed to John, and assisted Agnes up the 
 steps and into the car. 
 
 As they sat down in their stateroom. Agnes remarked his 
 silence, and, looking up into his face, caught an expression 
 of discontent. 
 
 " What has annoyed you, Ferdinand ? " she asked, sen 
 sitive to his coldness, and with a sinking of the heart. 
 
 Ferdinand did not reply at once. When he did it was with 
 an effort to be light in manner, "Oh, perhaps I don t like to 
 have the brakemen on our wedding trip call you by your first 
 name. You are Mrs. Ferdinand Ballington now." 
 
 " Why, that was John Talbot," returned Agnes in surprise. 
 " He meant it kindly, and he was my father s friend."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 153 
 
 "He can be kind without being familiar," rejoined Ferdi 
 nand briefly. 
 
 Her look, which had not left him, became bewildered, then 
 indescribably hurt. She turned and glanced through the 
 window. The familiar sights of her childhood were passing 
 rapidly. There was the tannery, there the mills, there was 
 John Talbot s house, and yes ! Molly was waving a hand 
 kerchief from the door. Over beyond was the plank road 
 where she had loved to ride with her father. Now came the 
 car shops then fields, fields, fields. She looked back till the 
 last outskirt of the town trailed away in the distance. 
 
 With sudden forgetfulness of all save her longing for 
 sympathy, she turned spontaneously, with tears on her lashes 
 and a smile on her lips, to Ferdinand, who was sitting 
 opposite her. 
 
 He had been watching her intently, but had not disturbed 
 her good-by to the home of her girlhood. The wait was 
 becoming intolerable to him. As she looked toward him he 
 leaned over and caught her hands in sudden passion. " My 
 love ! " he said in a very low voice, " My wife ! " and he bent 
 his head down and rested his throbbing forehead on their 
 clasped hands.
 
 PART III 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 months in Europe marked a great change in Agnes 
 Ballington and in the relations between Ferdinand and 
 her. 
 
 The first change in her was an external one, for soon after 
 reaching London Ferdinand had disregarded carelessly a 
 good share of the hand-made trousseau which Mrs. Sidney 
 had toiled over day and night to make for Agnes, and had 
 supplied in its place costly and conventional garments of his 
 own selection. Agnes tried to thank him for his presents, 
 but there was a lasting hurt in her heart. She remembered 
 her own dissatisfaction with her trousseau. Now such clothes 
 as she had craved might be hers, but when she looked at them 
 she saw only a tired woman stitching by lamp-light. When 
 Ferdinand criticised laughingly her country dresses, her 
 heart went out to her mother in an agony of love such as she 
 never had felt for her before. She would have given all this 
 new world of art and beauty for that old cheaply-held privi 
 lege of bringing a smile to her mother s weary eyes. 
 
 The change was not alone in soft drapery and Rembrandt 
 plumes. A subtle metamorphosis was noticeable in the young 
 wife s eyes. They held no longer the clear, light-hearted 
 gaze of a girl. There was an awakening of something less 
 assured, more poignant. Ferdinand did all the planning for 
 the trip, and he conscientiously got down to the business of 
 pleasure-seeking. They went the rounds of the sights in the 
 different cities they visited, Agnes often weary, but strug 
 gling on to fall in with her husband s desires. She soon felt 
 the difference between the old companionship with her father, 
 with its ever-patient courtesy and deference to her taste, its 
 ignoring of conventional and artificial standards, its linger 
 ing over rare and modest beauties ordinarily passed by, and 
 
 154
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 155 
 
 this new companionship, insisting upon promptness, order, 
 thorough-going putting-through of a stereotyped schedule. 
 At first she rebelled a little, once even refused to carry out 
 Ferdinand s programme for an afternoon, insisted instead on 
 loitering away the time in a park, but before the afternoon 
 was over she had repented of her petulance and apologized for 
 it. She did not indulge again a recalcitrant spirit, but there 
 came over her now and then a vague dread of a time coming 
 when two alien natures might challenge each other and when 
 she might be strong enough to walk along the way her own 
 nature impelled, not in willfulness but in resolve. 
 
 An uneasiness, too, about her financial position grew upon 
 her as the weeks passed. She had left home with the last dol 
 lars of her earnings in her purse. They soon were spent in 
 petty requirements of which she felt shy about telling her 
 husband, and Ferdinand offered her no more. She worried 
 about her mother s needs, was hurt that her husband never 
 referred to them or to his promise to see that her mother was 
 cared for, and presently began to worry about herself. Once 
 or twice she gathered courage to ask Ferdinand for little 
 sums of money, but he usually replied by inquiring what 
 she wished, and then buying it for her himself. In London 
 she suggested laying in a stock of gloves, saying that she 
 would like to send some to Helen and her mother, but Ferdi 
 nand had answered that it never was economy to buy more 
 than one needs, and he made no reference at all to her pro 
 posed gifts. Agnes shame in thinking of her mother in 
 creased as she learned from Beatrice s newsy letters that she 
 was taking embroidery lessons from Mrs. Sidney and paying 
 her for them. Once Agnes came to hot words with Ferdinand 
 over a wedding present she had wished to send an old Kent 
 friend. The girl was poor, and when Agnes was married 
 had made her a gift commensurate with her means. Ferdi 
 nand had required, not discourteously, that the gift they 
 returned should be no more expensive than the one which 
 they had received. To Agnes insistence that great love had 
 come to her with her friend s gift, he had replied good-
 
 156 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 humoredly, " Pay it back in love. No good ever comes from 
 mixing coin." 
 
 These incidents brought Agnes to a first attempt to reach 
 a financial arrangement with her husband which would be 
 satisfactory to both of them. Up to this time she had 
 adopted Beatrice s motto, " Carpe diem." She had tried 
 to drug her increasing anxiety with the sophistry natural to 
 brides that her first duty was to please Ferdinand, but she 
 was becoming so exhausted and low-spirited, and Ferdinand 
 so sated with attentions, that there was desirability of a 
 change if they expected to pass their lives together. 
 
 Agnes latent common sense awoke one morning. Maxims 
 of her mother passed through her mind homely but wise pre 
 cepts about the necessity of keeping the mind off one s self, 
 about the mistake of pampering healthy natures into queru- 
 lousness. " A foolish woman can spoil the best man that 
 ever lived, inside of one year," Agnes remembered her mother 
 saying on several occasions when Mrs. Sidney had vetoed 
 some of the doctor s cherished plans. Her father had yielded 
 after mild expostulation. Agnes had been indignant at see 
 ing him yield, and her mother s proverb had seemed to her a 
 self-satisfied and ostentatious proclaiming of victory. But 
 with better understanding of her mother, she realized now 
 that Mrs. Sidney had disguised not the joy, but the pain, of 
 victory by arraying the latter on the side of age-old wisdom. 
 " Mother was a sensible woman to face disagreeable situations 
 as they arose," Agnes reflected. " That is what Ferdinand 
 and I must do. I have been putting off this money discus 
 sion long enough." She finished dressing her hair and stuck 
 a shell-pin into it aggressively. " It looks like the feather 
 on the head of a Pawnee chief setting out on the warpath," 
 she said, pausing to survey herself before she left the mirror. 
 
 They had completed their tour of Germany, and were to 
 start that morning for Lucerne. 
 
 During breakfast Agnes resolve filled her with unusual 
 vivacity. When they were halfway through, Ferdinand put 
 down his newspaper to look at her curiously.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 157 
 
 She caught his puzzled expression and touched the orna 
 ment in her hair. " That is the white plume of Navarre, 
 Ferdinand." 
 
 " Indeed ? " her husband replied seriously, and returned to 
 his reading. 
 
 Agnes spirits were dampened. She fell into a thoughtful 
 mood, which lasted until they were aboard their train and 
 well started on their southward journey. 
 
 At last, with an effort of will, she turned to her husband, 
 opened her empty pocketbook, and held it out to him, looking 
 him full in the eyes as she did so. 
 
 He made no effort to take it, but returned her gaze, ap 
 parently oblivious of the entreaty in her eyes and of the 
 embarrassed flush on her cheeks. 
 
 " Ferdinand, I want some money," she said at length. A 
 subtle impulse of anger in her heart helped out the words. 
 
 " Do you wish to buy something ? Tell me what you need 
 and I will get it for you." 
 
 His tone was considerate, but Agnes eyes flashed as she 
 answered, " Perhaps I don t need anything, Ferdinand. When 
 I do, I like to get it myself. I don t want to ask you for 
 everything. I have to ask you to post my letters, and then 
 I have to explain why I m writing so often to the same 
 people." 
 
 Ferdinand ignored her last sentence as he replied cour 
 teously, "You will always find stamps in the portfolio. I 
 don t see why you should feel as you apparently do, since 
 I do not recall that I ever have refused to get you anything 
 within reason which you desired, and I have endeavored to 
 anticipate your wishes." 
 
 Agnes was ashamed of her exclamation, and when she next 
 spoke it was in a different mood. " That was a small thing 
 for me to say, Ferdinand. I m ashamed of myself. The fact 
 is, for some time back I ve never been dependent upon other 
 people for money. I used to earn money from my father 
 and by giving lessons, and I ve been accustomed to an inde 
 pendent purse. I m convinced that you should allow me this
 
 158 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 privilege. It will be a source of endless friction and humilia 
 tion, if you do not." 
 
 Ferdinand reflected, then took out his pocketbook. As he 
 did so he looked up at his wife. " I have a system of accounts 
 which I have kept ever since I was twelve years old. I had 
 intended to explain it to you when you should assume the 
 housekeeping. I wished to make this time as free as possible 
 for you, and I knew how difficult it is for women to be orderly 
 in money matters. It may, however, be a good plan for you 
 to begin accounts on a small scale now." He opened his 
 pocketbook, took out a gold louis, and handed it to her. 
 
 The red in Agnes cheeks rushed over her whole face. " I 
 don t want alms, Ferdinand. Keep your louis ! " she said 
 vehemently, and turned to the window to hide her face 
 from him. 
 
 " Agnes," Ferdinand said gently. 
 
 She made no answer. 
 
 He crossed over to her, put out his arm, and tried to draw 
 her to him. 
 
 She drew herself away from him decidedly, but turned her 
 burning face, with tears running down it, toward him. 
 " Take away your arm ! " she said. 
 
 He sat still a moment, then rose, took his own seat again, 
 and picked up his guide-book. 
 
 Presently he laid down the book, glanced through the 
 window, and remarked civilly, " We are passing through a 
 remarkable country. You may never see it again." 
 
 " I am looking at it," she answered, a mist obscuring 
 everything before her eyes. 
 
 They reached their destination late in the afternoon. 
 Agnes went at once to her room, where Ferdinand left her, 
 saying he would go for a stroll and get their mail. His last 
 words advised her to take a nap before dinner. 
 
 Agnes closed the door behind him without replying, and 
 instead of sleeping sat down to think over the situation in 
 which she found herself. 
 
 It was the first time she had realized unmistakably what
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 159 
 
 the consequences might be of relinquishing independence. 
 As a child, and later on as a girl, she had taken naturally to a 
 general supervision by her mother of her expenditures, but 
 she always had earned a little, and of late had been the princi 
 pal wage-earner of the family. To pass from the position of 
 supporting a household to being childishly dependent was 
 galling. " I have nothing of my own except the clothes I 
 brought from home and my wedding presents," she thought. 
 The sense of distance from her home and friends deepened 
 the helplessness she felt. 
 
 As her mind reviewed the little property she possessed in 
 her own right, Donald s unopened gift occurred to her, and 
 she remembered that she had been married a little over three 
 months. 
 
 She rose at once to get it, grateful to have her thoughts 
 diverted. She took the packet from her trunk, removed the 
 outer wrapping, and saw a second envelope with these words : 
 
 These packages are to be opened one a month and used by Mrs. Bal- 
 lington as she likes. 
 
 She opened the first packet, and, with a feeling of bewilder 
 ment as though a miracle had happened, found five American 
 twenty-dollar bills inside. 
 
 The color slowly rose in her face as she looked at them. 
 Astonishment, humiliation, an impulse to return the packet 
 to Donald, struggled within her. She began to tie it up 
 again with trembling fingers, but her thought outstripped 
 her hands. Presently she paused and the packet sank un 
 heeded in her lap. 
 
 It had come when she most needed it. The impulse to 
 return the money vanished before an irresistible longing for 
 it. It was hers, had been given to her in her father s name. 
 This thought forced the explanation of the gift home to her. 
 " Ferdinand does not intend to give me money to do as I like 
 with. Donald knew this and wanted me to have some. He 
 didn t want me to open it for three months because he wanted
 
 160 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 me to be familiar with Ferdinand s ways and so use the 
 money well ; and he didn t want me to use it all at once." 
 
 She turned the matter over in her mind, realizing that the 
 first crisis had come in her married life, and that her decision 
 now might have serious consequences. She already felt from 
 stray remarks of Ferdinand s that there was a latent irrita 
 tion in her husband s heart toward his partner. If she went 
 to her husband now and laid the matter before him she felt 
 that trouble would ensue between Ferdinand and Donald 
 which might result in permanent enstrangement. A wave of 
 bitterness at being forced to this pass surged up in her. 
 Again she felt rebellion against her husband, but it presently 
 spent itself, and her mind went on dispassionately. " If I tell 
 Ferdinand, I ll either have to return the money to Donald or 
 there will be a serious quarrel between us. In either case the 
 relations between all three of us will be awkward indefinitely. 
 Moreover, I need this amount and more, and Ferdinand never 
 would give it to me. He has refused to allow me to send 
 gifts to my mother and sister. Donald knows some things 
 about him better than I did." 
 
 As her mind went back to the time Donald had given her 
 the package, she remembered his open and friendly expres 
 sion. Her thought passed from that memory to all that she 
 ever had known of him, and a look of decision grew into her 
 face. "I am going to trust Donald s judgment," she 
 concluded. 
 
 A letter already written to her mother was lying unsealed 
 in her portfolio. With a thrill of relief and happiness, she 
 picked it up, inclosed three of the bills in it, and sealed it. 
 A few moments later she had written a short letter to Helen, 
 inclosing the fourth bill to her. Then she rang for a servant, 
 sent the letters to the post, that there might be no possibility 
 of recall, and put the fifth bill in her own pocketbook. The 
 four remaining packets she returned to the bottom of her 
 trunk.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 HPHE same maid who had taken Agnes letters to be posted 
 returned a little later, tapped at the door, and brought 
 in a small parcel which Monsieur had wished delivered to 
 Madame. 
 
 Agnes took it with a feeling of apprehension. It was a 
 velvet case containing a ring; a triple loop of diamonds, 
 rubies, and pearls. 
 
 Agnes looked at the jewels with mixed feelings. It was 
 undoubtedly Ferdinand s peace-offering. If she declined the 
 gift, as was her first impulse, she would hurt him. If she 
 accepted it grudgingly, he would think she was not satisfied 
 with its value. If she showed much pleasure, he would be 
 inclined to think that it was greed which had made her ask 
 for money. 
 
 She finally submitted to the latter embarrassment, dressed 
 hurriedly for dinner, put the ring on her finger, and sat down 
 to wait till he should come for her. She put aside an uneasy 
 regret at having used Donald s gift beyond recall. 
 
 Some minutes, a half hour, passed. 
 
 She looked at her watch and saw that dinner was already 
 in progress. She had heard Ferdinand enter his room, but 
 for some little time no sound had come from him. She got 
 up and went to the door opening into his apartment and 
 knocked. 
 
 There was an instant response, and in a moment he had 
 reached the door and opened it. 
 
 She noticed that he was dressed for dinner, that he was 
 slightly pale, and that he looked at her intently with eyes 
 which seemed a deeper blue than usual. She tried to smile. 
 " Arc you ready, Ferdinand ? " she asked. " I have been 
 waiting for you." 
 
 161
 
 162 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 She hesitated, then raised her hand with the ring upon it. 
 " It is very, very beautiful," she said sadly. 
 
 "You are pleased with it?" he asked. 
 
 " Yes it is exquisite and most so because you gave it 
 to me." There was a ring of sincerity in her voice. 
 
 Ferdinand appreciated the tone, and kissed the fingers 
 and palm of the hand raised to him. 
 
 They went together to the dining-room, conscious of a 
 reconciliation. 
 
 As they walked together down the long hall he noticed her 
 heightened color, and a momentary return of his first keen 
 zest in the possession of her gave to his eyes and voice that 
 early devotion for which she had been hungering for days. 
 " You are very beautiful to-night," he said. 
 
 She smiled an answer, fearing to speak lest she should 
 break the spell, but in her heart she was thinking, " To him 
 that hath, it shall be given." 
 
 During dinner Ferdinand s concentration upon her died a 
 natural death. She knew that she was losing his attention, 
 and the disappointment fired her into effort. He responded 
 to her conversation perfunctorily, and at last said, when she 
 paused, " I came across an acquaintance of mine while I was 
 out Frank Rousseau. He belongs to the Jean-Jacques fam 
 ily. It was rather agreeable to see someone I knew. Would 
 you like to meet him? " 
 
 " Yes, if you wish," she answered. " Is he staying here ? " 
 
 " I believe he is. We made a partial engagement to meet 
 this evening at a pavilion near the hotel. An operetta is 
 going on there. It is a cheap affair, but somewhat popular." 
 
 Agnes acquiesced in the arrangement, and after they had 
 finished dining they walked across the hotel lawn to the sum 
 mer pavilion, where they found two men waiting for them, 
 Rousseau and a friend of his, Mr. Partlow. 
 
 As Ferdinand presented her to his friends she felt a natural 
 desire to do him honor. With something of an effort she en 
 tered into conversation with young Rousseau, but with her 
 mind upon Ferdinand. She saw that she was succeeding in in-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 163 
 
 teresting the strangers and she felt an impulse to arouse the 
 same interest in her husband. It was with fear and distress 
 at the realization that she had lost the power to do this last 
 that she turned instinctively to the weapons with which nature 
 armed the female sex. She simulated an interest which she 
 was far from feeling, in Rousseau s anecdotes. 
 
 Ferdinand entered occasionally into the conversation, but 
 more often sat silent, watching his wife. 
 
 Presently the conversation turned upon religion, and as 
 it was introduced Agnes artificial zest died out. This was 
 an even more tender point with her than finances. Ferdinand 
 and she had circled about it in an ever-narrowing spiral for 
 three months, but of late an instinct of self-preservation had 
 warned her to keep away from it. What she had dreaded to 
 approach while she and Ferdinand were alone was doubly 
 painful now that it was touched in public. 
 
 Mr. Rousseau, however, did not lose his zest. As Agnes 
 withdrew from the conversation his evident desire to retain 
 her in it increased. His manner was colored by indirect gal 
 lantry which was no longer acceptable. Nor was the strength 
 of Mr. Rousseau s argument helped thereby, as was evidenced 
 by a sardonic gleam in Ferdinand s eyes at his friend s hope 
 less mixture of compliment and Galvanism. 
 
 " Are you a rationalist also, Mrs. Ballington? " asked the 
 young man finally. 
 
 " 1 don t know what you mean," Agnes answered red 
 dening. 
 
 " My wife is * wobbling, " commented Ferdinand dryly. 
 His observation of his wife had led him to the explanation 
 which Agnes had foreseen. He concluded that the ring had 
 restored her good-humor and that the admiration of the 
 strangers had completed her feminine satisfaction. Vanity 
 and the love of admiration were fundamental in women, as 
 was also hysterical religious emotion, which now logically 
 followed. 
 
 " No, I m not wobbling ! " exclaimed Agnes decidedly. 
 " I m a Christian ! I m a Presbyterian ! "
 
 164 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Rousseau cast upon her a look of blandishment. " Thy 
 God shall be my God," he said with invincible complaisance. 
 " In deference to you I shall become a follower of Calvin." 
 
 A satirical smile from Ferdinand rewarded his covert wit 
 ticism. 
 
 Agnes stood up and looked down upon the speaker with a 
 quivering face. Without knowing it she was making him a 
 scapegoat for her own and her husband s short-comings. 
 " You are a blasphemer," she said distinctly. " Ferdinand, 
 I wish to go to the hotel." 
 
 Ferdinand arose, but made no movement forward. He 
 was irritated. Feminine traits were becoming too pro 
 nounced, and he was beginning to regret his gift. 
 
 " This walk along the lake is very beautiful by moon 
 light," he said, without noticing his wife s exclamation. 
 " Suppose we take a stroll." He turned away with Mr. Part- 
 low, leaving Agnes to the attentions of Rousseau. 
 
 Rousseau sprang to assist her. She received his aid trem 
 bling with humiliation, and walked some distance across the 
 pavilion deaf to his nervous efforts at apology. Her weak 
 ness in thus yielding galled her pride indescribably, and as 
 they neared the steps to the lawn she was debating a decisive 
 move. 
 
 Mr. Partlow and Ferdinand were a little in advance. 
 Agnes quickened her pace and spoke to her husband as they 
 descended the stairs. " I don t care to walk, Ferdinand. 
 You misunderstood me. I wish you to take me to the hotel." 
 
 Her eyes were fixed intently upon her husband, and, not 
 heeding the last stair, she stepped too heavily to the ground, 
 turned her ankle as she did so, and uttered a cry of pain. 
 
 She noticed Ferdinand s face change. He was beside her 
 at once, pushing Rousseau aside as he took the support of 
 his wife, and said to her with concern in his voice, " Are 
 you hurt ? " 
 
 " No, it s nothing." She tested the foot carefully. " It 
 hurts a little." 
 
 " Let me carry you across the lawn," he insisted.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 165 
 
 " It s all right," she replied hurriedly. " Let us move 
 away from these men." 
 
 When they had gone a little way. she broke down and began 
 to cry from mortification over the scene they had passed 
 through. 
 
 Ferdinand felt her tears, thought they proceeded from 
 physical pain, stooped and picked her up in his arms. " You 
 are suffering," he said. " Whj did you try to walk? " 
 
 He carried her as though she were a child through the 
 almost deserted yard to the side door of the hotel. " It isn t 
 my ankle," she kept repeating hysterically. " Do put me 
 down." His only answer was to hold her more determinedly 
 in his arms. She resigned herself to the situation. 
 
 When they reached the elevator he put her gently upon 
 her feet. " Is Madame ill? " asked the man running the ele 
 vator, to whom Agnes always had given a friendly smile. 
 Ferdinand met the man s eyes and made no reply. The man 
 turned immediately to his rope. 
 
 In the upper hall Ferdinand supported his wife to her 
 room, where he laid her down upon her bed, and unlaced the 
 shoe from the injured foot. Agnes lay quite still while he 
 went through her trunk in a man s vague search for some 
 thing out of which to make a bandage. She felt an inclina 
 tion to laugh at his air of professional complacence as he at 
 last unearthed and tore up a home-made undergarment to 
 which he always had had an aversion. She continued to 
 watch him while he bound up the supposedly injured member 
 tightly, pointing out where it would begin to swell, and ex 
 plaining just how a bandage should be put on in order to 
 stay on. The humor of the situation grew upon her as sho 
 remembered how many times she had assisted her father in 
 the same operation, but she refrained from telling Ferdi 
 nand that he was doing it wrong, and they said good-night 
 amicably on both sides. 
 
 After Ferdinand left her, Agnes lay in the quiescence that 
 follows the cessation of nervous tension. She realized that 
 she had entered a new phase of her relations with her husband,
 
 166 
 
 that she no longer expected complete understanding or sym 
 pathy from him. It was not only Donald s present that 
 forced this fact upon her. It had been growing upon her 
 ever since she left home with Ferdinand. She had thought 
 she understood him before they were married, and she had put 
 off the discussion of certain topics until after they were mar 
 ried, thinking that the intimacy of the complete union would 
 make it easy to talk over vital subjects. It had seemed 
 enough to her that they had confessed a mutual love. She 
 had believed that such a confession involved a life-long effort 
 to attain a spiritual union for which only the marriage bond 
 offered opportunity. She had waited with unimaginable 
 eagerness for that sacred unveiling of the inmost thoughts 
 and aspirations with which she had peopled Ferdinand s 
 reticent soul. She had felt that this revelation of him would 
 help her to understand herself spiritually. She had waited 
 the three months in vain. At first she had expected him to 
 take the initiative, and when that hope was disappointed she 
 tried timidly herself to talk upon subjects her father con 
 versed upon as freely as upon family affairs. It puzzled her 
 that Ferdinand responded to her advances in a way which 
 showed that he had misunderstood her desires, and when she 
 endeavored to explain herself met her with a humorous in 
 dulgence. Then Agnes instinctively ceased seeking more 
 than he wished to give. Something warned her that she was 
 happier than she would be after a complete understanding 
 with him. Where she formerly spent hours in day-dreams 
 wondering what he was like, she now found herself shutting 
 those speculations out of her mind. Ferdinand s change of 
 manner this evening, from the cold insult of his disregard 
 when she wished to be relieved of Rousseau s society to his 
 solicitude when she strained her ankle, had occasioned one 
 of those rare periods in which she allowed herself to think 
 of this old mirage of their higher union. Why was it, she 
 asked herself passionately, that they had been disappointed, 
 so far, of what she had yearned for as the highest good? It 
 could not be that Ferdinand did not love her. She remem-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 167 
 
 bered expressions that were unmistakable, moments when he 
 had forgotten himself and seemed to think only of her. She 
 had tried to use those moments to lead to something less 
 transient, and then she always had lost them. She confessed 
 to herself at last that these moments of forgetfulness on 
 Ferdinand s part were growing rarer and briefer. She had 
 been eager for one to-night, and she reflected upon the means 
 she instinctively had employed to bring it about. She had 
 failed ignominiously to evoke sympathy in her mental suffer 
 ing, but a chance accident had enabled her to use a turned 
 ankle with instantaneous success. Was it true that Ferdi 
 nand was dead to everything except physical suffering? 
 material appeals? palpable success? Would she have to live 
 alone that inner life for which she felt so weak and helpless, 
 whose long road she was so unfit to travel without a guide?
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 TOURING the night after the last conversation and the 
 day following it Agnes state of mind changed. Second 
 and cooler thoughts came to her. She felt that she must not 
 let this critical financial and religious discussion pass without 
 its bettering the relations between Ferdinand and herself. 
 She had thought over Ferdinand s offer of the louis, and of 
 his immediate attempt at reconciliation after her refusal. 
 
 She assured her husband in the morning that her ankle 
 was quite strong, and they spent the day as he had planned, 
 taking a long ride on horseback along the mountain roads 
 to spend the night at a chalet. The precipitous grandeur of 
 the Alps and the blue peace of the lake below affected her as 
 nature always affects the non-egoist. 
 
 The long day s ramble wearied them both, and after dinner 
 they went early to their room. 
 
 As they stood on the balcony, looking in silence at the 
 purity of the mountain peaks, on which the flush of twilight 
 and the white glory of the moon were shining, Agnes was con 
 scious of a gentleness and serenity surrounding both her and 
 her husband. She felt for the first time that it would be 
 easy to speak to him on vital things, and she said to him 
 naturally and unaffectedly, " Ferdinand, when you offered 
 me money in the car yesterday I was wrong to refuse it as I 
 did. I have thought it over, and I am willing to accommo 
 date myself to your domestic arrangements. What I said 
 was impulsive, and I am sorry for it." 
 
 Ferdinand s face showed relief and appreciation. He was 
 glad to have the subject re-opened. " Thank you," he said. 
 " I am glad you have spoken of it again. Let me make my 
 position clear to you. I have a pretty fair income, but I am 
 obliged to meet many demands upon it. My affairs would 
 
 168
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 169 
 
 not be in their present condition if I had not always shown 
 self-denial and system. The largest income in the world 
 might slip through the fingers of a careless person without 
 his knowing where it had gone." 
 
 " Yes, I know," Agnes commented sympathetically. 
 
 " The Ballingtons as a family have a constitutional weak 
 ness in this way. My grandfather died a pauper, having 
 wasted a fine inheritance from his mother. He left his chil 
 dren no unencumbered property. It was the invention of the 
 car spring which pulled things together." 
 
 " You must be very proud of your father," Agnes re 
 turned. 
 
 " He didn t invent it. My mother did. She was the one 
 who held things together. My father wasn t worth much 
 more than Tom. He was shiftless and a drunkard." 
 
 Agnes started. " How can you speak so of your father? " 
 she asked drawing back a little. 
 
 " Why should I hesitate to tell the truth about him? From 
 the time of my father s death until I came into the business 
 matters were slovenly enough. Uncle Silas did better than 
 my father, but he was no manager. Much of my property 
 all from the Landseer side is invested otherwise than in the 
 shops, but I have quite an interest there." 
 
 Agnes was quiet for some time. A new and exquisite hope 
 was dawning within her. At last a real understanding was 
 arising between them and it was because she had acted like 
 a rational being. Money suddenly seemed a very small con 
 sideration. 
 
 It was with an effort that she brought herself back to re 
 spond to Ferdinand s last remark. " Donald must be a great 
 help to you in managing the business, Ferdinand." 
 
 " He is a good enough office man." 
 
 Again Agnes felt the shock of Ferdinand s downrightness. 
 
 "How about Tom? Is he no help? " 
 
 " No." There was no mistaking the contemptuous dislike 
 in the word. " He might have done better to make his gold 
 salt-cellars."
 
 170 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes glanced up uneasily at her husband s face. She 
 was reassured by the care and responsibility which were 
 apparent there. 
 
 " Well, I will try to be a help, beloved," she said ear 
 nestly, putting her hand over his on the railing. " I know 
 very little about business, but I will learn." 
 
 He responded to her touch with a look which brought the 
 color to her face. Neither of them spoke. The thin notes of 
 a zither and the distant barking of a sheep-dog baying the 
 moon filled the pauses. Laughter and snatches of song 
 floated up vaguely from a little tavern down in the village. 
 The glimmering lights in the low, flat-roofed houses and the 
 sounds- aforesaid were the only things in all the world of blue 
 heavens, mountain peaks, glaciers, precipices, and pine-gir 
 dled abysses, down which the wild music of mountain cata 
 racts plunged and was lost, which related it to the infinitesi 
 mal day of man s life and endeavor. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she said gently, " there s something I ve 
 wanted to speak to you about ever since we have been mar 
 ried." 
 
 " Why have you waited so long ? " he replied in a low 
 voice. 
 
 " I don t know. I think I ve been afraid. It s always been 
 hard for me to talk about religion. I wish you would talk to 
 me about it. What is your religion? " 
 
 Ferdinand did not reply at once. He had known that this 
 conversation must come some time, but he had been putting 
 it off, feeling that the time was not yet ripe. Agnes reason 
 ableness in coming round after their financial difference 
 decided him, however, to meet her inquiry without evasion. 
 
 " I am an agnostic," he said quietly. 
 
 Agnes looked at him steadily. " Do you mean, Ferdinand, 
 that you don t believe the Bible is what it is claimed to be? 
 And that you don t know whether there s a God or not? Do 
 you really mean that, Ferdinand ? " 
 
 Ferdinand was more disturbed by the anguish in her voice 
 than he would have believed possible. " I can t help believing
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 171 
 
 what my reason tells me, Agnes. You wouldn t have me do 
 otherwise, would you ? " 
 
 Agnes took her hand away from his. " Ferdinand," she 
 said in an unnatural voice, " why did you tell my mother that 
 you were confident that you soon would think as I did on 
 religion? " 
 
 " I didn t tell her so," her husband replied. He knew it 
 was coming now. 
 
 "You did not?" 
 
 " No. I said I was confident that we eventually would 
 think alike; and I am still. When you have seen enough of 
 the world you will broaden out. I can wait. You have good 
 mental qualities, and I shall give you every means of edu 
 cation." 
 
 Ferdinand weighed his words. He was prepared for an 
 outburst. It would be a shock to Agnes to realize that he 
 had misled her mother and herself. 
 
 The indignation did not come, however, as he had expected. 
 On the contrary Agnes turned white, and when she spoke* her 
 voice was low and there was a note in it which alarmed him. 
 " You deceived my mother, then. You deliberately let her 
 think you meant one thing when you meant something which 
 would have broken her heart." 
 
 Ferdinand, too, grew pale. "Yes, I let her believe one 
 thing while I meant another," he answered, " and I would do 
 so again. I can t accept Christianity. It would be equally 
 impossible for your mother at her time of life to modify her 
 views. Neither of us is accountable to the other, and my 
 course of action saved us all three much unpleasantness." 
 
 " But do you think there will be less unpleasantness when 
 she finds out that you deceived her? " 
 
 " 1 shall not undeceive her. You may do as you think 
 best." 
 
 As she did not speak, he said again, " I foresaw that the 
 struggle would come upon you. You would either be obliged 
 to go against your mother, or to give me up, and I wished to 
 prevent a family rupture."
 
 172 
 
 He wondered from her continued silence if she understood 
 just what he had been saying and all that he had spared her. 
 And he repeated, " You see you would have had to choose 
 between your mother and me, and it would have resulted in 
 your never having easy relations with your mother after 
 wards." ? r 
 
 He need not have reiterated the words. She was realizing 
 with a kind of moral shock that the whole question in Ferdi 
 nand s mind had been how to conciliate her mother; that he 
 had contemplated no difficulty or struggle with her own con 
 science; nay, he had ignored her conscience as if she had 
 none; and he never once had considered it remotely possible 
 that she would have given up him if the choice had rested 
 upon her. 
 
 At length she looked up and spoke. " Perhaps you were 
 right about me. I find that I am glad you did not put the 
 choice upon me." 
 
 This was the sentiment upon which Ferdinand had counted, 
 but there was a sub-meaning along with it which made him 
 uneasy. 
 
 When he would have drawn nearer to caress her she still 
 held off. " Yes, I m glad," she repeated, leaving an empha 
 sis of scorn on the final word, which she spoke so low that he 
 caught the scorn more clearly than the significance of the 
 word itself, " and yet I did have some conscience. I faced 
 that very question, and I found that I could make the sacri 
 fice. More than that, Ferdinand, I surely would have made 
 it. My mother will remember." 
 
 She stopped speaking, but he could see that she was fol 
 lowing out some line of thought. 
 
 After a few moments he resumed, " Besides, Agnes, I knew 
 that your views were bound to change, and if you regard 
 yourself closely you will see that you have changed considera 
 bly already. I have watched your progress with great in 
 terest and satisfaction. When we were first married you 
 never would have taken this ride with me on Sunday. Now 
 you "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 173 
 
 His wife turned suddenly and went into her room. 
 
 When he followed her he found her sobbing on the bed. 
 He stood looking down at her, utterly at a loss what to do. 
 " Why do you cry, Agnes ? " he asked uncomfortably. 
 
 She did not answer, and he sat down by her and put out his 
 hand to stroke her hair. 
 
 Gradually her shame and wretchedness came under control. 
 Her regret at having taken the ride began to fade before 
 the memory of the Sabbath stillness of the mountains and the 
 influence that had brooded over their own spirits all day. 
 Then, too, she was Ferdinand s wife now. Past deceit could 
 not be helped. What concerned them was to see that there 
 should be no more. She felt the need of spiritual help for 
 the future. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she asked, with a last effort, " do you ever 
 pray ? " 
 
 There was a moment s hesitation. Then he replied, " No." 
 
 " Won t you with me? " 
 
 Ferdinand s voice was uncertain as he answered, " It would 
 be hypocrisy for me to do so." 
 
 " Won t you try? If you love me, do." 
 
 Ferdinand was thoroughly unhappy. She seemed like a 
 child imploring him to search with her for a pot of gold in 
 a rainbow. It was contrary to his nature to allow misunder 
 standing under such circumstances. When Agnes was yet 
 to be won she was to be approached cautiously, but once his 
 wife the sooner she accommodated herself to the situation the 
 better. Yet he was almost disheartened as he took his hand 
 from her hair and answered briefly, " I cannot." 
 
 She was so lovely as she looked up at him with hurt eyes 
 and with the baffled pleading in her face that he could not 
 leave her so. " Agnes, be content with my love," he said 
 with feeling. " You will understand me better in time." 
 
 As he left her and went into his room his last words, with 
 their assurance of present love and of future understanding, 
 fell upon her tortured spirit like a benediction. " Better to 
 know it all. Better so," she thought in mingled grief and
 
 174 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 devotion. Then the solemnity of what was laid upon her 
 deepened as the night hours passed. She faced the convic 
 tion that she must live her spiritual life alone, and live it so 
 that he who now was part of her must be brought into sym 
 pathy with it. How easily she had accepted nominal Chris 
 tianity from her parents as a girl ! How dependently she had 
 looked to her husband to support her in her higher life ! It 
 was made plain to her at last that every man liveth to him 
 self. Her inner experience must be an individual one. What 
 did it mean to be a Christian ? She must find that out for her 
 self. The horror of her husband s repudiating Christianity 
 was clearer than her understanding of just what he had re 
 pudiated. It was not riding on Sunday, or drinking wine, 
 or going to the theater, or any of the gradually accepted 
 customs which at first she had reproved. In these she had 
 changed. Could it be possible that she would keep on chang 
 ing, as he said? Agnes anxiety gradually lessened as she 
 recollected his words. " I can wait. Be content with my 
 love. You will understand me better in time." He, too, had 
 been waiting for sympathy and comprehension as she had 
 been, but he had waited patiently and silently. She was as 
 unfit to meet his demands as he had been to meet hers. He, 
 too, had much to offer which always had been outside her 
 ken business discernment, scientific discipline, organized 
 and focused energies. If she could prove to him that her 
 great heritage was worthy his consideration while she ac 
 cepted his, what unity and power and happiness they might 
 attain ! This, perhaps, was what God had meant in bringing 
 them together. 
 
 Occasional conversations like this stood out in Agnes 
 memory as marking successive shocks of mutual readjust 
 ment, after which they would go on for a time without fric 
 tion. It was when they reached England some weeks later 
 that she saw the extent of the change in their attitude 
 toward each other. She found herself looking with different 
 and older eyes upon the scenes she had witnessed five months 
 before. Then everything had been a background for Ferdi-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 175 
 
 nand. It was so no longer. A hunger for wider vision, for 
 clearer understanding of the world about her, had awakened 
 within her. The mind had thrown off the shackles of pas 
 sion, and she realized she was leaving Europe just at the point 
 when she could appreciate her advantages. She had learned 
 to discriminate and enjoy. 
 
 A foreboding weighed upon her spirit as she saw England 
 sink below the horizon into the Atlantic. Would it always be 
 so? Would she learn to value the greatest things in her life 
 only as she parted from them? So her college life had slipped 
 away from her, her father; her mother s encircling devotion, 
 this last Renaissance with its rich opportunities. What 
 would be next?
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 * 4 F)O J u tnink tne table l oks a11 right, Sarah? " 
 
 Miss Margaret Ballington daintily drew back from 
 the antique epergne which she had been adorning with sprays 
 from her fuchsia plants and looked up hopefully. 
 
 " Elegant," said Mrs. Ballington approvingly. 
 
 Miss Margaret drew a breath of relief. The next moment 
 she glanced back at the table, this time at the candelabra, 
 and asked with increasing uneasiness in each phrase, " Is 
 that shade a little crooked? Will you please straighten it, 
 Tom? Be careful that your cuff doesn t catch in the flowers, 
 dear. Is that a carriage I hear? Shall I serve the salad 
 with the oysters or in a course by itself? Which would you, 
 Tom?" 
 
 " Both," said Tom promptly, narrowly escaping a decanter 
 with his elbow. 
 
 A momentary color passed like a shadow of youth over 
 his aunt s face. "Don t joke me, dear. They ll be here 
 before I can decide. Which would you do, Sarah? " 
 
 As Mrs. Ballington was arranging herself to reply, for 
 the sequence of salad and oysters was not a thing to be 
 disposed of flippantly, the dining-room door was opened and 
 a large woman of forty or upwards, with red hair and little 
 despotic gray eyes, appeared on the threshold and stood with 
 her hands on her hips, nodding at the long table, " Shall I 
 put on that loaf of mate, Miss Margaret ? It ll want cooking 
 the long half of an hour." 
 
 " Not just yet. Not right away, Eliza," her mistress 
 fluttered. " Isn t that Ferdinand s step I hear on the walk ? " 
 Miss Ballington rustled to the hall door, opened it and 
 listened. 
 
 " You sit down, Aunt Maggie. I ll watch for the car- 
 
 176
 
 177 
 
 riage," said Tom. He moved a chair where Miss Ballington 
 was standing, lifted the little woman up as he spoke and, 
 after having smoothed down her skirts as though she were 
 an infant in long clothes, seated her in it. 
 
 "Tom! Be careful, Tom!" 
 
 Tom gave her an affectionate pat, released her and turned 
 to the servant. " Get back to your den, Eliza. How do 
 you know what that meat s doing ? " 
 
 " And oh, Eliza ! " Miss Margaret sprang to her feet 
 again. " Hadn t you better will you please put a clean 
 apron on ? " 
 
 The Irishwoman glanced carelessly down. "This apron 
 is clane," she said aggressively. 
 
 " But I d a little rather you know Mr. Ferdinand likes 
 everything neat. You can have my little apron with the 
 clover blossoms on it. You ll find it in the second drawer of 
 my bureau in the pile on the left-hand side, a little back. 
 
 Be careful not to " Eliza disappeared and closed the 
 
 door before the sentence was finished. 
 
 Mrs. Ballington looked after her with indignation right 
 eously thrilling every nerve in her body. " Margaret ! " she 
 proclaimed, "you ruin your servants. Sam is utterly 
 spoiled. He won t mow our grass since Ferdinand went 
 away without an extra fee." 
 
 "I know I do, Sarah," said Miss Margaret miserably. 
 " I wouldn t have given that but there ! " She listened 
 breathlessly like a startled deer. "Do you hear anything, 
 Tom?" 
 
 " I think I do," said Tom resignedly. 
 
 Mrs. Ballington walked before the long mirror at 
 the end of the room, where she turned slowly, eyeing her 
 self. Miss Margaret sat down suddenly in her chair. Tom 
 was about to open the hall door, when the kitchen door flew 
 open and Eliza, with face aflame, strode through the room and 
 into the hall before him. She threw the front door open 
 wide, and was the first to greet Agnes Ballington as she 
 walked up the steps between Ferdinand and Donald.
 
 178 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Welcome home to yez, Mr. Ballington ! " cried Eliza, 
 her face beaming, " an welcome to your swate young wife ! " 
 She opened her big arms, gave Agnes a hug, then stepped 
 back and nodded critically at the bride. 
 
 Agnes smiled and straightened her drooping hat as she 
 returned the old servant s welcome. After greetings from 
 Tom, the party entered the house. 
 
 Ferdinand set the luggage down in the hall and opened 
 the door into the green parlor. " Come in here, Agnes," he 
 said. " Aunt Margaret will be here presently." 
 
 " She wants to see you alone first. She s in the dining- 
 room," whispered Tom. " I ll go in with your wife. Mother 
 is here in the parlor." 
 
 Agnes already had seen Mrs. Silas Ballington, and she 
 was so occupied with that lady s somewhat distant greeting 
 that she did not notice her husband s annoyed expression 
 and subsequent disappearance. She glanced eagerly around 
 the room, noting for the first time the interior of her new 
 home. There was something attractive and something repel 
 lent in the formal arrangement of pictures and green rep 
 mahogany furniture. It was a handsome apartment, but cold 
 and austere. Agnes felt like an alien sitting on the edge 
 of one of the big pieces and looking up to meet the still 
 gray eyes of Estelle Landseer, Ferdinand s mother, looking 
 down from the gold frame on the wall over the green lounge. 
 She returned Mrs. Ballington s greeting mechanically. " It 
 was very kind in you to welcome us home, Mrs. Ballington," 
 she said, her eyes still resting on the portrait. She traced 
 Ferdinand s features in the grave face. There was some 
 thing ascetic, something despotic, in the expression, and, 
 along with these, something inscrutable. Agnes found her 
 self trying to interpret it by Ferdinand s face, and failing. 
 It seemed to her as though her husband s mother were passing 
 her in review, challenging her strength, questioning her wis 
 dom, warning her of the stubborn and masterful spirit whose 
 home she had entered. " He is my son," Agnes almost heard 
 her say. " Are you equal to it? "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 179 
 
 "I m sure I m delighted," said the once-admired society 
 voice of Mrs. Silas Ballington. 
 
 Agnes started, trying to remember what Mrs. Ballington 
 was delighted about. Her interest in the picture, however, 
 overtopped everything else. She pointed to it. "What a 
 remarkable face ! And she actually invented the car spring ! " 
 
 If Agnes had cast about her for a long time she could not 
 have searched out a more infuriating remark. Mrs. Silas 
 drew herself up and darted a poisonous glance at the new 
 and unwelcome addition to the family. 
 
 Agnes interpreted it as a reproach for failing to under 
 stand her new aunt s last remark, and she hastened to atone. 
 " It was so nice to see Donald at the station," she said. " We 
 hardly expected such a home-coming." 
 
 The moment it was out she realized that she had made 
 matters worse. 
 
 At that instant Tom came in from the hall, saw that some 
 thing was wrong, as usual, with his mother, and promptly 
 went up to Agnes and kissed her. 
 
 " Tom ! " exclaimed his mother ; then grandiloquently to 
 Agnes, " You must excuse my son, Mrs. Ballington." 
 
 " I wish you would call me Agnes, " said the bride, try 
 ing to smile, but feeling like crying. 
 
 " With pleasure," Tom answered immediately, and he 
 looked around at the chairs. " Which one do you advise me 
 to sit in, mother?" he asked, with interest. 
 
 The dowager was casting a withering glance at her son, 
 when the dining-room door was opened, and Ferdinand, still 
 in his ulster, entered with his aunt. She wore a flowered silk 
 of mild shades, with tiny pink bows sprinkled over it, and 
 she looked to Agnes like a little Dresden figure come to life. 
 
 "This is my wife, Aunt Margaret," said Ferdinand. 
 
 Agnes rose and came forward, smiling with genuine 
 pleasure. 
 
 Miss Margaret gave a little gasp, then held out both hands, 
 and lifted her face to be kissed. She kept hold of one hand 
 as she said, " Come, dear, I will take you upstairs. Your
 
 180 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 room is all ready, Ferdinand. There s a little fire in the 
 grate." 
 
 She fluttered into the hall and up the stairs, still leading 
 Agnes, who felt clumsy and stiff beside her. 
 
 They went into a roomy apartment which was dressed 
 sedately in old-fashioned watered silk. A gilt mirror hung 
 against the wall, and this was draped with fresh muslin. 
 There were flowers on the table, a tray containing a glass 
 of cracked ice, and a small champagne bottle. 
 
 Miss Ballington closed the door, went up to Agnes, looked 
 at her with a timid smile, kissed her, said, " Will you love me 
 a little, dear? " and kissed her again. 
 
 " Yes, I love you already," answered Agnes, laughing in 
 some embarrassment, yet altogether charmed with her hus 
 band s aunt. 
 
 "You dear child. I shall try to make you happy, dear. 
 You will love me, won t you? You know there s nobody 
 I love quite as I do Ferdinand. He s all I have. You wouldn t 
 want him not to love me, would you? " 
 
 " No, indeed," replied Agnes, still smiling. 
 
 " I knew you wouldn t. I knew you would add your sweet 
 love to his. I won t find him changed, do you think ? " The 
 last sentence caught Agnes attention with its child-like 
 pathos. 
 
 " No, I think not," she said gently. 
 
 " And I shall call you Agnes right away. You want 
 me to, don t you? And you will call me Aunt Margaret, 
 just as Ferdinand does?" continued the little lady. She 
 always spoke rapidly, and excitement now made her almost 
 unintelligible. 
 
 " Of course I will," said Agnes heartily. 
 
 "Call me so now, dear. Will you, dear? " and Miss Mar 
 garet looked up tenderly at her new niece. 
 
 "Why, yes Aunt Margaret," answered Agnes, wishing 
 her aunt would give her some natural excuse for saying Aunt 
 Margaret. 
 
 Something in her manner may have conveyed Agnes
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 181 
 
 awkwardness to Miss Ballington, for the latter turned away 
 from her guest and tripped across the room to look into the 
 water pitcher. Then she went out into the hall and closed 
 the door behind her softly. 
 
 " Oh, Agnes dear," she called through the keyhole. 
 
 " Yes ? " asked Agnes, opening the door again. 
 
 " I didn t mean to disturb you, dear. You needn t have 
 opened the door. I just wanted to ask if I could do anything 
 else for you." 
 
 " No, I thank you," said Agnes in a daze. 
 
 " And shall I have dinner served soon ? " 
 
 " I shall be ready in ten minutes." And Agnes recovered 
 her senses briskly. 
 
 " Very well, dear. Don t hurry," and light little steps 
 went down the stairs. 
 
 Agnes hastened to change her traveling dress for a coral- 
 colored silk which her mother had made. It had been the 
 best dress of her trousseau, and she still preferred it to the 
 more elaborate gowns her husband had given her since. She 
 was just finishing when Ferdinand knocked and entered the 
 room. 
 
 They went down together and met the others in the draw 
 ing-room, from which they all passed on to the dining- 
 room, Ferdinand still keeping by his wife s side. 
 
 Miss Ballington previously had considered whether she 
 should offer Agnes the head of the table at once, and had con 
 cluded it would be better to make the change later in pri 
 vate. Now, however, she looked from one to the other in 
 embarrassment. 
 
 Tom, perceiving the emergency, slipped into Ferdinand s 
 place and said to the latter with a flourish of his hand, 
 " Above the salt, Mr. Ballington. Take your seat there. 
 To-morrow Mrs. Ballington and you may take possession, 
 but to-night you are the distinguished guests of Miss Mar 
 garet and Mr. Thomas Ballington." Tom s annoyance with 
 the situation gave place to good-humored mischief as he took 
 his place at the head of Ferdinand s table.
 
 182 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ferdinand s ghost-smile hovered around his lips as he 
 seated himself beside Agnes. 
 
 The burden of conversation fell upon Tom. He addressed 
 himself especially to Agnes, whom everyone was watching. 
 She had changed somewhat during the short absence, was 
 a little fuller in figure, had grown into a quieter manner, 
 a greater reserve in speech, and a noticeable courtesy in listen 
 ing. In repose there was a luminousness in her dark eyes 
 which marked a growing likeness to Dr. Sidney; and when 
 she became animated a radiance of expression flushed her 
 face with delicate color. Altogether she was a richer and 
 quieter figure than the girl Tom remembered. 
 
 Miss Margaret Ballington s surprise and delight in her 
 nephew s wife became more and more evident. Happiness 
 transformed her. She seemed years younger than when she 
 had listened for the carriage wheels, while the nervousness 
 of elation had driven out and replaced in her always appre 
 hensive little body the nervousness of foreboding. 
 
 "I presume you fully appreciate the fact that you suc 
 cessfully passed Minos in the hall, Agnes," said Tom when 
 conversation lulled a moment. 
 
 Agnes turned to him with a tinge of diffidence in her 
 manner. 
 
 " He means Eliza," explained Ferdinand. 
 
 " The proprietress of the establishment," continued Tom 
 impressively. " The Proserpine of the kitchen. Let me give 
 you a word of advice, Agnes. Eliza has all the rest of us 
 under her thumb. Unless you start out by putting her down, 
 the Ballington family is doomed." 
 
 As if the reference to Eliza had summoned that person, 
 she appeared at this instant, displaying a blur of tomato 
 juice on Miss Margaret s apron, and nodding approvingly 
 at Agnes across the room. 
 
 " Yez hev struck luck, Mrs. Ballington," she said, tilting 
 her horse-like head to one side as she included Ferdinand in 
 the next nod. " Mr. Ferdinand is the prime pet of fortune, 
 sure."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 183 
 
 " We think Mrs. .Ballington is a pet of fortune, too, 
 Eliza," put in Donald. 
 
 " Thin two pets have met," rejoined the red-haired woman 
 promptly. " Did ye see Ireland on the other side, Mr. 
 Ferdinand?" 
 
 " We are waiting for the salad, Eliza," suggested Miss 
 Margaret. 
 
 The cook shrugged her shoulders with a side look at Agnes 
 in reply, and went back to the kitchen. 
 
 " You re on the right side of Eliza," Tom exclaimed when 
 the door closed. " Now let time and tide work their will." 
 
 When they went back to the drawing-room Miss Mar 
 garet drew Agnes to her side on the lounge and pressed the 
 girl s hand impulsively. " You dear, dear child," she 
 whispered. 
 
 Agnes blushed and tried to return the pressure, but Miss 
 Margaret s demonstration embarrassed her. She diverted 
 herself by talking a little to Mrs. Ballington and wondering 
 that she no longer was impressed by that lady s lofty 
 bearing. 
 
 " Won t you favor us with a song? " asked Mrs. Balling- 
 ton, at length. 
 
 " Agnes is too tired to sing," interrupted Ferdinand. 
 
 " We ought to be going, Tom," said Donald, rising. " We 
 mustn t stay too late the first night. John will be here for 
 you shortly, mother." 
 
 The brothers said good-night, shook hands with Agnes and 
 left the house together. 
 
 Soon afterwards the carriage came for Mrs. Ballington. 
 As she was departing she drew Miss Margaret outside and 
 whispered something in her ear which brought a startled 
 exclamation to Miss Margaret s lips. When the latter re 
 turned to the parlor there were signs of confusion in her 
 face and manner. 
 
 "You must be very tired, dear," she said effusively to 
 Agnes. " Is there anything you would like ? " 
 
 " No, thank you, Aunt Margaret. I have just told Fer-
 
 184 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 dinand I think I will go to my room. Thank you so much 
 for your kind reception." Agnes turned to the door as 
 she spoke. 
 
 "Thank you, dear child. Will you kiss me good-night? 
 Good-night. Sleep well, dear." 
 
 After Agnes had left them Ferdinand turned to his aunt. 
 " I noticed the lawn has not been cut back of the house," 
 he said questioningly. 
 
 "No, Ferdinand," said Miss Ballington, at once on the 
 defensive and voluble with excuses, " Sam has been very un 
 reasonable very. I ve had to raise his wages, too." She 
 sighed. " He was going to leave, dear. Don t you think 
 I did right to raise his wages? Are you offended with me, 
 Ferdinand?" 
 
 " No. I knew when I left you, you couldn t manage the 
 place," returned her nephew philosophically. 
 
 " I m so sorry," she replied at once, on the verge of tears. 
 " I really tried, dear." 
 
 Ferdinand hastened to change the subject. " Are the 
 accounts at hand ? " he inquired, not noticing her half tear 
 ful lament. 
 
 " Yes, dearest. Right here. I have them all ready." 
 
 She hurried across the room, opened a tiny drawer in the 
 inlaid cabinet, and returned with a small leather book. 
 
 " I have told Agnes you had better continue the manage 
 ment of the house for the remainder of the year," said Fer 
 dinand before opening the notebook. " Then she can begin 
 the first of January." 
 
 "Yes, dearest. Very well," responded Miss Ballington 
 with a gleam of hope. 
 
 She stood behind his chair, and caressed his hair, occa 
 sionally leaning down to bestow a kiss upon it. Presently he 
 stirred, moved his head restlessly. The patting ceased a 
 moment, then began again. 
 
 " You ll tire yourself," he said, pausing at length in his 
 reading and moving his chair to one side. " Sit down, 
 Aunt Margaret."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 185 
 
 " No, you sweet dear. I love to stand here." She laid her 
 faded hair alongside his dark head. " It s so good to have 
 you here, dear ! I ve missed jou so ! " 
 
 Ferdinand arose, walked to the center of the room and stood 
 under the hanging lamp. His aunt s caresses worried him, 
 as they had done ever since he was old enough to run away 
 from her. 
 
 " This isn t added correctly," he said. 
 
 " Isn t it, dear? Are you sure it isn t? " asked Miss Bal- 
 lington, her attention instantly diverted to her perennial 
 source of worry, the balancing of accounts. " I went over 
 it eight times. You see there s nine cents unaccounted for. 
 I don t know. I m not sure but that cabbage that s down 
 in August somewhere I ve got it underlined there it is 
 that cabbage may have been four cents instead of two. I m 
 not just sure. That would account for two cents." 
 
 "The fault is in the adding," Ferdinand said, returning 
 the book. " The expenditure adds to nine cents more than 
 you make it. You have about thirty dollars on hand, I see." 
 
 " Yes, dear," said Miss Margaret with pride in her thrift. 
 
 " You have done very well. It s remarkable what method 
 the most unsystematic women may acquire under training. 
 You may have the balance." 
 
 " Have the thirty dollars ! Do you mean without keeping 
 an account of it, Ferdinand ? " gasped his aunt. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Oh, thank you, dear. Th ere are some " She hastily 
 
 checked her inopportune disclosures. " Thank you very 
 much." 
 
 " Good-night. We have breakfast at the usual time? " 
 Ferdinand asked as a matter of form. 
 
 " Yes, yes. You wouldn t like it changed, would you, dear 
 est? " said Miss Margaret, on the look-out for new afflictions 
 with Eliza. 
 
 " No," said Ferdinand indifferently. 
 
 " Ferdinand ! " she exclaimed, suddenly forgetting break 
 fast and Eliza.
 
 186 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 He had reached the door, but he turned at her ejaculation. 
 
 " You aren t angry with me, are you, dear? " she inter 
 rupted herself to ask anxiously. 
 
 " Certainly not." 
 
 "Won t you kiss me good-night?" she persisted, ap 
 proaching him hesitatingly. 
 
 He stooped and kissed her forehead. 
 
 " This doesn t make any difference, does it, Ferdinand ? 
 She won t come between us, will she, dear? You were such a 
 dear little baby, Ferdinand. You ll always be my baby, you 
 know. I think she s lovely, lovely. And she says she loves 
 me, loves me already. She doesn t brush her hair quite up in 
 the neck. But that doesn t matter. I love her dearly." 
 
 She clung to him as the disjointed sentences came out. 
 He indulgently disengaged her arms, turned, and went up 
 the stairs. 
 
 Five minutes later she tapped at his door. 
 
 " I don t mean to disturb you, dearest. I just wanted to 
 ask if everything is all right. There s a fresh cake of soap 
 in the dish, isn t there? " 
 
 " I have my own." The voice came through the closed 
 door patiently. 
 
 "Ferdinand!" 
 
 After an instant s hesitation the door was open and he 
 stood once more looking down at her. 
 
 She flushed consciously, looked down at her hands and 
 smiled a very little, then looked up wistfully. 
 
 " Yes ? " inquired Ferdinand, waiting. 
 
 " There isn t anything you d like to tell me, is there, 
 dearest? " 
 
 Ferdinand was puzzled. " Tell you ? I think not," he 
 said. 
 
 " I mean any little confidence. I m like your mother, you 
 know, dear." 
 
 She looked up at him half expectantly. 
 
 " There is nothing," he replied briefly. 
 
 She took alarm at once. " Oh ! Good-night. You aren t
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 18? 
 
 angry with me for asking, are you ? I only asked from inter 
 est, dearest, the most loving interest. Good-night." 
 
 His door closed. Miss Margaret walked down the hall a 
 little, hesitated, turned back and approached his door, then 
 paused again and turned resolutely to her own room. 
 
 Just then she heard Eliza s heavy step going up the back 
 stairs. She leaned over the banisters. " Eliza didn t turn 
 out the lights or lock up, again," she said to herself, putting 
 her hand up to her head. " Oh, dear ! Oh, dear ! I must go 
 down." 
 
 Then the tired little feet went down the stairs, and through 
 the long halls. She locked the doors, stood up on the chairs 
 to fasten the windows, paused in the green room to kiss a 
 baby miniature of Ferdinand, and turned out the lights. 
 Then she climbed the staircase in the dark and felt her way 
 to her own room, where she undressed and cried herself to 
 sleep.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 A FTER Donald and Tom left Ferdinand s home on the 
 *:* night of their cousin s return, they started on their 
 homeward way in silence. It was not until they passed the 
 border-line of their cousin s property that Tom thrust his 
 hands into his pockets and spoke abruptly, " Oh, hell ! " 
 
 " You did splendidly to-night, Tom," answered Donald, 
 ignoring the ejaculation; " the evening would have been very 
 trying without you." 
 
 " Yes, I saw that. Now, you don t get me to go near his 
 house again. Down in the office I don t care a damn." 
 
 " Agnes looked very beautiful," continued Donald thought 
 fully, still without heeding his brother s ill-temper. 
 
 " You re right, she did," Tom agreed. " The green parlor 
 made me think of the sea, and she of that spray of coral in 
 the cabinet that Uncle Tom gave me when I was a baby and 
 that Aunt Stella took away from me. By gad ! " Tom s 
 voice became suddenly louder " I ll smash into that cabinet 
 some day ! " 
 
 Donald smiled. He remembered his brother s boyish pas 
 sion for the coral. 
 
 " Aunt Maggie seems quite taken with Agnes," Tom went 
 on presently. 
 
 " Yes," said Donald dubiously, " I hope it lasts." 
 
 " Did you see Aunt Maggie get me out into the hall for a 
 confidential chat before we left? She thought she d hurt 
 my feelings by saying something about my mussing her 
 dress." 
 
 He finished with an impatient sigh which told of other mat 
 ters on his mind. 
 
 Donald looked at him. " What is it, Tom ? " he asked. 
 
 " Oh, nothing, nothing. If I could get together fifty or 
 
 188
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 189 
 
 seventy-five cents, I d go off on a trip. I need a few cents 
 for clothes, too. I d be thankful to have the wardrobe of a 
 Zulu. I don t ask to be arrayed like Solomon." 
 
 After a pause Donald asked in an apologetic voice, " You 
 haven t been playing the stocks again, have you ? " 
 
 " Now look here, Don," said Tom irritably, " there s reason 
 in stocks just as there is in everything else. It s unscientific 
 in you to object to something you know nothing about." 
 
 Donald raised his hand imploringly. Tom muttered some 
 thing in his throat. The brothers walked on a little distance 
 without speaking. 
 
 Donald was reviewing Tom s new fever for speculation, 
 and one result which seemed to him particularly unfortu 
 nate. This was a renewed and growing companionship with 
 Beatrice Sidney. 
 
 " Tom," Donald said thoughtfully, at last, " do you see 
 much of General Mott? " 
 
 " See much of Mott? Why, no, why should I? " 
 
 " Well you go out to the lake house often enough." 
 
 " Well, I don t go to see him," said Tom crustily. 
 
 " You seem to be going there a good deal," persisted Don 
 ald. " I don t think it looks altogether well. It seems to be 
 a good deal more convenient for you to get out there than 
 it is for Sidney. Of course I know it s all right, but I think 
 you ought to be a little careful." 
 
 " Well, I ll be * a little careful ! I know what you mean. 
 Now Ferdinand is back, we re in the world of gossip once 
 more. If he could do Beatrice a mean turn and get a slap 
 at me at the same time, one of the main objects of his life 
 would be accomplished." Tom s tone was full of venom. 
 
 Donald tried to turn the conversation back into its origi 
 nal channel. 
 
 " Why is it, Tom, that Beatrice spends so much of her 
 time away from her husband? She no sooner got that great 
 place built than she leaves it. I thought she was staying 
 with her father out at the lake." 
 
 " How long is it since you ve begun to gossip, Don? " ex-
 
 190 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 claimed Tom angrily. " Old Mott s down in New York 
 speculating in stocks, with a long-distance telephone put in 
 at the lake house. Bee has her ticker and she has made a 
 tidy little sum herself." 
 
 A look of alarm came into Donald s face. " I hope you re 
 not interested in the Mott speculations," he said earnestly. 
 His worries with regard to Tom took on a change of front. 
 " The General s going to get caught some day." 
 
 Tom gave a disdainful laugh. " That s what Ferd thinks. 
 But his hope has been deferred a long time. The Motts are 
 a cool-headed lot. Father and daughter have got enough put 
 away to buy our car-barns at the price Ferdinand puts on 
 them, and they won t touch it either, even if they lose every 
 cent of their floating capital. Old Mott never goes in over 
 his depths, and when he s drunk he doesn t go in at all." 
 
 " What started Beatrice at this ? " said Donald after 
 having turned over in his mind Tom s disclosures. 
 
 " Oh, she went into it this last summer. It was awfully 
 dull in Kent, and she couldn t get Fred to go anywhere else. 
 Sidney made such a row about her having a ticker in Kent 
 that she put it in at the lake house to keep peace in the 
 family." 
 
 " Do you mean to say, Tom, that you are countenancing 
 Beatrice in a position of antagonism to her husband s 
 wishes? I don t see how your sense of honor can allow you 
 to take such a step." 
 
 " See here, Don," replied Tom with a ring of determination 
 in his voice, " my family have had a good deal to say about 
 my course of life, hitherto. I haven t had character enough 
 to cut loose and do what I was made to do. I am a good- 
 natured, shuffling leaner like Uncle Tom. Here I am, on a 
 clerk s salary in Ferdinand s office. I won t have a cent of 
 capital till I m thirty years old, while mother and you, the 
 executors of my father s estate, dole out to me enough to buy 
 shoestrings and neckties. Mother would like to buy them 
 for me if she could. Looking forward to that thirtieth year 
 has been the ruin of me. I m not going to look any more.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 191 
 
 I m going to get some money now, anyway that s feasible, 
 do you understand ? " 
 
 " I have never refused you money within reason," said 
 Donald in a hurt voice. " I have offered you a European 
 trip twice told you to take a few months off. I make you 
 the same offer now." 
 
 " I don t want a few months off. I want the privilege of 
 being of age before I m in my second childhood. When I 
 go abroad it will be on my own money, to stay as long as I 
 like." 
 
 The bitterness in Tom s heart astonished Donald. For the 
 first time he saw that he might be the author of more danger 
 ous developments in Tom s character than would have taken 
 place had his brother been left to his own harmless, if mean 
 ingless, ambitions. Perhaps his mother and he had made a 
 great mistake. Perhaps Tom should have been allowed at 
 eighteen to follow out his queer passion to be a goldsmith. 
 He wavered, was almost at the point of proposing to Tom 
 the long-wished-for study of goldsmithry abroad. Then the 
 thought of Ferdinand s and his mother s indignation at his 
 weakness in seconding Tom s madness steadied his judg 
 ment. 
 
 He laid his hand regretfully on Tom s shoulder. " Tom, 
 we all have to give up things. I know you are worried and 
 exasperated." 
 
 Tom interrupted him savagely, " For heaven s sake, spare 
 me that, Don. I m not worried about anything. I m as 
 peaceful as a boiled egg. You and mother needn t sit on me 
 any longer. There s no hope of my hatching." 
 
 They walked on in the darkness until they reached the out 
 skirts of the town. 
 
 Then Donald spoke again, " I ve been thinking about 
 something for some time, Tom. If you have any inclination 
 to marry, I want you to feel perfectly free to do so. An 
 arrangement can be made to give you a suitable income in 
 anticipation of your share in our father s estate." 
 
 " I don t want to get married," replied Tom moodily.
 
 192 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Then a memory came back to him. There was a new tone 
 in his voice as he continued, " There s one woman who might 
 have made something of me." 
 
 "Who is that, Tom?" Donald asked with an impulse of 
 hope. 
 
 " That young woman Agnes brought to our house the time 
 she came to dinner. She talked to me about Benvenuto Cel 
 lini when I took her home. She said if a man had it in him 
 to be anything, he d be it. If a man had that kind of woman 
 around, he might," Tom finished gloomily. 
 
 " Agnes was telling me about her this evening," replied 
 Donald, forgetting his own memories of that night in his 
 surprise at Tom s reminiscence. " I did not know you took 
 an interest in her. You never have spoken of her. Isn t she 
 older than you ? " 
 
 " Oh, Lord, Don, you make me sick ! " 
 
 Tom turned away from his brother abruptly, and started 
 across the street. 
 
 Donald put out his hand and caught him. " Hold on, 
 Tom ! Come along, home. I didn t mean anything by that." 
 
 " No, you haven t enough brains to mean anything when 
 you try." Tom s voice shook with passion and his face 
 looked white under the gas-lamp. 
 
 Donald was arrested by a look of desperation in his brother 
 which he never had seen before. " See here, Tom," he said 
 decidedly, "I believe you are right. I don t mean about the 
 brains, but about Miriam Cass." 
 
 He stopped and the two looked at each other. Tom was 
 strangely quiet. 
 
 Donald continued. " I think she is a remarkable woman, 
 a woman worth loving, and why shouldn t she love you ? The 
 age doesn t make any difference. Why have you never 
 spoken about her before? " 
 
 The color slowly rose into Tom s face. "Why haven t 
 I? " he groaned. 
 
 A pang of sympathy pierced to Donald s heart. He turned 
 away and began to walk along slowly.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 193 
 
 In a few moments, Tom caught up with him. " Don ! " 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 There was a tone in his voice that made Donald s heart 
 leap. The next moment he felt Tom s arm thrown over his 
 shoulder and around his neck. " Let s talk about her ! " 
 
 The world as it is vanished from Tom as he spoke. The 
 world as a boy dreams it came in its place. A sudden 
 adoration that rises none knows whence nor whither pos 
 sessed him, the innocent passion that longs to give and not 
 to get, the idolatry of youth with all its rainbow glory. 
 
 Donald did not dare glance at him. He knew the ethereal 
 fragility of that mood, but he knew that if Tom could keep 
 it, it would be his salvation. With his heart in his mouth, he 
 began to talk of Miriam Cass, and when they reached the 
 house and separated for the night the tears were wet on his 
 cheeks and Tom s mood was unbroken.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 CEVERAL days after her arrival Agnes was busy 
 arranging her own and her husband s rooms when she 
 heard Miss Margaret s delicate tap at the half-open door. 
 Miss Ballington entered without waiting for an invitation, 
 holding a large pasteboard box in her arms. 
 
 Agnes hurried to help her. "Let me take the box, Aunt 
 Margaret. You ll drop it," she said, holding out her hands. 
 
 " You dear child," ej aculated Miss Margaret ecstatically. 
 * How happy I am since you ve come here. I ve never found 
 anybody except Ferdinand, of course, and those who have 
 left us with whom I ve felt quite so much in sympathy. I 
 don t mean anything against Sarah or Donald or dear Tom. 
 You don t think that, do you ? " 
 
 "No, indeed," said Agnes; "what have you there? It 
 looks wonderfully interesting." 
 
 " I knew you would love to look at these things with me," 
 said the elder woman delightedly. 
 
 She fluttered around to Agnes side of the box, and gave 
 her several butterfly kisses. Agnes took off the cover and 
 sat down on the floor by the box. 
 
 "Why! They re baby clothes," she said, lifting an ex 
 quisite, old-fashioned garment without sleeves. 
 
 " They re what dear little Ferdinand used to wear," said 
 Miss Margaret, patting the dress. " Estelle made them her 
 self. She was an expert needle-woman. She had had lessons 
 from the nuns." 
 
 "They are beautiful," said Agnes, turning over some of 
 the garments and thinking of her own mother s equally 
 beautiful but self-taught work. " Think of Ferdinand s ever 
 getting into this shirt ! " 
 
 " He was the sweetest baby," said Miss Margaret. " Some 
 times Estelle would let me give him his bath. See this little 
 
 194
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 195 
 
 brush. It s the very one I used to brush his hair with." She 
 laid down the brush and took up a package of letters, tied 
 with a faded ribbon. "I m going to leave these for you to 
 read, dearest. They re my most precious letters. They re 
 from Tom that s Ferdinand s father, you know and 
 Estelle, and some from Ferdinand, too. My brother Tom was 
 a very attractive man, so good-hearted. I don t believe he 
 ever said an unkind word to anybody in all his life. I wish 
 you could have heard him sing. He used to sing at all the 
 church sociables." 
 
 Here Miss Margaret s reminiscences became too vivid for 
 mere narration and she began singing softly in a sweet, thin 
 voice : 
 
 " Kathleen Mavourneen, the gray dawn is breaking, 
 The horn of the hunter is heard on the hill." 
 
 As Agnes watched her she felt the ghost of the first Tom 
 Ballington behind his sister as she knelt on the floor, a gentler 
 and sweeter spirit than his son had sketched him. 
 
 She shook off the eerie feeling and resolutely took up 
 the letters. " I have wondered what Ferdinand s mother 
 was like," she said ; " I can t tell how glad I shall be to 
 read her letters." 
 
 Her evident interest filled Miss Margaret s cup of satis 
 faction to overflowing and she became girlishly confidential. 
 " And here is some of Ferdinand s hair when he was two years 
 old," she said in a half whisper. " Isn t it soft ? I used to 
 rock him to sleep in my arms sometimes in that little white 
 chair in my room. Some time, perhaps, I ll give the chair to 
 you, dear." 
 
 "Oh, I wouldn t take it away from you, Aunt Margaret. 
 I d like a little wisp of this hair, though, to put in one of my 
 lockets, if you don t mind." 
 
 "You shall have half. You don t think I ought to give 
 it all to you, do you ? " Miss Margaret paused apprehen 
 sively. 
 
 " No, indeed," exclaimed Agnes.
 
 196 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Thank you, dear. I thought these things ought to belong 
 to you now. But you ll let me keep one little set, won t you? 
 I d like to have one set for my very own." 
 
 Agnes was touched, Miss Margaret was so evidently giving 
 away her dearest treasures, and yet they must not be refused. 
 " Certainly, dear Aunt Margaret. It s very good in you to 
 give any of them to me." 
 
 As she spoke Agnes replaced the little pieces in the box, 
 with the exception of the one set, and with a look of friendly 
 gratitude, picked up the box and carried it into her closet. 
 
 When she returned Miss Ballington was sitting in a rock 
 ing-chair picking nervously at a bow on her dress. 
 
 " Agnes, dear," she said. 
 
 At the sound of her voice Agnes mood instinctively clouded 
 over. " Yes ? " she asked guardedly. 
 
 " We love each other, don t we ? " 
 
 " Why yes. Certainly." 
 
 " There ought to be perfect confidence between us. Don t 
 you think so ? " 
 
 Agnes made no reply. 
 
 " Don t you think so, precious ? " repeated Miss Margaret, 
 and she went over and put her thin arms over the back of 
 Agnes chair. 
 
 " Wasn t that picture of Ferdinand too pretty for any 
 thing?" Agnes exclaimed evasively, rising and going to the 
 closet again. " I m going to have it out here till he comes 
 home. There ! Doesn t he look dignified ? " 
 
 She did not sit down again, but stood looking at a picture 
 which she had placed on the high mahogany bureau. She 
 was trying to bring back the easy relations which had char 
 acterized the opening of the interview. 
 
 Miss Margaret rose and slipped her arm around Agnes 
 waist. " Isn t there a soulful look in his eyes? " she asked. 
 " He used to look at me that way sometimes when he was a 
 little boy. Dear little fellow. I ve thought he must look at 
 you that way, doesn t he, dear ? " 
 
 Agnes was divided between a desire to laugh at the soul-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 197 
 
 ful glanees of the bafby Ferdinand, and resentment at the 
 starved sentimentality which was timidly trying to claim 
 kinship with her young and full experience, but the pathos of 
 the ridiculous situation gagged her exasperation into a futile 
 reply. " Why I don t know." 
 
 " Wouldn t you you wouldn t be angry if I ask you some 
 thing, will you, dear? " Miss Margaret hesitated at her own 
 temerity. Then she took courage. She had at last found 
 someone who was kind ^nd who might give her a glimpse into 
 that world from which fate had shut her out. " I d so like 
 to know what he says to you sometimes. Won t you tell me 
 some of the pet names he calls you, dear? I m going to let 
 you read my letters," she added tremulously, frightened by 
 the sudden flush on Agnes cheeks and brow. 
 
 Agnes sense of humor came to the rescue. " He gen 
 erally calls me Agnes ." 
 
 " Don t be angry wifti me, dearest. Please don t." 
 
 Miss Margaret moved hesitatingly toward Agnes and 
 stood trembling in front of her. As the young wife glanced 
 down and saw the sterile hopes and blasted instincts in the 
 withered facfe her heart smote her. 
 
 " I ll tell you what he called you the other day," she said 
 smiling, a sudden thought coming to her. " He called you a 
 carnation pink." 
 
 Miss Margaret s face took on an illumination. " Did he? " 
 she said softly. " How sweet in you to tell me, dear." 
 
 Agnes was glad of the diversion, but her conscience pricked 
 her a little at the construction she had put upon some words 
 of Ferdinand s. 
 
 Miss Margaret did not go, however. 
 
 " I never thought I could be so happy with Ferdinand s 
 wife here," she said presently, sitting down and drawing a 
 crochet pattern from her pocket. " It s so nice to have some 
 one to chat with mornings. Sarah comes sometimes. But 
 Sarah is rather unapproachable, don t you think so, dear?" 
 
 Agnes smiled shrewdly. " I shouldn t think she would 
 attract confidence," she said.
 
 198 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " I never can forget how unjust she was to you, dear. You 
 are the very last- person in the world to call bold. I m sure 
 nobody could think that of you. Ferdinand was angry, when 
 he heard it. Oh!" 
 
 Agnes smile suddenly vanished. Indignation at Mrs. Bal- 
 lington was aggravated by impatience at herself for having 
 given Aunt Margaret a loophole for gossip. 
 
 Miss Margaret stammered on confusedly. " I oughtn t to 
 have told you that. I promised Donald no, it was Ferdinand 
 I promised. He said just wait a year and see what you would 
 be. He said he was going to give you every advantage. 
 Every advantage that money could buy. Wasn t it sweet in 
 him?" 
 
 Miss Margaret paused with a hopeful expression. 
 
 " Very," responded Agnes icily. 
 
 " I m sure you are lovely already, dear," exclaimed Miss 
 Margaret, ill at ease. "You look pale, dear child. You 
 aren t ill, are you?" 
 
 "No, not at all." 
 
 "I want you just to rest and take your ease here. You 
 had to work so hard at home." If Miss Margaret had had 
 Machiavelian designs of enjoying herself at another s self- 
 invited discomfiture, she might now have congratulated herself 
 upon her success, but she went on, innocent of any such 
 motives : " I know all about what a hard home life you had, 
 and how exacting your mother was." 
 
 A flood of color swept into Agnes face. " My mother 
 was a saint ! a martyr ! " she said abruptly. " I was a 
 miserable, shiftless, good-for-nothing girl." 
 
 Miss Margaret laughed delightedly, dropped her work, and 
 reached up to give Agnes a little hug. 
 
 Agnes turned away to the bureau and looked at her watch. 
 The conversation was growing intolerable. 
 
 " Are you faint, dear ? " asked Miss Margaret solicitously. 
 
 " No," came the laconic reply. 
 
 But Miss Margaret s evil genius was in full control of her. 
 " You aren t very strong, are you, now? " she continued.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 199 
 
 "Now?" Agnes turned and met Miss Margaret s look 
 full. 
 
 The dark gaze and the somberness of the one word would 
 have warned off anybody but a little brow-beaten creature 
 expanding for the first time under the genial influence of 
 sympathetic kindness. So she added the finishing touch to 
 her unintentional but none the less artistic inquisitional 
 torture. 
 
 " I mean, dear it s all interest. I thought perhaps Fer 
 dinand or you would have told me before this. I ve tried to 
 show that I love you. I m just like Ferdinand s mother. 
 Won t you tell me, dear ? " 
 
 Agnes was smarting under the realization that she her 
 self had been the source and Ferdinand the channel of Miss 
 Margaret s knowledge, such as it was, of the Sidney family. 
 Her heart bled at the thought of her mother s pride and 
 loyalty in the family, and her own foolish garrulity. 
 
 "You remember I have not seen my mother since my 
 return," she said haughtily, and, as she finished speaking, 
 she walked across the room toward Ferdinand s door, her 
 heart on fire with love and longing for the woman who had 
 borne her, nursed her, and then given her away just when she 
 had arrived at a point where she could do something in return. 
 What a thankless office motherhood is! She went into the 
 adjoining room and closed the door after her. 
 
 Miss Margaret sprang up, letting her crochet work drop 
 to the floor, and flew to the door. " Agnes ! Dear, dear 
 Agnes ! " she called excitedly. Then she bent down to the 
 keyhole and modified her voice. "Won t you let me come in 
 just a minute? Just a little minute? I do want to tell 
 you " 
 
 She turned the knob gently and had slightly opened the 
 door, when it was pushed back from the other side and the 
 key turned in the lock. 
 
 Miss Margaret stood still, trembling. " She s turned the 
 key on me. She s locked me out," she said with a bewildered 
 expression. Then her face quivered. She turned and ran out
 
 200 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 into the hall and to her own room, where she shut herself in 
 and stayed until night. 
 
 Agnes lay upon the bed in Ferdinand s room until the sum 
 mons to luncheon. She was faint in mind and body, and torn 
 with rebellion as she realized the physical and mental impo 
 tence so relentlessly gaining upon her. She realized that she 
 was abnormally sensitive and she shrank as she thought of the 
 future. 
 
 She ate her luncheon alone, making no inquiries for Miss 
 Ballington, and answering Eliza in monosyllables when the 
 latter attempted a conversation. In the afternoon she wrote 
 a long letter to Miriam Cass, who was in New York studying 
 art. When the letter was done, Agnes dressed for dinner. 
 The habit of fastidious care as to her personal appearance 
 was growing upon her as insidiously as was the instinct of 
 timidity and caution in her physical exercise. Once she had 
 been fearless in her movements, careless ki her looks, but the 
 diffidence which had attacked her mental life was spreading 
 to the physical. 
 
 The time of Ferdinand s return at night was the happiest 
 part of the day. To-night Agnes looked for him as for the 
 shadow of a rock in a weary land. She heard his ring of the 
 bell, heard Eliza pass through the hall to admit him, and went 
 to the stairs to meet him. 
 
 Miss Ballington was already greeting him in the lower 
 hall. Agnes heard her words, " Will you come into the 
 library, Ferdinand? I wish to speak to you." She saw her 
 husband follow the drooping little figure, and then she went 
 back to her room and waited. 
 
 Downstairs, Ferdinand remained standing in the library. 
 And Miss Margaret, after having seated herself, got up 
 again. 
 
 " Ferdinand, something exceedingly painful has hap 
 pened," she said, with difficulty. 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " Your wife has locked me out of her room turned the 
 key against me."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 201 
 
 There was no reply. 
 
 " She turned the key in my face, Ferdinand," Miss Mar 
 garet went on more earnestly. 
 
 " Evidently she wished to be alone." 
 
 Ferdinand was displeased at this beginning of domestic 
 discord. 
 
 " I have nothing to do with this," he added. 
 
 " No, of course not. I wanted you to ask her if I could 
 come up to see her. I want to tell her I m sorry. I did not 
 mean to force myself upon her." Miss Margaret s misery 
 was acute and patent. 
 
 " I will give her your message," her nephew responded 
 briefly. 
 
 He was turning toward the door when his aunt spoke 
 again. She was struggling to keep her self-control and to 
 conciliate him. A brave attempt to smile resulted only in a 
 look of desperate beseeching. 
 
 " And, dear, before you go, I want to tell you how very, 
 very happy you ve made me." 
 
 He stood waiting. 
 
 " Agnes told me the sweet name you gave me. You don t 
 mind her telling me, do you? I shall always love the flower 
 more after this. Carnation pink ! " 
 
 He looked at her uncomprehending. Suddenly a recol 
 lection darted into his mind. Several days previous, when 
 commenting upon his aunt to Agnes he had remarked, " She 
 has about as much logic as that carnation pink." 
 
 " If there is nothing else, I will go upstairs," he said, turn 
 ing away. 
 
 He had been chafing under the delay which kept him from 
 his wife until the pink was mentioned. Now, however, he went 
 directly into his own room without speaking to Agnes. 
 
 When they were called to dinner he opened the door into 
 her room and entered. Then, with only a cold salutation, he 
 remarked as he opened the hall door for her, " Aunt Margaret 
 wished me to tell you that she was sorry she intruded upon 
 you, and to ask if you would let her explain."
 
 202 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 He was already softening toward her as he looked at her, 
 but Agnes was now sore from his leaving her alone. " I will 
 apologize to her to-night," she said, feeling his words a rebuke 
 and too proud to explain the episode. 
 
 Ferdinand never asked for explanations, so he put his own 
 interpretation upon her silence, and changed the subject. 
 
 Miss Ballington was in the dining-room when they entered. 
 Agnes spoke to her at once. 
 
 " I was very rude to you to-day, Aunt Margaret. For 
 give me." 
 
 " Don t speak of it," exclaimed Miss Ballington in a new 
 distress of remorse and pain. " It was all my fault." 
 
 In spite of the mutual apologies the dinner hour was not 
 comfortable. Agnes was on the verge of crying. She ex 
 cused herself at the dessert and returned to her own room. 
 
 " She hasn t forgiven me," said Miss Margaret plaintively, 
 as Agnes footsteps died away. " How cold and straight she 
 sat there. Do you think she is hard-hearted, Ferdinand? She 
 isn t hard-hearted, is she ? " 
 
 Ferdinand rose in cold disgust and went into the library, 
 where he spent the first part of the evening reading. It was 
 part of his system of self-control to allow no external annoy 
 ance perceptibly to disturb his comfort. He believed in leav 
 ing people to their humors. With Agnes, however, he found 
 this rather difficult. At last he got up, put down his paper, 
 selected a book from the case and went upstairs to his wife s 
 room. 
 
 He found her sitting idly by the window in the dark. 
 " Come, Agnes. This is foolish," he said, and he lighted the 
 lamp. 
 
 "Let me be the judge of my own actions," said a low, 
 quivering voice, and Agnes turned her eyes with their enlarged 
 pupils toward her husband and the light. She was thinking 
 of his promise to exhibit her in a year. 
 
 Ferdinand looked at her in surprise; then he said, "You 
 remember a conversation we had in Paris on the subject of 
 religion ? "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 203 
 
 Her face softened instantly. " Yes yes," she said, half 
 rising, and sitting again. 
 
 " I didn t wish to unsettle you while we were traveling," 
 continued Ferdinand. " But now I should like you to begin 
 a course of reading which will bring us into understanding. 
 This is a good book to begin with." He came toward her 
 and held out the volume. 
 
 She looked at the title, saw, " Controversial Essays. T. 
 Huxley," and said, turning to the window again, " I shall 
 not read it." 
 
 Ferdinand had hit upon a most unfortunate time for intro 
 ducing Agnes to Huxley. It gave her a chance to retrieve 
 what she considered past disloyalty to her mother. Her 
 afternoon of lonely brooding over Miss Margaret s unlucky 
 disclosures had resulted in a series of self-accusations and 
 resolves. 
 
 He still held out the book. 
 
 " Do I understand that you refuse to read this book ? " he 
 asked. 
 
 " I refuse. I will have nothing to do with heretical works. 
 Mother wouldn t allow them in our house. I shall not read 
 one of your series." 
 
 The words ended in a sob. 
 
 He waited a moment longer, turned slowly, laid the book 
 on the table, and walked toward the door. Then, before 
 leaving the room, he said, looking toward her, " The last 
 time we spoke of this you were reasonable, although ignorant. 
 I have left the book on your table. When you become rea 
 sonable again, we will discuss it further. There is one quota 
 tion I will leave for you to consider before you take up the 
 reading : He who dare not reason is a coward ; he who will 
 not reason is a bigot ; he who cannot reason is a fool. 
 Then he went into the hall and closed the door after him. 
 
 As soon as Ferdinand left her Agnes broke down entirely. 
 When she was somewhat relieved, she picked up the volume 
 of Huxley s Essays, carried it into Ferdinand s room and 
 left it in the middle of his bed. " If he brings it back," she
 
 204 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 said to herself with flashing eyes, " I shall throw it into the 
 fire." 
 
 She was partly undressed, when, happening to catch sight 
 of the letter she had written to Miriam, she put on a wrapper, 
 got out her writing materials, and added another sheet to the 
 letter, then sealed it up and went to bed. 
 
 Her sleep was troubled. Toward morning she began to 
 rest. Suddenly she woke up feeling someone near her. She 
 was frightened and sat up instantly. A little figure in white 
 was standing at the foot of the bed, just visible in the pale 
 dawn. " Aunt Margaret," exclaimed Agnes, " is that you? " 
 
 " Yes, dear. I couldn t endure it. I ve hardly slept all 
 night. I never ought to have asked your confidence. And I 
 ought not to have spoken to Ferdinand afterwards. Oh, I m 
 very miserable, Agnes dear ; do say you forgive me." 
 
 "Yes, Aunt Margaret," Agnes answered sadly. "If 
 there s anything to forgive, I do. You mustn t stay here. 
 You ll catch cold." 
 
 " No, I won t. I won t, dear. I m going to try to make 
 you happy after this." And Miss Margaret turned and hur 
 ried away. 
 
 Ferdinand made no further reference to the Huxley. It 
 stayed in his room on the table where Eliza put it when she 
 found it on the foot of his bed. Agnes tried to put the cir 
 cumstance from her mind, but with pretty poor success. She 
 was unrelenting in her refusal of Ferdinand s request, and 
 might long have remained so but for Miriam s next letter, one 
 portion of which read as follows : 
 
 I can understand what you write to me about religion. I have been 
 through it, and came to the conclusion that we need not trouble our 
 selves about " dangerous doctrines." No danger is quite so great as 
 that of mental timidity. Why should one be afraid to find out that 
 certain things one has believed are foolish? If you like we can read 
 some together. 
 
 The same day this letter was received came two books from 
 Miriam. Agnes began them with a will, finished them in a
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 205 
 
 few days in a thirsty state of mind, and took the book of 
 Huxley s from Ferdinand s room into her own. 
 
 He noticed it, and congratulated himself upon his coup 
 d etat. Ordinarily women were to be left to the illusions of 
 faith. They were not formed for stronger vision. He had 
 chosen his mate, however, for intellectual as well as material 
 companionship, and he watched with satisfaction her progress 
 along the path which he had marked out for her.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 IC OR two months Agnes found herself the center of Wins 
 ton attention. She received many calls, returned them 
 with Miss Margaret or Mrs. Silas Ballington, attended a 
 large reception which the latter gave for her, more to prove 
 that there was no ground for the rumor of Donald s and 
 Ferdinand s rivalry than for anything else, and was present 
 at the various other festivities. She felt considerable interest 
 in meeting socially the influential townspeople whom she used 
 
 . to usher to their seats at the college musicales and lectures. 
 
 & College itself was entering upon a struggle with poverty 
 under new and cold management, but it was still a familiar 
 and memory-haunted spot which she sought from time to 
 time when she felt lonely. 
 
 During these first weeks in Winston Agnes was also get 
 ting an insight into the family which she had entered. Ferdi 
 nand s differentiation from the rest of the Ballingtons grew 
 upon her, and the more Miss Margaret talked of her dead 
 brother Tom the clearer became Agnes conviction that Ferdi 
 nand must be a Landseer with little or nothing of his father 
 in him. She fell into the way of questioning Miss Margaret 
 about the mother, Estelle Landseer, about the grandfather, 
 rich old Ferdinand Landseer, and his eccentric wife, Estelle s 
 mother, whose hermit life prevented anyone from knowing her. 
 Miss Margaret was not at ease, Agnes soon discovered, under 
 this catechism, and the painfully conscientious replies confirmed 
 Agnes in her preconceived notions of the uncompromising and 
 silent nature of her husband s mother. She often looked at the 
 baby-clothes, wondering that the woman who had invented 
 the car-spring should be so exquisite a needle-woman and so 
 painstaking a housekeeper as her letters showed her to be. 
 
 These simple and formal letters, written for the most 
 part about ordinary domestic occurrences, brought Agnes 
 
 206
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 207 
 
 into closer touch with the woman whom she dimly felt to be 
 the key to much she could not understand. Here and there 
 on the neatly-written pages sentences stood out in startling 
 contrast to the rest, like flashes of fire struck out by the col 
 lision of her will with her environment. 
 
 One of the letters was a curious, proud apology for having 
 taken with her, against the doctor s orders, the three-year-old 
 baby Ferdinand when she was ordered from home for rest 
 and change. " I know you and Thomas would do everything 
 for the baby, dear Margaret, but he is a greater care than 
 most children, owing, I believe, to his having inherited my 
 stubborn will, and I could not feel right about leaving him. 
 I often tell myself, when tired, that we must not spoil the man 
 in humoring the child. I hope and pray that he has been 
 born to glorify God. Whether we enjoy or not is relatively 
 unimportant." 
 
 Agnes pondered over this letter. There was the same note 
 of dominant character here that there was in her own 
 mother s letters, but along with it was a reserve to which 
 Mrs. Sidney was a stranger. Agnes suspected that Ferdi 
 nand s mother had planned the trip away not to get rest 
 and change for herself, but to get the child away from its 
 jovial, easy-going father and its weakly -indulgent aunt. 
 
 After reading the letters it did not surprise Agnes to learn 
 of her mother-in-law s stern adherence to the Calvinistic faith 
 in which she herself had been born and bred, but she appre 
 ciated a vast difference between the Calvinism of Dr. Sidney 
 and the Calvinism of the old letters and the markings of the 
 religious books which once had belonged to Ferdinand s 
 mother. With Estelle the unflinching theology, grimly ac 
 cepted, seemed ever present and was even apparent in that 
 period of her correspondence when, owing to her mother s 
 peculiarities, old Ferdinand Landseer had put her in a con 
 vent school to learn French, music and sewing. 
 
 Once when Agnes commented to her husband upon his 
 mother s rigid orthodoxy he answered her with a reminiscent 
 smile, " One of the few things I remember her saying is a
 
 208 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 sentence she quoted once to my father, * For whom He did 
 foreknow He also did predestinate. It was shortly before 
 she died, and the reason I remember it is that she was stopped 
 in the middle by a fit of coughing, but it didn t prevent her 
 finishing the sentence a word at a time. My father began 
 to laugh, but when he picked her up to carry her to the lounge 
 he was crying. As soon as she had breath enough to get up 
 she walked back to her chair." Ferdinand s smile had van 
 ished, and he added with that respect and satisfaction which 
 he always showed in speaking of his mother. " My mother 
 was a logical woman." It was a long time before Agnes 
 understood what connection there was in Ferdinand s mind 
 between logic and this incident, but that was one of the things 
 she came to know. 
 
 Agnes now had been married seven months and yet had not 
 visited her mother. Although she had made the trip alone 
 repeatedly as a girl going to and from college, it seemed 
 to be a matter of pride with Ferdinand to accompany her 
 on her first visit home, so she was obliged to control her im 
 patience until he could leave his business. Finally, at Christ 
 mas time, he proposed that they go to see her mother. Agnes 
 would not confess to herself that she would rather have gone 
 alone. 
 
 Dr. Quinn met them at the station with Peggy* and Agnes 
 heart went out to the doctor when she saw his placid spec 
 tacled face through the car window. The town seemed oddly 
 still, and as they drove up to her mother s home it looked 
 low and broad and isolated from the wide world she had 
 known since she left its doors. But the woman on the porch, 
 stretching out hospitable arms to her, held the knowledge 
 of that world in the clear eyes which met her daughter s with 
 understanding. 
 
 " You ll find your room all ready, Agnes," said Mrs. Sid 
 ney, picking up some of the luggage before Ferdinand was 
 able to grasp it. " The train was late, and dinner s been 
 waiting. Hurry up and get ready. God be praised, you re 
 safe at home again."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 209 
 
 Agnes went upstairs with a youthful heart. " Mother 
 will take care of everything now," she thought. 
 
 She looked in upon her aunt, greeted her affectionately, 
 then hurriedly took off her furs and wraps. The bedroom 
 looked low-ceilinged, but she never had loved it so well before. 
 She thrilled with pleasure when Ferdinand said, " It is very 
 homelike, more so than our house." 
 
 " Isn t it lovely ! " Agnes answered in delight, running 
 through the upstairs rooms in a fervor of joy. " And smell 
 the turkey ! " she cried as her husband met her and they de 
 scended the stairs. " This is just too good. I have my little 
 blue teacup, and we ll have our tea with the dinner. How 
 lovely everything is. How your face shines, mother. It 
 makes me think of Moses when he came down from the 
 mount." 
 
 They all sat down at the table, Dr. Quinn at the head. 
 
 " You shouldn t speak flippantly about Moses, Agnes, * 
 said Mrs. Sidney after the doctor had asked the blessing, 
 but there was a happy smile on her face. " If my face 
 shines, it is with soap and water." 
 
 " At all events, then," remarked Dr. Quinn, looking at Mrs. 
 Sidney with friendly eyes, " it shines with the next thing to 
 godliness." 
 
 As soon as the dinner was over Agnes rose and said, " Give 
 me an apron, mother. I m going to help with the dishes." 
 
 Ferdinand, Dr. Quinn, and Aunt Mattie were energetically 
 ushered into the parlor by Mrs. Sidney, who seated them 
 around nuts and apples, furnished them a topic of conversa 
 tion by telling Ferdinand that his two companions had been 
 arguing for a week past over Cleopatra s mummy, about 
 which he now would be able to tell them all there was to 
 know. Thereupon she went back to the kitchen and closed 
 the door behind her. 
 
 It was with a deep sigh of content that she took her 
 daughter s face between her hard hands and kissed her 
 soundly. " They re settled in there, and now we can have a 
 good, long talk," she said.
 
 210 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes began at the beginning, and gave the history of 
 their travels abroad. Mrs. Sidney listened with a pleasure 
 that was almost keener, Agnes thought, than she herself had 
 experienced in making the trip. Indeed the mother s satisfac 
 tion was unbounded in the fact that Providence had given 
 Agnes such opportunities. 
 
 When Mrs. Sidney had been satisfied about the wedding 
 trip, she questioned her daughter about her new relations 
 in her husband s home, and she listened with a half -wise, half- 
 humorous expression to Agnes confidences. It did not take 
 the older woman long to get a better idea than Agnes her-* 
 self had of the state of things at the farm. She shook with 
 laughter when Agnes finished a heated description of Miss 
 Margaret s well-meant intrusions into her personal mat 
 ters. " If you two had more work to do, you wouldn t bother 
 yourselves or each other. You ought to take example by me, 
 Agnes. Since you ve gone away and I ve had less to do, I ve 
 taken up giving Beatrice lessons in housekeeping. She 
 needs it as bad as anybody I ever knew, and she pays me 
 generously." 
 
 As Mrs. Sidney wiped the tears of laughter from her eyes, 
 her face underwent one of those sudden changes from mirth 
 to sternness which Agnes remembered so well. " I don t 
 know that I would go out to give lessons at my time of life," 
 Mrs. Sidney continued, " if it wasn t that I thought Beatrice 
 needs something even more than housekeeping lessons. The 
 way she is going on with Thomas Ballington again has been 
 a great care to me, Agnes." 
 
 The thought of her mother s being assisted by Beatrice 
 while she herself was doing so little for her caused Agnes 
 keen suffering. To disguise her emotions, she answered 
 hastily, " Don t worry about that, mamma. It s only non 
 sense. Social forms aren t as rigid as they used to be." As 
 she spoke, Agnes remembered impatiently how Ferdinand 
 continually had thrown out innuendoes about various people, 
 conspicuously Tom and Beatrice. 
 
 " Don t say nonsense, Agnes," her mother returned
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 211 
 
 gravely. " Whatever social forms may be, results follow 
 causes nowadays just as much as they ever did. Beatrice 
 and Tom can t walk on hot coals without getting burned." 
 
 Here Mrs. Sidney wrung out the dishcloth, cleaned up the 
 sink, hung up the towels, and, after casting a glance around 
 the neat little kitchen, turned to her daughter, with her hands 
 on her hips : " It seems to me Ferdinand looks a little thin, 
 Agnes." 
 
 Agnes smiled. " Yes," she replied, " he s been worried 
 about some business a matter that s all right now, and, at 
 the same time, he took it into his head that he was getting 
 too fat and began to diet." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney shook her head disparagingly. " I never did 
 believe in dieting," she said, looking down at her own sub 
 stantial form. " Vanity is at the bottom of it. I think, too, 
 that Ferdinand had better begin to lay up treasure in heaven. 
 Has he said anything about uniting with the Church 
 
 yet?" 
 
 " No, not yet," replied Agnes in a low voice. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney cast a keen look over at her daughter. She 
 was struck with an expression of helplessness in Agnes face 
 which she never had noticed before and also a look of em 
 barrassment which she did not understand. It never occurred 
 to her simple faith that her daughter s attitude toward re 
 ligion could change. She had been pleased from the first 
 with her son-in-law s sobriety, and thought it but a question 
 of time, under the right influences, until he would, as she ex 
 pressed it, come into the fold. Mrs. Sidney s pointed ques 
 tion, however, suddenly revealed to Agnes how great a change 
 had been effected in her by a few weeks critical reading and 
 correspondence with Miriam Cass. She was embarrassed to 
 find that her old eagerness for Ferdinand s formal profes 
 sion had fallen into the background of her thought. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney, however, answered Agnes expression as she 
 interpreted it. " Deal courageously, Agnes, and the God of 
 your father will be with you. Get Miss Margaret to help. 
 When two or three are joined together, you know. And I ll
 
 212 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 be here. You can depend upon the Lord s word being true, 
 Agnes." 
 
 Agnes laid her hand affectionately on her mother s 
 shoulder. " I know that, mamma," she said earnestly, " and 
 I m trying to know what that word is more than I ever did 
 before. Since I ve gone away from you, I ve wished every 
 day that I had been a better girl while I was here, and I 
 have thanked God continually that I was born and brought 
 up in a Christian home." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s apron went up to her eyes, and she sat down 
 in a chair with a sob. " It was the Lord who put it into your 
 heart to say that, Agnes," she said indistinctly. " I m glad 
 you don t forget your father. Sometimes I think I never 
 shall be good enough to get where he is, to see him again. I 
 don t doubt the Lord s word," and she looked up over her 
 apron, " but it s hard for me to be humble. Still," and here 
 the apron went down altogether, " if Stephen Sidney had had 
 a humble wife, the whole world would have imposed upon 
 him." 
 
 At this moment Aunt Mattie appeared in the doorway. 
 " Quinn had to go on his rounds," she said, " and Ferdinand 
 decided to ride with him as far as the Buchers ." 
 
 Agnes was pleased. The visit had started in well, she 
 thought. 
 
 The days went swiftly by. Agnes was conscious of a lack 
 of interest in her old friends and spent most of her time at 
 home, but there was one memorable evening at the home of 
 the Kent rabbi, where, to her surprise, she discovered a new 
 sympathy with the seedy old gentleman who had read Dante 
 with her father ; while his son-in-law, who always had seemed 
 silent and awkward, suddenly discovered a wide and bril 
 liant acquaintance with the topics most interesting to Ferdi 
 nand. She sat back with the rabbi and his daughter and 
 listened while the two younger men talked. Unconsciously 
 she contrasted the thin subtle-faced German whose ancestors 
 two thousand years before had kept sheep on the hills of 
 Palestine, and who had learned by the experiences of his
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 213 
 
 persecuted race to regard impartially many hypotheses, with 
 the successful young business man who spoke for agnosti 
 cism as a partisan. To the latter it was the one method. The 
 rabbi was listening, too. From time to time the old man s 
 eyes lit up with a fire that might have meant anything from 
 anger to amusement, but when his eyes met those of Agnes 
 this inscrutable expression changed instantly to one of kindly 
 penetration. 
 
 Agnes was heavy-hearted when the last day of the visit 
 came around. They were to have a quiet evening at home 
 and return to Winston on the late train. Mrs. Sidney had 
 made an effort to please her daughter s taste in preparing 
 the supper. She came to the table herself with beads of per 
 spiration standing upon her forehead. Agnes looked grate 
 fully at her mother. The fair skin and open pores pleased 
 her eyes. But the food almost choked her. She wondered 
 at the comparative ease with which she had left home upon 
 her marriage. 
 
 After supper Mrs. Sidney covered the table with a cloth, 
 saying she would leave the dishes till after her children had 
 gone, and they all went together into the parlor. 
 
 " Well, Ferdinand," said Mrs. Sidney cheerfully, " I ve 
 been hearing a good deal about your trip from Agnes. I m 
 very thankful she had such an opportunity. I m surprised 
 at all the things she s remembered. The doctor used to have 
 just such a good memory. I tell Agnes that the trip will be 
 capital for her whole life. I m very glad she had it, and had 
 it now. Stephen always wanted to travel. I used to think 
 the time would come when he could, but now his days on this 
 earth are done with." 
 
 Ferdinand listened courteously, but made no reply. The 
 relaxation of the short vacation was over, and he was 
 already considering how he should best start in the new year 
 with his wife. 
 
 " Didn t you find Agnes a very creditable traveling com 
 panion? " continued Mrs. Sidney, as she looked with pride 
 and happiness upon her daughter.
 
 214 
 
 " In some ways." Ferdinand had no intention of being 
 unkind. He was merely saying aloud what he had been going 
 over mentally in considering their future relations. 
 
 Agnes moved a little. She had been congratulating her 
 self that the visit had passed without anything disagreeable 
 between her mother and Ferdinand. She was alive to the 
 subtle change in her husband s mood, and pained at the sur 
 prised look in her mother s face. She hastened to speak 
 herself. 
 
 " You know, mother, Ferdinand had been all over the 
 ground before and it was rather tiresome to him. I suppose 
 I tried his patience many times." 
 
 " Tiresome ! " exclaimed Mrs. Sidney, looking at Agnes 
 disapprovingly. 
 
 " I shouldn t have cared to cover the ground a second 
 time for myself," said Ferdinand, crossing his knee. " Few 
 people benefit by a first trip, however, because they are not 
 fitted for traveling when they undertake it. They are igno 
 rant of the history of the countries they visit, and they are 
 not able either to observe or to reason. Most people drift." 
 
 " Well, Agnes didn t drift," responded Mrs. Sidney 
 proudly, " and her father always said if there was one thing 
 she should have, it was an education. Stephen always said 
 a well-educated family was the best legacy a man could 
 leave." 
 
 Agnes grew gradually paler during her mother s speech. 
 Her eyes were fixed upon her husband with a beseeching 
 expression. 
 
 " It was unfortunate Agnes couldn t have attended some 
 high-grade school for a short time," returned Ferdinand, 
 oblivious of the mute appeal. 
 
 " High-grade school ! " exclaimed Mrs. Sidney, sitting 
 up straight in her chair. " Agnes had three years at col 
 lege. She would have been a graduate with a diploma if her 
 father had lived." 
 
 " She s just as well off without a diploma from Winston," 
 Ferdinand remarked, still preoccupied.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 215 
 
 " I ve always told Ferdinand that my ignorance was caused 
 by my own lack of thoroughness," interposed Agnes, trying 
 to avert an unpleasant collision on a tender point of her 
 mother s. " It is not the fault of the school. Neither is it 
 too late for me to learn now. I want to learn, and Miriam 
 and I have begun reading together." 
 
 She felt sore toward her husband for having made this 
 avowal necessary before her mother. Her color came back 
 into her cheeks and there was an intensity in the dark eyes. 
 
 " School-girl friendships are very picturesque," volun 
 teered Ferdinand, looking at his wife indulgently. He was 
 thinking how well she looked in the girlish pose, and he was 
 wondering whether or not he should cross over and sit beside 
 her on the sofa. " This wonderful Miss Cass and Agnes are 
 going to become great scholars," he added amiably. 
 
 " No," said Agnes, " I never shall become a scholar, but 
 I shall become less ignorant." 
 
 " Don t you call yourself ignorant, Agnes ! " cried Mrs. 
 Sidney, a grim determination beginning to assert itself 
 through her hurt feelings. " It s just as wicked to slander 
 yourself as to slander anyone else. Who hath given under 
 standing unto the mind? Be careful how you charge the 
 Lord, Agnes. Agnes is a very unusual woman, Ferdinand. 
 She s the peer of anyone. She s the peer of a statesman." 
 
 " That s a pretty broad statement," replied Ferdinand 
 smiling, and analyzing the excitement in Mrs. Sidney s face. 
 " It would be a dangerous experiment to trust our country 
 to statesmen of whom Agnes is a peer. It always has seemed 
 curious to me that a woman of Agnes native ability should 
 be as ignorant as she is. I marvel at it continually." 
 
 " Ferdinand ! Don t let me hear you say that word again ! " 
 said Mrs. Sidney, raising her voice authoritatively. 
 
 Ferdinand would not confess to himself that he was glad 
 of a chance to speak with perhaps unnecessary plainness to 
 his mother-in-law. He always had been secretly nettled at 
 the misunderstanding which he had necessarily allowed Mrs. 
 Sidney to have about himself and his motives at the outset
 
 216 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 of their acquaintance. Moreover, her absurd complacence 
 in her daughter s accomplishments ought to be corrected. 
 
 " What word ignorant ? " he said imperturbably. " Agnes 
 is a very ignorant woman. She isn t the peer of various 
 other women I have met, to say nothing of the average man. 
 She is very inferior to what my mother was at her age. Agnes 
 has fair native ability, but it is just as she says she has not 
 cultivated thorough mental habits. Her mind is yes, I re 
 gard it as in a more undisciplined condition than that of 
 any woman of equal advantages I know excepting your 
 nephew s wife, Mrs. Fred Sidney." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney stood up. 
 
 " Don t stop me, Agnes ! " she said as her daughter ap 
 proached her. " As the Lord liveth, I shall tell Ferdinand 
 what I think of him. Who is he to come among us clapping 
 his hands and multiplying his words " 
 
 She turned at a slight noise. Aunt Mattie had arisen and 
 was helping herself out of the room by means of chairs. 
 
 " Never mind, mamma," broke in Agnes, taking advantage 
 of the interruption and pushing her mother gently toward 
 a chair, " Ferdinand doesn t mean to make you feel bad. Men 
 state facts without regard to feelings. When we aren t used 
 to it, it hurts ; but it isn t so hard when one gets used to it. 
 It is true I am ignorant, just as he says, but I don t 
 intend " 
 
 Mrs. Sidney sat down. They saw the tears start to her 
 eyes when Agnes corroborated her husband s words. 
 
 " I m glad Stephen Sidney didn t live to hear his daughter 
 say this," she said, the look of a mortal wound in her eyes. 
 " After all Stephen did and my scrimping and going with 
 out a new bonnet and a sewing-machine : 
 
 " Don t ! Don t, mother ! " Agnes broke in desperately. 
 
 There was a short silence after the cry. Then she turned 
 back to her mother, and continued rapidly, " I never forget 
 it night or day, what papa and you did for me. Sometimes 
 it seems as if it would kill me." 
 
 No one spoke.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 217 
 
 She broke the silence again. " I didn t use it when I had 
 the chance " 
 
 She did not finish, but was turning to leave the room, when 
 Ferdinand spoke from the window where he had retreated. 
 At his voice she paused. 
 
 " Agnes has taken the right attitude," he said, with a desire 
 to conciliate, " and I shall give her every means of educating 
 herself." 
 
 " I ask for no other means than those I have," returned 
 Agnes instantly. " My mother is not the only one who has 
 made rash statements about me to-night. There are other 
 women besides Beatrice as lacking in mental discipline as I 
 am. Aunt Sarah and Aunt Margaret are two. I don t know 
 the Landseers, but there are some perhaps who disgrace the 
 family as much as I do." 
 
 " You don t disgrace the family, Agnes," said Ferdinand 
 uncomfortably. " Ignorance is no disgrace when one wants 
 to learn. On the contrary, in your remarks to-night, all but 
 the last, you have been a pride to the family." 
 
 He turned again to the window, and she stood still in 
 silence, bitterly appreciating that he had criticised justly 
 her last remark. 
 
 " Someone is coming in at the gate," said Ferdinand chang 
 ing his voice. " I think it is Fred Sidney and his wife. 11 He 
 added more hurriedly, " I did not say I knew no other women as 
 untrained as you, but I knew no others of equal advantages." 
 
 He was cut short by the sound of the front door thrown 
 noisily open. A moment later Beatrice, after a resounding 
 rap, blew into the room, shaking the snow from her fur cap 
 and coat, her gypsy hair and scarlet cheeks wet with the 
 melting flakes. Fred Sidney followed quietly. Panting and 
 laughing, Beatrice nodded familiarly to Mrs. Sidney, caught 
 Agnes in her arms and kissed her on each cheek. 
 
 " We walked all the way from West Hill," she announced 
 breathlessly, as she released Agnes and made for Ferdinand 
 with the evident intention of including him in her salute. 
 " How d ye do, Cousin Ferdinand ! First we endure, then
 
 218 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 pity, then " She raised her arms and pursed her short 
 
 upper lip dangerously near Ferdinand s coat-collar. Then, 
 laughing at his expression, with a supple combination of a 
 shrug and the graceful curve of the ballet-dancer, she turned 
 unexpectedly and melted in real affection upon Mrs. Sidney s 
 straight but unhappy figure. 
 
 Her face was still against Mrs. Sidney s cheek as she de 
 manded briskly, " Well, what have you all been doing ? You 
 look as if Ferdinand had been telling the story of his life." 
 
 Then, dropping her voice to a whisper, she said in Mrs. 
 Sidney s ear, with an accompanying glance at Ferdinand, 
 " I have two new customers for your butter. Thirty cents 
 the year round." 
 
 Giving the substantial shoulders a gentle shake as she re 
 leased them, she gave a sliding step in the direction of Agnes, 
 and, with another venomous glance at Ferdinand, whispered 
 in her ear, " Go over and talk to Fred and your mother. I 
 have some business with Ferdinand. It s about real estate." 
 The glib lie occurred to her as likely to allay any discomfort 
 that might arise in Agnes mind. 
 
 Fred Sidney s quiet but hearty greeting did much to dispel 
 the awkwardness of the situation, and Agnes allowed herself 
 to be drawn over to the corner, where she sat down between 
 him and her mother. 
 
 Beatrice, meantime, took Ferdinand by the arm, gently 
 pushed him into a chair and drew up another one facing him. 
 Before they were fairly seated she began a voluble conversa 
 tion, asking his advice upon bits of property which she 
 invented upon the spot and described with a flow of words 
 from which Ferdinand could not escape without pointed dis 
 courtesy. He was making, too, an effort at courtesy because 
 of the events that had taken place earlier in the evening. 
 
 He endured the torrent for about fifteen minutes, then he 
 rose deliberately and stepped around her. She chose this 
 particular moment to make a dive for her muff directly under 
 his feet, which nearly threw him headlong. With an un 
 naturally long step he partially regained his equilibrium and
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 219 
 
 proceeded unsteadily in the direction of his wife. Beatrice 
 buried her face in the muff a moment before she turned with 
 dancing eyes to follow him. " I wanted to ask you about 
 the advisability of that artesian well," she continued in an 
 uncertain voice. 
 
 Ferdinand paid no attention to her, but took out his watch. 
 " I think I will go out and engage a sleigh, Agnes," he said. 
 " It is snowing hard." 
 
 " Quinn left the big satchel at the station for us," Agnes 
 replied at once. " I d rather like to walk. Perhaps Fred 
 and Bee will go up with us." 
 
 " We ll go," said Beatrice. 
 
 " It will be better for you to ride," replied Ferdinand with 
 an air of finality. " I shall be back in half an hour." And 
 without waiting for a reply he left the room. 
 
 As soon as Ferdinand was out of the house Beatrice, with 
 ready good-nature, picked up Fred s hat, and, with a shrewd 
 glance at Agnes and her mother, exclaimed, " Wo must be 
 going. It is a long way home and we must walk." After 
 a hasty farewell, she propelled her husband out through the 
 front door by means of a vigorous and supple hand between 
 his shoulders. 
 
 Ferdinand did not return at the end of half an hour, and 
 Agnes and her mother had the evening together. 
 
 Near the end of it Agnes said shyly, Here is a little 
 New Year s gift for you, mother. Get yourself something," 
 and she laid one of Donald s packets in ]>er mother s hand. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney hesitated as to how to decline. " I don t like 
 to take Ferdinand s money from you," she said, handing back 
 the roll of bills, but comforted by the thought that her son- 
 in-law was at least generous with money. 
 
 " This is not Ferdinand s. It s mine to do as I like with." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney persisted, but kindly, " I can get along with 
 out it. If the time comes when I can t, I ll lot you help me." 
 
 "Take it for Aunt Mattie, mother ! !l Agnes cried in a 
 suppressed voice. " Do that for me ! I have a right to help 
 her, too."
 
 220 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Mrs. Sidney caught the anguish in the tone, and, after a 
 moment s struggle, conquered her pride. 
 
 " Very well," she said briefly. " It will be a godsend for 
 Mattie." 
 
 Unable to control herself any longer Agnes hastily left 
 the room, ostensibly to say good-by to her aunt. 
 
 When she returned her mother clasped her in her arms. 
 " Don t get down in the mouth, Agnes," she said. " The 
 Lord won t let you be brought under if you hold fast your 
 integrity. Don t think He doesn t know what s going on. 
 The eyes of the Lord run to and fro through the whole 
 earth. Keep your heart perfect in His sight and never mind 
 Ferdinand." 
 
 Agnes met her mother s smile, but she said at once, " Don t 
 think about that conversation, mother. I m beginning to 
 comprehend Ferdinand now, and I m going to be better and 
 broader for having married him. Here he comes. Good-by ! 
 Good-by! It s been heaven here." 
 
 She kissed her mother and went down to the sleigh, where 
 Ferdinand had preceded her after a civil but somewhat dis 
 tant farewell to his mother-in-law. 
 
 Ferdinand tucked his wife in carefully with the furs, and 
 she knew that his light sigh as he sat up again meant that 
 he considered that he had done a duty and that he was re 
 lieved that the visit was over. There was a jingle of sleigh- 
 bells, a crunch of crisp snow. As they passed the church 
 Agnes heard the choir practicing a familiar New Year s 
 anthem, and there passed before her vision the picture of her 
 father in his pew with his hand behind his ear, "listening as 
 she sang from the choir loft. The sleigh turned the corner, 
 and she looked back at the old home. For an instant she saw 
 the light in the kitchen-window; then the elms shut off the 
 view. 
 
 Agnes turned her face resolutely toward the north.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 ACCORDING to Ferdinand s programme the months inter- 
 !** vening between his marriage and the beginning of the 
 new year were a season of preparation. The first ardor of 
 the honeymoon was to pass by a gradual and natural tran 
 sition into that permanent condition of orderly conjugal 
 responsibilities and comforts which were to ballast and 
 cushion his life henceforth. The heart-burnings, the rebel 
 lious starts, the spasmodic agonies which Agnes could only 
 half conceal from him he took philosophically, smiling, like 
 Milton s Adam, " with superior love." 
 
 At the beginning of the new year he brought a daybook 
 to Agnes, and with some ceremony invested her with full 
 control of the household expenses. Agnes had been looking 
 forward to this time, hoping that some settlement of a per 
 sonal income upon her might restore to her that financial self- 
 respect so necessary to every normal mind. She was inde 
 scribably disappointed, therefore, even dismayed, to find that 
 the monthly allowance was for household expenses and that 
 she must keep a rigid account of every penny spent and sub 
 ject this account to Ferdinand s approval; that for her per 
 sonal expenses she must, as heretofore, consult him and be 
 allowed or refused as he saw fit. She submitted to the inevita 
 ble, modeled her bookkeeping upon Ferdinand s system, and 
 as she was naturally quick at figures the work did not tax her 
 as it had taxed Miss Margaret. 
 
 Ever since his third call at Kent Agnes had known from 
 Ferdinand that he was assisting two families besides his own ; 
 his step-grandmother on the Landseer side, and a great-aunt 
 upon the Ballington side who received equal contributions 
 from Ferdinand and Mrs. Silas household. These depend- 
 
 221
 
 222 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ents were discussed freely and impersonally by Ferdinand. 
 "If I had not been prudent and self-denying, I should not now 
 be able to support three families," was one of his frequent 
 remarks to relatives and acquaintances. In listening to him, 
 his wife always shrank from the thought that any of her kin 
 might some time be obliged to accept his aid, and by so doing 
 become subject to his comments. 
 
 The little gifts which, during her betrothal, Agnes had 
 fondly planned to send her mother and sister were not sent; 
 but they lingered as sore spots in her memory. The privilege 
 of her girlhood, to deny herself in order to give a present to 
 a friend, was no longer hers. Ferdinand was proud to indulge 
 his wife in such ways as seemed suitable to himself, and he 
 insisted upon luxuries Agnes cared nothing for, which he 
 deemed imposed by his position, but the habits of hospitality, 
 personal benevolence, and loving gift-making, to which Agnes 
 had been brought up, were regarded by him as faults, and he 
 held his wife closely restricted in such ways. At the end of 
 each month he carefully examined Agnes accounts, together 
 with his own, and those from the grandmother Landseer and 
 the great-aunt Ballington. 
 
 Agnes now had remaining the last two hundred dollars of 
 Donald s wedding gift. Knowing that she had nowhere to 
 look for any more money for her private disposal, she laid 
 the balance away for an emergency, and with almost a miser s 
 instinct began to cast about for means to increase the hoard. 
 
 It was at the close of March, shortly before the birth of 
 her first child, that she attempted an experiment with her 
 accounts. She watched Ferdinand furtively as he ran his 
 eye up and down the columns, and she knew what was coming 
 when he paused and looked up at her. 
 
 " I notice," he said, with a queer scrutiny, " you have an 
 item here marked nine dollars personal. I don t like to 
 have you form the habit of generalizing in this way. It is 
 slovenly. Always be able to tell where every penny has gone. 
 If you put down each item, you will grow more judicious as 
 to what these items are."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 223 
 
 He noticed her color rise, and he added kindly, " I have 
 learned this by my own experience." 
 
 Agnes long-rankling sense of injustice quivered in her 
 voice as she replied, " Ferdinand, suppose I demanded that 
 you submit your accounts to me each month, and that I did 
 not approve of about half of them." Here she checked her 
 self and went on more gently : " The money which was yours 
 is ours now, you see. You have with all your worldly goods 
 me endowed." 
 
 He looked at her flushed face, and flushed a trifle himself. 
 There was a disagreeable familiarity in his smile as he said, 
 " You misunderstand the word endow. According to law 
 * endow means to give a wife her widow s dower. My worldly 
 goods are mine while I live. However," Ferdinand went on, 
 giving her time to realize that his concession was voluntary 
 and not necessary on his part, " you are welcome to look at 
 my accounts. The business accounts are kept at the office. 
 My personal ones are on file in the second drawer of the 
 library desk. Here is the key." He took a ring of keys from 
 his pocket, detached one, and handed it to her. 
 
 There was a pause, during which Agnes went through a 
 shock of sickening revelation. Then she glanced at him and 
 turned away without replying. 
 
 He still held out the key to her. " I have no matters pri 
 vate from you," he said, without taking his eyes from her 
 face. 
 
 " You misunderstand me," she replied simply, and, with 
 out looking at him again, quietly left the room. 
 
 He replaced the key on the ring and returned it to his 
 pocket, satisfied to have passed through an inevitable episode 
 with his usual success in averting domestic friction. 
 
 That night Agnes added nine dollars to her savings. She 
 handled the little pile jealously, feeling that it had reached 
 its limit. 
 
 About the middle of April Estelle Ballington was born. 
 Ferdinand had expressed a wish that if a daughter were born 
 to them she might bear his mother s name. It was the first
 
 224 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 sentiment of its kind that Agnes had known in her husband, 
 and she gladly complied with his request. She was very 
 happy with the baby, and in being the recipient of Ferdi 
 nand s renewed devotion. She used often to recall the look in 
 his eyes when the child was first put into his arms and his 
 gaze passed over the infant held close to his heart and rested 
 upon her. 
 
 " He is like an old Roman father," she told herself with a 
 smile half dependent and half rebellious. " The baby is one 
 thing more to be taken care of, brought up in the way it 
 should go." 
 
 Every day Agnes longed for Ferdinand s return at night, 
 and this anticipation helped her to bear patiently her slavery 
 to her nurse, her helplessness under Miss Margaret s incessant 
 attentions, her exasperation at the treacle-like manners of 
 her fashionable doctor, and Mrs. Silas Ballington s tri-weekly 
 calls. Agnes had been brought up in a doctor s family and 
 had imbibed unconsciously her mother s sensible ideas about 
 nursing. It seemed to her that she was being scientifically 
 starved to death and kept in bed like a paralytic when 
 she was perfectly able and frantic to get outdoors in the 
 sun. 
 
 At length, in desperation, she poured forth her wrongs 
 and the wrongs of their firstborn into Ferdinand s attentive 
 ears, and was promptly championed. In a few brief and bit 
 ing remarks the obsequious doctor and the insultingly-bland 
 nurse were prescribed limitations which they did not venture 
 to overstep. The head of the house stood by directing the 
 nurse how to dress Agnes, and then he took his wife in his 
 arms, " as though I were one of the Sabine women," Agnes 
 thought with a grim humor, and carried her downstairs into 
 the garden, while the nurse followed ignominiously with 
 the child in her arms, and Miss Margaret came pitter-patter- 
 ing along in the rear, a meek mound of cushions and 
 blankets. 
 
 This triumphal progress was repeated for several days, 
 the masculine protective instinct in Ferdinand s soul being
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 225 
 
 mightily gratified at Agnes appeal and at his own athletic 
 ability to respond to it. He felt a glow of satisfaction in 
 the creaking of his joints as he went up and down the stairs, 
 casting back deep-breathed exhortations to the nurse not to 
 drop the baby, and to Aunt Margaret not to get entangled 
 in the blankets and so precipitate herself upon those descend 
 ing before her. 
 
 The convalescence soon came to an end, however, and life 
 became vitally complex for Agnes during the following 
 months. She found herself living both a superficial and a 
 profound life; the first with the bustle and worry and sweet 
 cares of a young mother s busy round of duties ; the second 
 remote from this, in the quiet of an elemental change. 
 This deeper existence was generally submerged beneath the 
 eddies of the superficial life, unexpected swirls produced by 
 conflicting currents setting in from unforeseen sources and 
 intermingling perplexingly. Yet, in the midst of these 
 obvious perplexities, Agnes was conscious of a slow and steady 
 movement of the unseen deep. Whither was that slow tide 
 tending? Was it to unite with a kindred deep in her hus 
 band s soul, as in her hopeful moods she told herself, or was 
 it drifting away into inevitable solitude? Upon the latter 
 alternative Agnes did not permit herself to speculate. She 
 felt that nothing she could do could arrest now the course 
 of fate once set in motion, and so she held herself cheerfully 
 and pertinaciously to her obvious duties, trusting that, if she 
 did not fail in these, she need not fear the unknown toward 
 which her nature moved. 
 
 To Ferdinand the year was passing, on the whole, satisfac 
 torily. Except in one respect he believed that Agnes had 
 adjusted herself to his views, and his domestic life seemed to 
 be proceeding in serene accord with his control. He thought 
 with complacence that in one year he practically had trans 
 muted Agnes religious and financial traditions. Her bigo 
 tries had fallen away from her, her accounts were methodi 
 cally kept, disturbing exhibitions of temper and rebellion 
 were matters of the past.
 
 226 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes, too, sometimes persuaded herself that she had 
 grown into contact with her husband s point of view, but this 
 state of mind came only in answer to an effort of the will. At 
 other times she was dimly aware of " abysmal griefs hidden 
 under the current of daily life and seemingly forgotten, till 
 now and then they came up to the surface a flash of agony 
 like the fish that jumps in the calm pool." When she held 
 herself to the letter of their original differences she con 
 fessed that Ferdinand had been right in forecasting her 
 development. 
 
 Her realization of the expanding and modifying pro 
 cess her views had undergone since her marriage again and 
 again checked hasty judgment of her husband now when 
 their opinions clashed. When she went deeper and began to 
 brood upon the spirit of their differences she invariably 
 became uneasy. All the religious, educational, and financial 
 questions at issue between them looked at in themselves seemed 
 trivial enough; but when she regarded them as successive 
 phases illustrating a divergence that went far deeper than 
 any one of them, they seemed grave and terrible manifesta 
 tions of an organic, atomic repellence. She became afraid to 
 look at things this way and evaded it by keeping her atten 
 tion to the letter of their discussions. She almost never now 
 referred to the spiritual contents of the gospels with her 
 husband, but spoke more of dates, of disputed authorship, 
 spurious passages, verbal renderings. Nor did she any 
 longer argue over gifts she could not make or purchases that 
 were discountenanced. She accepted her husband s strictures 
 in silence, and discussed with him prices, grade of goods, and 
 preferred shops for the merchandise he favored. In the latter 
 case, too, realizing her inferior judgment, she submitted 
 usually to his experience, waiting quietly for the time when 
 responsibility would naturally devolve upon her trained and 
 capable judgment. At the best her peace of mind was never 
 sanguine as was Ferdinand s. She knew that, so far, she had 
 kept things pleasant by avoiding the disagreeable, and that, 
 at any time now, something not to be avoided might arise.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 227 
 
 Hitherto she had put away the thought of this crisis, hoping 
 that, before it arrived, they might both of them have gained 
 wisdom and forbearance enough to meet it wisely. 
 
 Before Estelle was many weeks old, however, Agnes began 
 to realize that something which it was impossible to avoid or 
 to isolate and so deal with objectively had come into their 
 mutual relations. This new element also furnished the one 
 exception to Ferdinand s conjugal satisfaction. The excep 
 tion bade fair to be an obstinately unpleasant one, too. Here 
 he found himself in contention with an instinct rather than a 
 tradition in Agnes, and the regulation of her maternal love 
 presented difficulties of unreasonable magnitude. The dif 
 ferences which arose between them about the habits of the 
 baby at present, and the vague foreshadowings of later and 
 graver differences in training a developing child, were not 
 only more obdurate now, but seemed likely to be longer-lived 
 and to multiply far beyond any previous ones. 
 
 From the day when Agnes had appealed to Ferdinand 
 against the nurse and doctor, his instinct for over-seeing 
 things extended itself to the sick-room and the nursery. He 
 had enjoyed the pride of defending his wife, and his care and 
 vigilance were really tender and were acceptable to her, but 
 as she regained her strength and he felt no longer any physi 
 cal demand for sympathy, the tenderness went out of his vig 
 ilance, while officialism took its place. Agnes soon saw, to 
 her sorrow, that by once having exposed the doctor and nurse 
 to her husband s scorn she had given him a precedent for dis 
 regarding their advice and regulations when she gladly would 
 have observed them. " You and I will manage this child our 
 selves," he said decidedly, and presently the young wife real 
 ized that she was expected to be as silent a partner here as 
 in their other mutual responsibilities. The nurse left as soon 
 as possible, and they were together without interference to 
 settle Estelle s little way of life between them. Almost at 
 once their minds and wills grappled. On this one subject all 
 through the summer they remained under full strain, quite 
 quiet, as wrestlers who are evenly matched.
 
 228 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Meantime, the outer life of reading and driving and smil 
 ing went on, while the unconscious baby, somehow or other, 
 survived experiences which angered Ferdinand and tortured 
 Agnes, and managed, for all the trouble it was causing, and 
 the vicissitudes through which it was passing, to bring a 
 wondrous amount of joy and love into the Ballington 
 household.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 morning in early autumn Agnes sat at her desk before 
 the open window writing to Ferdinand s dictation. A 
 bough of the old apple tree outside now and then brushed 
 softly against the window-sill, while a ray of hazy September 
 sunlight glanced fitfully through the leafy screen and 
 played over the half-written page. As Agnes wrote on 
 mechanically to her husband s monotonous voice, she half 
 smiled to see the ethereal lances strike and shatter themselves 
 against the sooty and troll-like words she was setting down. 
 
 "This constitutes virtually a ball-and-socket joint, unit 
 ing great strength with freedom of motion." 
 
 A warm gust of wind outside shot a whole arsenal of golden 
 arrows quivering and gleaming to impale the " ball-and-socket 
 joint," in airy mockery of its grimy and laborious strength 
 and freedom. 
 
 Agnes smile deepened, and, as Ferdinand paused to con 
 sider his next sentence, her eyes strayed out into the green 
 shadow of the apple tree, and rested there. She had recovered 
 full strength and animation, and there was a fullness and gen 
 tleness of sympathy in her expression that lent a new charm 
 and dignity to the brilliance and vigor of her girlhood. 
 
 She was so lost in her musing that she did not hear Ferdi 
 nand when he resumed, and he looked up, half impatiently, to 
 see why the pen had ceased. Instead of recalling her to her 
 task, however, he sat still, watching her with analytical admi 
 ration. The richness and delicacy, the unconscious grace of 
 her figure, reminded him vaguely of old Italian pictures, and 
 when a light wind lifted the waving hair a moment on the tem 
 ples and a sunbeam passed waveringly across her dark eyes, 
 the breeze seemed to bring with it out of the past a fleeting 
 memory of a ford across a country stream with the wind lift- 
 
 229
 
 230 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ing the forest foliage overhead and the sunlight losing itself 
 in the brown water underneath. 
 
 The charm held him for a moment only, however. Then he 
 rose and stretched his arms, breathing deep with the relief of 
 a change of position. 
 
 With a start Agnes came back to herself. " I m afraid I m 
 absent-minded," she said apologetically. "You re not 
 through, are you ? " 
 
 Without answering, Ferdinand came and stood behind her 
 chair. 
 
 " Isn t that a new picture? " he asked, pointing at a small 
 etching on top of her desk. As he spoke, his eye compared it 
 with another one of the same size in a similar frame which 
 stood beside it. 
 
 Agnes reached up, took down the etching, and looked at it 
 with pride. " Yes, it is new," she said, " and isn t it beau 
 tiful?" 
 
 Ferdinand bent over to look at it with her. It was an 
 etching of the portrait of Huxley with the skull in his hand. 
 As Ferdinand scrutinized the strong, nervous face, the de 
 termination and grace of the pose, his eye went back again 
 curiously to the companion picture on the desk Booth as 
 Hamlet, with the skull in his hand. 
 
 " When did you set up in the undertaking business ? " he 
 said at last, straightening up and looking down at her. 
 " Haven t you a new frame on that Hamlet? " 
 
 Agnes put the Huxley back on the desk, then turned to her 
 husband. " Miriam sent me the Huxley last week. It s an 
 artist s proof. You remember Tom gave me the Hamlet my 
 last birthday. When I showed him the Huxley, he asked me 
 to let him take the two and get them framed alike, for an 
 equinoctial present. They just came to-day. Tom has good 
 instincts," she added reflectively, turning back to the etching. 
 " He saw at once the poetic affinity of those two pictures." 
 
 Ferdinand thrust his hands in his pockets and turned away. 
 " All the relation I see between Hamlet and Huxley is that 
 their names begin with H. "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 231 
 
 As he spoke he paused beside a bowl of white roses on the 
 table. After a moment he took one of his hands out of 
 his pocket and touched the roses delicately as he counted 
 them. 
 
 " Donald sent you these ? " he asked, looking at his wife 
 over his shoulder. 
 
 The almost imperceptible emphasis on the word " Donald " 
 arrested Agnes attention. She looked up instantly and met 
 his gaze. " You saw him give them to me yesterday at the 
 shop," she said. "He bought them of the cripple at the 
 door." 
 
 As she returned her husband s look something in his ex 
 pression embarrassed her, and to her annoyance she felt her 
 self blushing. Donald had been in the habit of sending 
 flowers to the house not infrequently, and Ferdinand had 
 accepted it naturally enough at first, until a slight circum 
 stance in the spring had irritated him. As it happened, 
 Donald was the first to send Agnes flowers after Estelle s 
 birth, and Agnes noticed at the time that Ferdinand resented 
 deeply the fact that Donald s roses came before it had 
 occurred to himself to get any. He had occasionally com 
 mented upon the episode since, and they both instinctively 
 thought of it now. As he turned his eyes away, she dropped 
 hers to the desk, and began to sort and arrange the papers 
 scattered over it. 
 
 " The baby is six months old now, Ferdinand, and, much as 
 I regret it, she will have to be weaned. Mother wrote me 
 that she would help me if I could come down to Kent for a 
 week." 
 
 Ferdinand walked the length of the room before he replied. 
 " I believe I ll take you down," he said reflectively. " I rather 
 want to see that young doctor again." 
 
 "Who? Quinn?" said Agnes in surprise. She was won 
 dering at her husband s unusual friendship for her father s 
 silent young assistant. 
 
 "I don t know when I ve met a physician with so good 
 mechanical ideas," continued Ferdinand. " He has a little
 
 232 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 surgical contrivance that I might as well get patented and 
 put on the market at the same time I m putting through my 
 own invention. I think he has a good thing and I m inclined 
 to take an interest in it." 
 
 " My father suggested it," said Agnes eagerly. " Quinn 
 is only completing it." 
 
 " Indeed ? " said Ferdinand, pausing in his walk. 
 
 " Papa invented a number of things, but he gave them all 
 to the profession. He didn t think it was right to patent 
 them." 
 
 Ferdinand resumed his walk, vouchsafing no reply to this 
 weak-minded sentiment. 
 
 Presently the summons came for luncheon, and they 
 went down, meeting Miss Margaret at the foot of the stairs. 
 She was just coming in from outdoors in a state of secret 
 elation. As soon as they were seated at the table Ferdinand 
 turned to his aunt. 
 
 "Wasn t that Flynn s wife I saw you talking with a few 
 moments ago out in front? " he asked quietly. 
 
 " Yes yes, dear, she was here," answered Miss Balling- 
 ton with visible embarrassment. "You don t object to her 
 coming here, do you, Ferdinand ? " 
 
 " What did she want ? " he returned immovably. 
 
 Miss Margaret hesitated. " She was begging. They are 
 having a terrible time since her husband has been out of work ; 
 a terrible time, Ferdinand. Some of the time the children 
 have only dry bread to eat, dry bread." 
 
 Ferdinand disregarded his aunt s appeal. "I don t wish 
 you to have anything to do with the family. Tell her so, if 
 she comes again." 
 
 Miss Margaret s face fell, but she persisted faintly, " Yes, 
 dear, if you really mean it. The baby has no milk." 
 
 " I mean it." 
 
 " The baby has no milk, dear." It was a last frightened 
 expostulation. 
 
 "Fiynn knows how he can get it," answered Ferdinand 
 grimly.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 233 
 
 " Ferdinand is going to take me out riding this afternoon, 
 Aunt Margaret," interposed Agnes. " Wouldn t you like to 
 go? We can take the drag and call for someone else Miss 
 Sewell, if you like. You could have a nice visit with her in 
 the back seat, while Ferdinand tells me about Professor Dim- 
 mock s lecture in front ! " She looked at her husband in the 
 hope that he would second the invitation. 
 
 " You dear child ! " exclaimed Miss Margaret, beaming, 
 " how sweet in you to want me ! But you shall have the phae 
 ton all to yourselves, dear. Sarah is going to bring over 
 her work this afternoon. She is coming early. There s the 
 bell now." 
 
 A moment later Mrs. Silas Ballington entered and was 
 greeted effusively by Miss Margaret, who tripped around 
 the table to meet her. 
 
 " Ferdinand and Agnes are going to drive, Sarah," she 
 said at once to her sister-in-law. And then, turning to her 
 nephew, she asked, " Would you just as soon go by the stores, 
 Ferdinand, and get me a bottle of witch-hazel? " , 
 
 " Certainly," replied Ferdinand with civility. " Is there 
 anything else ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Miss Margaret, taking advantage of the unex 
 pected opportunity, "I d like a box of blue notepaper, and 
 
 and Her courage suddenly evaporated. " That s 
 
 all," she finished weakly. 
 
 " What else do you want, Aunt Margaret ? " asked Agnes 
 when Ferdinand had left the room. " Tell me. I ll see that 
 Ferdinand gets it." 
 
 " You dear child. Isn t she sweet to me, Sarah? I do want 
 a spool of that little baby-ribbon, pink, or bird s-egg blue, or 
 corn-color. It doesn t make any difference which." 
 
 " Margaret," said Mrs. Ballington, looking at the little 
 woman with a patronizing pity, " it s absurd the way you 
 have to tell Ferdinand every time you want a spool of thread. 
 You ought to make him give you some pin-money. I shouldn t 
 tolerate such a system." 
 
 " But I like it, Sarah," Miss Margaret said with loyal
 
 234 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 mendacity. " It saves me so much trouble. I never cared for 
 shopping anyway." 
 
 Agnes heart ached as she looked at her aunt. She knew 
 that the little woman was never so happy as when fussing 
 about the fancy stores. 
 
 "Well! I shouldn t like it," rejoined Mrs. Ballington, 
 waving her lorgnette. " I feel free to say that I should not 
 enjoy it in the least. It s fortunate that you and Agnes 
 do." 
 
 Her prominent eyes swept by Miss Ballington and chal 
 lenged the younger woman. Agnes returned her look steadily, 
 and the prominent eyes wavered and turned away. 
 
 " There s Ferdinand at the gate," broke in Miss Margaret 
 nervously, looking through the window. 
 
 Mrs. Ballington turned to her. " Since you have no nurse 
 I suppose we are to take care of Estelle," she said pointedly. 
 
 " Oh, I love the baby," exclaimed Miss Margaret instantly. 
 " I d love to have her with us, but she s asleep now. When 
 Eliza has the dishes washed, she s going to wheel her out in 
 the park." 
 
 "Eliza has her hands full," remarked Mrs. Ballington 
 when Agnes had left them. " You look out, Margaret. She ll 
 strike for more wages." Her voice dropped its society tone 
 when the door closed. 
 
 " It s because no other girl can get along with Eliza, Sarah, 
 that we don t have a second girl," replied Miss Margaret 
 earnestly. " The little time Agnes had a nurse Eliza and she 
 had a hand-to-hand fight " 
 
 "Well, wasn t it Eliza s fault?" broke in Mrs. Ballington 
 aggressively. 
 
 " I don t doubt it was. But Ferdinand thought I 
 
 presume he was right. I didn t witness the fight myself. 
 Shall we sew upstairs ? " Miss Margaret suddenly broke off 
 and changed the painful subject. 
 
 They went up to Miss Ballington s room and settled them 
 selves for the afternoon. As they sewed Mrs. Ballington 
 catechised Miss Ballington as to the past, present, and future
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 235 
 
 of the family plans. She regretted to see that Estelle had 
 no teeth. Tom had one at four months, but he was a very 
 remarkable child, and she should not expect the same of 
 Estelle perhaps. It was time, however, that Estelle showed 
 an inclination to creep. It was time, too, that Agnes should 
 call again upon Mrs. Mortimer Tompkins, and Miss Mar 
 garet ought to see to it that Agnes kept her social engage 
 ments better than she had been doing. People were begin 
 ning to talk about her eccentricities as well as Ferdinand s. 
 "I am pleased to see, however," she finished approvingly, 
 " that Agnes has given up her music. It shows some atten 
 tion to the baby." 
 
 Before she had been there an hour Mrs. Silas had reduced 
 Miss Margaret to the state of mental disintegration and 
 indiscriminate apology for herself and everybody else which 
 usually followed upon her sister-in-law s visits. She now 
 proceeded to fill up the bewildered little woman s brain with 
 gossip. She informed her of the return of Fred and Beatrice 
 from their summer s trip to Europe, adding that the young 
 couple were seriously divided on the question of Fred s return 
 to the bank. Tom had been appealed to by Beatrice to talk 
 to Fred on the subject, but had promptly packed his grip 
 and left the city on a vacation. Her son had dropped the 
 remark before he left that Fred could clerk it in the infernal 
 regions for all he cared. The dowager sighed regretfully 
 because Donald had not more of his younger brother s spirit. 
 " Donald is very wearing to live with ; he is like his father in 
 many ways. Here he might marry Geraldine Tompkins, and 
 he prefers to go around with the face of a grave-digger, say 
 ing he doesn t care to marry." 
 
 Mrs. Silas then referred to the approaching visit of Agnes 
 mother. Miss Margaret had not heard anything of it, and 
 expressed her surprise, whereupon the dowager smiled mean 
 ingly. Probably Agnes was ashamed of her mother and was 
 keeping her visit a secret as long as possible. Everybody 
 knew Mrs. Sidney was an ignorant and undesirable connec 
 tion. As for Mrs. Silas herself, she intended to be out of the
 
 236 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 city while Mrs. Sidney was in it, and she advised Miss 
 Margaret to accompany her. 
 
 The little lady was overcome on the spot by a vision of 
 Agnes mother descending like a bird of prey on her peaceful 
 home, but she bravely replied to her sister-in-law s invitation 
 by stating her intention to stay and entertain Ferdinand s 
 mother-in-law " as though she were the first lady in the land, 
 Sarah. We can never forget that, whatever else she may be, 
 she is little Estelle s grandmother." 
 
 Meantime, Ferdinand and Agnes were driving through one 
 of the beautiful suburbs of the city. They had conversed 
 fitfully on indifferent subjects, but Ferdinand had been brood 
 ing over Donald s flowers to Agnes and her blush when he had 
 referred to them. His irritation had extended to Tom s 
 frames, which Donald, of course, would have to pay for. The 
 insulting spendthriftiness which could not find enough legal 
 holidays to celebrate with presents, but must needs compli 
 ment the movement of the seasons, was insufferable. Then 
 there was Flynn s wife flaunting Flynn s impudence in the 
 very bosom of his family! While Ferdinand was brooding 
 over these things, a letter which he had received that morning 
 occurred to him as suggesting a new grievance. 
 
 " You remember Frank Rousseau ? " he asked, watching 
 Agnes narrowly as he spoke. 
 
 The color crept slowly into Agnes face. " Mr. Rousseau 
 whom we met in Switzerland?" she asked. "Yes. I remem 
 ber him well." 
 
 " He is coming to Winston on business soon. I am think 
 ing of asking him to the house for a few days." 
 
 Agnes said nothing. 
 
 " You would like me to ask him to stay with us ? " per 
 sisted Ferdinand. 
 
 " No, I should not like it," Agnes returned in a low voice. 
 
 " What is your objection? " 
 
 " Mr. Rousseau s manner at the close of that evening was 
 not gentlemanly," she forced herself to reply. 
 
 Ferdinand leaned back in the phaeton. "It is curious,"
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 237 
 
 he said slowly, " that men always are considered the aggres 
 sors in such affairs. He never would have looked at you as he 
 did if you had not led him on by flirting with him." 
 
 Agnes looked at her husband in astonishment. "Flirting 
 with him ! I have never flirted with men." 
 
 " It was quite decorous, of course," her husband replied 
 in the same tone. 
 
 The remainder of the drive was almost without conversa 
 tion. Agnes listened to the sharp, clean foot-falls of Dan on 
 the earth road, and lived over again the evening at Lucerne. 
 She remembered her exhilaration consequent upon her hus 
 band s early demonstrations of emotion, her desire to call his 
 feeling into play that night, her conversation with Mr. Rous 
 seau, and what followed. She recalled Ferdinand s quiet pose 
 and control. 
 
 When they were nearly home she spoke again. " Ferdinand, 
 she said reluctantly, " I think it is true that I did coquette 
 with Mr. Rousseau. I am ashamed of it." 
 
 She saw Ferdinand s face change as soon as she had spoken. 
 When he spoke, however, his voice was under control. "I 
 admire your honesty," he said. 
 
 " It is the only time that I ever was guilty of that, and I 
 am sorry." 
 
 An expression she was familiar with, but which she had 
 never understood, came across his face. 
 
 " The fault, perhaps, is mine in having introduced such a 
 man as Rousseau to you. The best thing men and women can 
 do is to be honest, and now that you have become so, I will 
 endeavor to keep you out of temptation." 
 
 "Ferdinand!" cried Agnes in alarm. "You don t 
 
 think " She drew away from him into the corner of the 
 
 carriage. 
 
 When she had mastered her indignation enough to think, 
 she finally spoke. There was a strong reminiscence of Mrs. 
 Sidney in the manner, and of Dr. Sidney in the matter, of her 
 remarks. "Ferdinand, you have been telling me for some 
 time about my faults. Now I have been noticing that there is
 
 238 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 a streak of coarseness in much that you say and think. I have 
 observed it in your remarks about other people, but it is 
 especially brought home to me now that you are beginning to 
 apply it to me. You seem to like to degrade human nature 
 and to think it is a mark of your superiority. It isn t, 
 though. It is a sign of moral degeneration, and if you don t 
 rid yourself of it speedily your evil imagination will con 
 taminate your actions." 
 
 Ferdinand had the confused sensation of a commander-in- 
 chief who has been halted suddenly on the picket-line by a 
 private whom he has himself placed on duty. 
 
 He rallied himself, however, and replied, " Far from being 
 a mark of moral degeneration, it is a mark of honesty. You 
 sugar-coat every unpalatable truth. Now, I see life as it is, 
 no matter whether I like it or not. You call that being 
 coarse." 
 
 "You see life as it is not," she replied stolidly. "You 
 misrepresent me in such a way that you insult us both. I must 
 insist upon one thing. I sometimes sought the admiration of 
 men before my marriage, and that once afterwards, but I 
 never should have been in danger of anything more." 
 
 He made no reply, but assisted her from the carriage, and 
 drove to the barn. 
 
 Agnes went directly to her room, where she remained with 
 her baby until dinner. 
 
 Mr. Rousseau came to Winston and went away, but he did 
 not come to the Ballingtons , whether because he had received 
 no invitation or had declined one Agnes never knew.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 AUTUMN was almost over; the ground was covered with 
 crimson leaves, and the sky crossed by sailing lines of 
 birds. A bacchanalian frieze of scarlet woodbine and yellow 
 ing wildgrape, ripe with purple berries just ready to drop 
 from their stems, framed Mrs. Sidney s veranda. It was 
 tangled here and there with bronzed honeysuckle sprays still 
 bearing one or two late clusters of flowers. The autumn wind, 
 which was lifting the leaves from off the old maples and elms 
 and floating them down like the spirits of carbuncles and 
 topazes through the smoke-veiled air, touched Agnes cheeks 
 with color and blew her hair about her face as she sat on her 
 mother s porch, surrounded by some leather-bound volumes. 
 Ferdinand sat near her, smoking. 
 
 " I still can follow the Latin, I see," she said, looking up at 
 her husband, " but I ll never be able to read any of these," and 
 she held up a volume of Sophocles bound in rich but faded 
 green leather. 
 
 Ferdinand took his cigar from his mouth to answer her. 
 "You will have that much less lumber in your mind. It s 
 curious how people go on loading their minds with exploded 
 ideas two thousand years old." 
 
 Agnes went on with her work without replying. She had 
 been aware vaguely when Ferdinand first came out from Dr. 
 Quinn s office a few minutes before that his apparent serenity 
 was masking some annoyance, and his tone, affable though it 
 was, confirmed her suspicion. As she turned over her father s 
 despised classics in silence, her mind wandered from the Greek 
 and Latin and Italian pages to speculations upon what had 
 taken place between her husband and Dr. Quinn. By the 
 time Ferdinand had finished his cigar she had satisfied her-
 
 240 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 self that Quinn had refused Ferdinand s offer to push the sur 
 gical invention and take an interest in it. 
 
 As Ferdinand rose at last and picked up his hat, Agnes 
 spoke to him involuntarily, "Doesn t Quinn want to go in 
 with you ? " 
 
 " No," said Ferdinand, pausing before he turned to the 
 steps. " He says he s in no hurry to patent and that he d 
 rather go slower and be independent." He did not look at 
 his wife as he started to descend to the yard. 
 
 Admiration and trust in Quinn flashed into Agnes mind, 
 but the next instant apprehension possessed her. Ferdinand 
 would not forget the doctor s self-sufficiency, and this outcome 
 to the purpose which had been chief in bringing her husband 
 to Kent might cloud over the home visit. 
 
 She hastened to detain him with words meant to conciliate. 
 " Don t go ! " she said eagerly. " Come in and see mother 
 give Estelle her dinner. She has learned to drink out of a 
 glass." 
 
 Ferdinand hesitated, then turned back more readily than 
 his wife had hoped, and they found Mrs. Sidney and the baby 
 in the dining-room. 
 
 "Don t let her see you, Agnes," Mrs. Sidney warned the 
 young mother. She held a glass of milk in her hand as she 
 spoke. 
 
 Agnes approached softly behind the child, and Ferdinand 
 and she stood watching. The baby made a little hitching 
 motion with her body and leaned forward toward the milk, 
 drinking a little daintily as her grandmother held the glass. 
 Ferdinand looked on gravely. 
 
 When the meal was finished he remarked, " I notice you do 
 not use the nursing-bottles I bought. I didn t wish to disturb 
 you this time, but I prefer to have Estelle suck her milk. It 
 causes a flow of saliva and is better for her digestion." 
 
 " She is old enough to drink now," said Mrs. Sidney com 
 placently, proud of the baby as well as of her own success. 
 
 Ferdinand eyed her a moment before replying, "I prefer 
 to have her use a bottle."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 241 
 
 " How do you suppose I got along before you were born, 
 Ferdinand? " asked Mrs. Sidney, looking up with a twinkle 
 in her eye. " I ve taken care of more babies than you ve years 
 to your life. It won t do the child one bit of harm to drink 
 her milk, and it s a good deal easier for the mother. Nursing 
 bottles are hard to keep clean." 
 
 " I should not think it very difficult to wash a bottle," 
 remarked Ferdinand, and Agnes noticed sensitively that the 
 hint of a sneer was creeping into his voice. 
 
 She stood, her back to the table, both hands resting upon 
 it, her head slightly lowered, as she rapidly thought over how 
 she could ward off a quarrel between Ferdinand and her 
 mother. 
 
 " You might not think so, but it is," returned Mrs. Sidney, 
 looking at her son-in-law openly. " It s a nice little thing 
 to do, especially when there are a million other things to 
 see to at the same time, and it isn t just one bottle; it s 
 eight ! " 
 
 "What will be the expense of hiring these washed per 
 day? " inquired Ferdinand, feeling for his purse. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s offended surprise leaped into indignation. 
 
 " Ferdinand Ballington, you ought to be ashamed of your 
 self. I m an old woman and I know how to take care of 
 babies. Estelle is my grandchild, and I m not going to teach 
 her to suck a bottle now. It doesn t look well to see a child 
 sucking a bottle. Come with grandma, Estelle." 
 
 " I don t care to discuss the matter, Mrs. Sidney," insisted 
 Ferdinand evenly, but with an edge in his voice. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney picked up the baby and crossed the room with 
 her. 
 
 As they disappeared within the bedroom Ferdinand fin 
 ished, " You understand my wish. I want nursing-bottles 
 used." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney answered him from across the threshold, "I 
 don t care to discuss it either, Ferdinand. This child is in my 
 house and she s going to drink! " and the bedroom door 
 closed.
 
 242 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 "Have you any plans for the afternoon?" asked Ferdi 
 nand, turning to Agnes. 
 
 She lifted her face for the first time, and looked at him with 
 eyes whose pain added to their luminousness. 
 
 As she was silent he repeated his question. 
 
 Then she released her hold on the table and turned away 
 from him, saying mechanically, " Nothing definite. Beatrice 
 spoke of taking us to drive." 
 
 Ferdinand looked at his watch, considered a moment, and 
 then said enigmatically: 
 
 " It is now half -past two. I am going out on some 
 errands." 
 
 She let him pass without replying, and watched him 
 thoughtfully through the window as he disappeared down the 
 street. When he was out of sight she returned with slow 
 steps to her mother. 
 
 " Well," said Mrs. Sidney, looking up buoyantly when her 
 daughter entered the room, "I hope I taught Ferdinand a 
 lesson." She was hard at work on short clothes for the baby, 
 and as Agnes sat down by her she held up a fluffy hemstitched 
 ruffle. "He needs discipline. It s perfectly ridiculous, his 
 setting himself up as an authority on babies. I ve humored 
 him long enough. It s something new each day. The child 
 can t suck its thumb, can t be rocked, can t suck a sugar lump 
 or a crust of bread. Farinaceous food isn t digestible. 
 I ve seen it digest. You mark my words, Agnes, Ferdinand 
 needs a good talking to once in a while. He s my son and I 
 love him, but he d better be careful. Pride goeth before a 
 fall. " 
 
 " Never mind, mother," Agnes answered tenderly. " It s a 
 little thing. I d just as soon wash the bottles." And she 
 smiled with sudden warmth. 
 
 But Mrs. Sidney, with instant keenness, rebuked her 
 daughter s concession. "The Lord helps those who help 
 themselves, Agnes," she said, her face sobering. " How dare 
 you ask the Lord to bless you when you shirk your duty to 
 your husband? I tell you it s high time you took Ferdinand
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 243 
 
 Ballington in hand to correct his faults if you ever expect 
 him to amount to anything." 
 
 Agnes laid her hand on her mother s knee as she said 
 quietly : 
 
 " Ferdinand isn t like papa, mamma." 
 
 "I shouldn t be talking to you like this, if he were," 
 returned the older woman undaunted. " You know what the 
 Bible says about a man wise in his own conceit. There is 
 more hope of a fool than of him. I wish I d told Ferdinand 
 that." 
 
 Agnes stood up without answering. She was turning over 
 in her mind the Bible words of her mother s which had caught 
 her ear, " There is more hope of a fool than of him." 
 
 " Now, when your new baby comes," went on Mrs. Sidney 
 earnestly, " don t you begin by holding it off for three hours 
 when it wants to nurse. Their little stomachs are only as big 
 as a thimble. Look at my thimble here and see how little it 
 is. Does a calf have to wait three hours before the cow takes 
 it? I guess God s own little image has as good instincts when 
 it comes into the world as a calf has." 
 
 Agnes came to herself as her mother talked, and when Mrs. 
 Sidney had finished, she bent down and kissed her mother on 
 the forehead. " I shall have you there to manage this time, 
 mother," she said. She lingered a little, speaking of other 
 things. Then with a change of voice she said, " I think I will 
 go and dress for the ride with Bee." She passed her hand 
 lightly over Mrs. Sidney s forehead. " Do take a rest, mother. 
 You ll spoil your eyes." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney pushed back her spectacles and pressed her 
 own hand hard on her eyes. 
 
 " Estelle and grandma will blow soap bubbles ! " she sug 
 gested the moment after, beaming upon the baby on the 
 floor, who was looking uneasily after her mother. 
 
 As Agnes passed through the hall she saw a messenger boy 
 coming up the steps. Her heart sank as she took the note he 
 brought, for she recognized her husband s handwriting, and 
 knew that what she had been dreading was upon her.
 
 244 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " The gentleman said there was no answer," the boy called 
 back as he ran down the steps. 
 
 Agnes tore open the envelope and hastily read the following 
 note: 
 
 DEAR AGNES: 
 
 Make your arrangements to leave for Winston on the evening train. 
 I shall not be back for dinner, but shall call for you with a carriage 
 in time to reach the station. 
 
 Yours, 
 
 F. B. 
 
 Agnes stood quite still with the open message in her hand. 
 Grief, bitterness, and anger raged in her heart as she recalled 
 her long wait for this little visit home, the short happy two 
 days she had had with her mother, and the weary winter 
 ahead in the companionship of Miss Margaret and Eliza. 
 Then a torrent of tears rushed to her eyes and she went up the 
 stairs quivering. 
 
 When she came down she was dressed for driving. She 
 found her cousin Fred in the parlor talking to her mother. 
 
 " Why, Fred ! How do you happen to be out so early ? " 
 she asked. Then she recollected that it was Saturday and the 
 bank closed at noon. 
 
 " I thought I should find Bee here," answered Fred. " She 
 had left the house with the double carriage and should have 
 been here by this time." 
 
 Agnes forgot even Ferdinand s note in her eagerness at 
 finding herself at last free to talk with Fred. Except for a 
 hasty hand-shake in the bank, it was the first time that she 
 had seen him for many months. He had spent the summer in 
 Europe with Beatrice. It was his first trip and he had taken 
 it as a hard concession to his wife s insistence. Agnes remem 
 bered what her own travel had done for her, the changes it had 
 made in her views of life. Surely the journey had meant this, 
 too, for Fred, had broadened him, freed him from his pro 
 vincial aims and brought him into a more sympathetic under 
 standing of his wife s nature. On the other hand, the variety 
 and activity of many weeks of traveling, together with the
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 245 
 
 success in getting Fred out into the world, must have quieted 
 Beatrice s restlessness and discontent. How much the summer 
 might have done for both of them in closing up what threat 
 ened to be a dangerous breach in their relations ! 
 
 As she drew up a chair and sat down by her cousin Agnes 
 searched his face with anxiety and hope for signs of new 
 interests. The glimpse of him at the bank had told her noth 
 ing, while Beatrice s manner during the one visit she had had 
 with her had been jovial but inscrutable. All that Agnes 
 knew about her cousin and his wife since their return was what 
 Donald had told her, and that was that soon after the Sidneys 
 return to Kent Tom had gone out to the lake house to see 
 Beatrice, and upon his return had asked urgently for a vaca 
 tion. He had earned it by months of steady work and, accord 
 ingly, it was willingly granted. Had Beatrice herself put a 
 period to their bohemian comradeship, or was Tom s trip an 
 escape from her? Which conjecture was true neither Donald 
 nor Agnes could tell. 
 
 To Agnes disappointment she did not see in Fred s face 
 the expression for which she had hoped. He looked sadder, 
 quieter, more ascetic. It was not the face of a man who had 
 grown into closer sympathy with such a woman as Beatrice. 
 Rather it was the face of one who had been settled more firmly 
 in his convictions. Agnes was alarmed at the gentle and 
 refined fixedness that was becoming the habitual expression 
 of her cousin s face. 
 
 " Fred," she said impulsively, " I m sorry you came back 
 to this country so soon. It was your first trip. You ought to 
 have stayed over there longer." 
 
 " I didn t wish to over-stay my leave of absence." 
 
 " I don t believe it would have made much difference," she 
 persisted. " Kent is an easy-going town. The bank wasn t 
 suffering." 
 
 " I was away a good while for me," Fred returned with a 
 faint smile. " Beatrice wanted to stay longer." 
 
 " I think you might have consented ; wives like to have their 
 husbands amenable on an outing. And then, too," she said,
 
 246 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 with a nervous laugh, "when you come right down to it, 
 Fred, what are you in the bank at all for? " 
 
 Fred flushed. " It is the only self-respecting course for me 
 to follow," he said doggedly. 
 
 " Indeed it is," interrupted Mrs. Sidney. " Fred must fill 
 a husband s position. He must be a bread-winner." 
 
 " But, mother, where is the use of winning bread for a table 
 that can afford fruits out of season?" queried Agnes. "If 
 Fred wants to win bread, he could win a good deal more by 
 letting Beatrice set him up in business." 
 
 Fred s brows contracted irritably. "A man ought 
 not to be dependent on his wife for everything," he said 
 sententiously. 
 
 " A man ought to do more than be financially independent 
 of his wife," said Mrs. Sidney authoratively. " He ought 
 to rule his house. Beatrice makes her money in ways of which 
 her husband does not approve. She gambles in stocks. She 
 uses that as an excuse for some other things." 
 
 " Not now, mother ! " interrupted Agnes, lifting her hand. 
 
 " How long is it since Thomas Ballington was at the lake 
 house ? " asked Mrs. Sidney sternly of her nephew. 
 
 Agnes interposed. "Tom has been away for some time, 
 mother, in the Maine woods." 
 
 "Aunt Kate, I think we had better not talk about this," 
 said Fred in a controlled voice. " It can do no possible good 
 and I decline to hear it." 
 
 " Fred, I brought you up," his aunt replied instantly. 
 " I m going to talk to you as I would to Agnes, and you 
 needn t get up on your dignity. You sit where you are ! " 
 
 Fred hesitated, then leaned back stolidly. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney went on with rising energy. " It is the mark 
 of a man and a husband who expects to be the father of chil 
 dren some day, to be the head of his own household. You 
 ought to make Beatrice understand this. She needs a con 
 trolling hand. She is good-hearted and generous. She would 
 have done a good deal for me if I had let her. But she has 
 had no bringing up. Her own willful desires are her only law.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 247 
 
 Instead of wisely controlling her, you think your duty stops 
 with going down to that bank all day every day, while she is 
 out at the lake with Tom Ballington, gambling by telegraph." 
 
 " I tell you, mother, " interrupted Agnes. 
 
 " You keep still, Agnes ! Gambling by telegraph ! When 
 your hours are up at the bank, you should go where your wife 
 is. Thomas Ballington s hunting-trips don t last very long. 
 When he comes back, you should forbid him the house. I 
 don t think he would come again if you did this." 
 
 A pause followed Mrs. Sidney s last words. 
 
 Then Fred said in an impersonal voice, " The house is hers, 
 Aunt Kate." 
 
 " Beatrice is yours," returned Mrs. Sidney instantly. " If 
 you don t make her feel that pretty soon, she won t stay 
 yours." 
 
 There was another stillness. 
 
 Then Fred spoke again in the impersonal tone. " My wife 
 belongs to herself. If I should take the course you suggest, 
 she would retaliate by a reckless defiance which could have 
 but one end, the severing of our relations." 
 
 Agnes sat up and began to speak eagerly. " Fred, if you 
 allowed Beatrice her way in financial matters, I believe she 
 would recognize your right as a husband to exclude unwel 
 come guests from your home. Does it not seem that there is 
 a needless irritation between you on that point?" 
 
 " Good God ! " exclaimed Fred, springing to his feet and 
 looking down upon the two women with burning eyes. " Do 
 you want to take away my last shred of independence to 
 take away my only shadow of authority? " 
 
 " I don t know what Agnes wants," said Mrs. Sidney 
 promptly. " If you have got any authority, I d counsel you 
 to use it, and try to extend it beyond that bank. Be the head 
 of your family, not a bank-clerk." 
 
 Fred s face grew white. " Since you are so full of 
 advice," he said rapidly, " tell me this. How is a man to con 
 trol a self-willed and passionate woman who has grown tired 
 of him, and for whom, therefore, a legal release, his only
 
 248 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 weapon, has no terrors! I tell you I can do nothing with 
 her!" 
 
 He looked down into the startled faces a moment, then 
 turned, went out of the room abruptly, and a moment later 
 had left the house. 
 
 Agnes and her mother sat where he left them, but upon 
 Mrs. Sidney s face a righteous displeasure was growing. She 
 was about to speak when Agnes drew a quick breath and 
 anticipated her. 
 
 "I have had a note from Ferdinand, mother. He is sud 
 denly called home on business and says that we must return 
 to-night." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney looked steadily at her daughter. " Agnes, 
 don t tell me a falsehood. Ferdinand isn t going away for 
 business. He is going to take you home because I gave 
 Estelle her dinner out of a glass. He can t control his 
 ungodly temper." 
 
 Agnes did not reply, but Mrs. Sidney had a logical mind, 
 and presently she resumed. " Well, I guess you will have to 
 go. It s a pity that Ferdinand didn t marry Beatrice. He 
 might have done some good there." 
 
 She waited a moment, and when she spoke again there was 
 a quaver in her voice. " So he is going to take my daughter 
 away from me, is he, after two days?" 
 
 " Mother," cried Agnes passionately, " I won t go." 
 
 All that she had striven to keep from her mother s 
 knowledge flamed in her face, and Mrs. Sidney read it 
 clearly. There was a moment s struggle in the mother s 
 heart. Then conscience triumphed over instinct. 
 
 " Agnes," she said, " a husband has the right to say where 
 his wife and child shall be. Ferdinand is well within his 
 rights." 
 
 " He has not the right over the child till it is seven years 
 old," interrupted Agnes, in a tense voice. " The custody is 
 the mother s until then, if she is a good woman. Think of it ! 
 She bears it, and cares for it, and suffers with it, and has a 
 right to it only for the period of infancy, and then it belongs
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 249 
 
 to the father. Oh, the cruelty of it! A man mustn t touch 
 his wife with his little finger, but he can torture her mind and 
 crush the soul out of her, and she must bear it." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney watched Agnes closely as she was speaking. 
 When she had finished, the older woman asked, " Where did 
 you find out all these things?" 
 
 " In a play." 
 
 " The theater ! " There was both grief and reproof in the 
 mother s voice. 
 
 Presently she spoke again with unusual gravity. " Agnes, 
 you have been thinking of leaving your husband. My 
 daughter, you can t leave Ferdinand. The Lord has put a 
 work upon you. You ve got to sanctify him." 
 
 " Mother, I have been beside myself because he wouldn t 
 let me do for the baby what I thought I ought to do. He said 
 I was training her to cry because I took her up when she did 
 cry, and he made me leave her to scream all by herself until 
 she would stop from exhaustion. Sometimes she cried because 
 she was hungry, and sometimes she was sick." 
 
 " How did he keep you away from her? " 
 
 Agnes did not answer. 
 
 "Did he tie you up in a chair? " demanded Mrs. Sidney, 
 pressing her. 
 
 " No, he said I mustn t go," said Agnes, scarcely above a 
 whisper. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney pressed her further. "And that kept you! 
 And you would like to make laws to let women go away from 
 their husbands women who sit still and let their babies scream 
 because a man tells them to ? " 
 
 " Mother," said Agnes, looking down at her clasped hands, 
 " he would take Estelle into his room and lock her in. I 
 couldn t get to her." 
 
 There was a considerable pause after this confession. 
 
 Then Mrs. Sidney asked, " Why didn t you lock her up in 
 your room first ? " 
 
 " I would when I could get her first," said Agnes, the 
 clasped hands trembling. " He said that he did not want to
 
 250 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 do what he did, but that I needed discipline as much as the 
 child." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s indignation at her daughter s revelation was 
 counteracted by her alarm at the consequences which threat 
 ened to follow Ferdinand s conduct. She ran over rapidly in 
 her mind various ways of dealing with him. 
 
 When she resumed, there was decision in her voice. " Now, 
 Agnes, listen to me. It isn t the law that makes a home. It 
 is character. Once you let the law step in and it isn t a home 
 any longer. Ferdinand is your husband and you ve got to 
 love him " 
 
 "I do love him," interposed Agnes with dignity. 
 
 " So much the better," went on Mrs. Sidney. " Now you 
 see to it, that, along with your loving him, you make him 
 understand that you mean what you say just as much as he 
 does. You ve got to take your own stand. The law can t 
 take it for you." 
 
 " Mother, isn t this a little inconsistent with the way you 
 were talking to Fred a moment ago ? " 
 
 " No," responded Mrs. Sidney stoutly ; " the cases are 
 different." 
 
 "They are indeed," replied her daughter. "If I had 
 
 money " She broke off. " It does no good to oppose 
 
 Ferdinand. You see how much good it did when you held 
 out against him." 
 
 " I am not his wife." Mrs. Sidney rose. " I ve got to sub 
 mit to a mother-in-law s position." Her face passed through 
 bitter struggle to grim control as she spoke. 
 
 Then an obtrusive sense of humor manifested itself. " Do 
 you think it would do me any good to want to make laws 
 upholding mothers-in-law ? " She looked at her daughter 
 with a real smile as the words came out. 
 
 The smile faded, however, as she continued, " I didn t mean 
 to say to Fred that a wife is the husband s property. She is 
 his companion, and Ferdinand s wife above all must not be a 
 moral coward." 
 
 As she finished she left the room and went into her bed-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 251 
 
 room. Once inside it she gave way to a spasm of weeping, 
 which she interrupted every now and then to utter some words 
 of prayer. 
 
 In accordance with Ferdinand s demand, Agnes packed 
 their trunk, and was ready to go when her husband came with 
 the carriage. 
 
 " Good-by, Ferdinand. God bless you ! " called Mrs. Sid 
 ney from the veranda. But she did not trust herself to go 
 down to the carriage with Agnes. Nor did Ferdinand come 
 to the house. 
 
 He was considerate toward Agnes during the home trip, 
 silenced Miss Margaret s questions on their arrival and kissed 
 his wife when he said good-night. She accepted his caress 
 silently. 
 
 Agnes continued to feed Estelle from a glass the following 
 day, but she took pains to do so when her husband was out of 
 sight. It must come to a contest between them, but in 
 weariness she longed to postpone it. 
 
 In the afternoon a letter came from her mother. She 
 noticed that her mother had written a letter also to Ferdinand. 
 He read it, and handed it over to her without comment, a 
 grim satisfaction in his face. Agnes read it with mingled 
 torture and admiration. She knew how much effort the 
 apology had cost her mother. 
 
 MY DEAR SON FERDINAND: I thought the Lord was going to let me 
 teach you a lesson. But I guess He saw fit to let you teach me one. 
 It won t do your baby any harm to drink out of a glass, but I m not the 
 one to say what shall be done to your and Agnes child. I oughtn t to 
 have interfered, and I hope you ll forgive me and bring Agnes and the 
 baby back to see me. I ve got a lonely heart, and I love you all. I 
 pray God to bless you all. 
 
 Your mother, 
 
 KATE SIDNEY. 
 
 The tears streamed down Agnes face as she handed the 
 letter back to her husband. " My poor mother ! " she said 
 brokenly. " You ll answer it, Ferdinand? " 
 
 " I see no reason why I should do so," said Ferdinand,
 
 252 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 pocketing the letter. " It is no more than she ought to have 
 done, and it has been a good thing for her. You have told me 
 yourself that she always has been tyrannical." 
 
 Agnes remembered only too well. In the first flush of her 
 love for Ferdinand she thoughtlessly had made him the con 
 fident of her girlish impatience with her mother, as well as 
 of her father s unworldly ideals of life. Once more she felt 
 the regret which follows impulsive self -revelation. 
 
 " I do not regard Mrs. Sidney as wholly to blame," Fer 
 dinand continued. " The fault is more with your father. 
 He ought to have controlled her till she was able to control 
 herself. Personally, I admire your mother s character the 
 more of the two. Her faults are the faults of strength, 
 whereas his faults " 
 
 " Don t say anything against papa ! " cried Agnes 
 abruptly. 
 
 She walked across the room and back before she continued. 
 
 " Please write to her. Tell her you will take me back," she 
 said, stopping in front of him. Then she added deliberately, 
 "Won t you do it for me? Won t you write her an affec 
 tionate letter ? " 
 
 There was the desperation of a forlorn hope in her face, 
 but Ferdinand ignored it. " I have no affection for her," he 
 said. 
 
 He started to pass her as he spoke. There was a sudden 
 motion forbidding him, and then Agnes drew back trembling. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she cried in a vibrating voice, " mother is 
 inclined to be tyrannical, but she is not a deliberate tyrant, as 
 you are. More than that, my mother has risen above her feel 
 ings and has made you an apology which has cost her a 
 struggle of which you have no conception. A poor old 
 woman at her time of life ! She conquered herself. And you, 
 a young man, a young, strong man, who has won his point 
 and disciplined an old woman who has worked her eyes out for 
 his child, you can t conquer yourself. You can t even respond 
 to her apology. She does love you. She means every word 
 of it, and you don t feel a spark of pity or affection for her."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 253 
 
 Suddenly in the midst of her agony a memory flashed across 
 Agnes mind. It was Donald s voice saying, " You should do 
 for your parents whatever you might wish. I can understand 
 the desire, and it would be my happiness and my honor to 
 gratify it." There was despair in her heart as she cried 
 bitterly to the man she had chosen, " Oh, you can t know how 
 you make me feel toward you ! I wish to God I had married 
 Donald!" 
 
 A sudden stillness fell over them as they looked at each 
 other. A comb that Agnes wore dropped to the floor. Both 
 started as though it were a pistol shot. The soft and shining 
 waves of Agnes hair gently uncoiled and shadowed her eyes 
 as they still held Ferdinand s. 
 
 A new expression flashed into Ferdinand s face, called up 
 by the fierceness of her beauty. In an instant he was strain 
 ing her to him so violently that a low cry of pain was forced 
 from her. 
 
 " Ferdinand, I have never wished that what I said," she 
 said indistinctly. 
 
 After he was gone Agnes sank back upon the lounge. She 
 began to doubt her powe.r to control her moods, and she knew 
 that what influence she had over her husband would fade with 
 her self-control and endurance. On his part, Ferdinand never 
 forgot Agnes outcry. Before this there had been more or less 
 of oscillation in their hopes and desires in each other, but from 
 this day, although the oscillation continued, it began to be 
 accompanied with a graduated fall.
 
 PART IV 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 L^ERDINAND never answered Mrs. Sidney s letter, but 
 twice during the winter he took his wife for a brief visit 
 to her mother s. Moreover, although he never yielded openly 
 to his mother-in-law s methods of bringing up children, he 
 tacitly gave way to them more and more. He had decided, 
 as have many others before him, that it is generally best to 
 allow the world s efficient people to have their own way. 
 
 In May the long-expected visit of her mother to Winston, 
 to which Agnes had been looking forward with longing, 
 came about. Miss Margaret had anticipated it with trepida 
 tion owing to Mrs. Silas persistent innuendoes. The latter 
 lady had carefully suppressed in Miss Margaret every bud 
 ding impulse of hospitable pleasure as fast as it appeared, 
 and had repeated her original assertion that she would leave 
 as soon as Mrs. Sidney should arrive. She did not leave, how 
 ever, which confused Miss Margaret s ideas well-nigh hope 
 lessly during the first week of Mrs. Sidney s visit. 
 
 Mrs. Silas herself regarded Mrs. Sidney with unstable 
 emotions. She had intended to stay in town just long enough 
 to impress the doctor s widow, and then to leave without hav 
 ing cast over her the mantle of her own social prestige. Her 
 stupefaction which followed upon the speedy discovery that 
 it was quite hopeless to impress Agnes mother, and that, 
 furthermore, she herself unwillingly was impressed with the 
 newcomer, passed by a natural transition into a desire to 
 make Mrs. Sidney the engine of social retribution upon the 
 distinguished Mrs. Mortimer Tompkins. For a generation 
 now Mrs. Mortimer Tompkins had been a rival too wealthy, 
 too small-minded and infinitesimal-hearted for Mrs. Silas to 
 get the better of her. There was a kind of fascination in 
 
 254
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 255 
 
 the thought of watching the rival affronted, enraged, and 
 finally routed by this obscure but indomitable person from 
 Kent. Accordingly she gave a luncheon for Mrs. Sidney, and 
 her unconscious guest carried herself so well and irritated 
 Mrs. Tompkins to such an extent that Mrs. Silas then and 
 there conceived as small a dislike of Agnes mother as it was 
 possible for her to extend to any of her fellow-beings. Mrs. 
 Silas relations with her acquaintances were measured by 
 varying degrees of disapproval. These took the place in her 
 of what in less highly organized people were friendships. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney took an early occasion to give Mrs. Balling- 
 ton a warning on the subject of her son Tom s relations with 
 Beatrice. Mrs. Silas received the communication haughtily, 
 but, finding that her loftiness had no effect whatever, a cer 
 tain hard common sense which she had at bottom, and which 
 Mrs. Sidney addressed, made her think better of it, and she 
 agreed to use her influence in keeping Tom occupied away 
 from Kent. 
 
 Miss Margaret and Mrs. Sidney became friends, and, ex 
 cept for the guest s condemnation of Miss Margaret s recent 
 conversion to Christian Science, they had no altercation 
 worth mention. Miss Margaret was meek and deferential 
 toward Mrs. Sidney, having a bewildered idea that Mrs. Sid 
 ney must be a great social power indeed. Mrs. Silas con 
 sideration could flow from no other source, and Miss Mar 
 garet s naturally ornate phraseology took on an added state- 
 liness as though she were addressing a member of the royal 
 family. 
 
 The same naturalness which characterized Mrs. Sidney s 
 entrance into Winston society characterized her entrance into 
 Ferdinand s home. Ferdinand did not interfere with his 
 mother-in-law and was away much of the time, and Eliza 
 met her Waterloo in her first encounter with the guest. 
 
 As for Agnes herself, the month was one of the easiest dur 
 ing her married life, and she always felt an added tenderness 
 toward her little son, because it was her mother who first 
 laid the baby in her arms, saying in a tone of fervent thanks-
 
 256 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 giving, " He s a fine, healthy boy, Agnes, and he shall be 
 called Stephen Sidney Ballington." 
 
 Only one thing happened to cloud Agnes month with her 
 mother, and this took place just before Mrs. Sidney left. 
 Agnes knew that her mother was worried over something, and 
 she guessed what it was, for she had seen Pleasant Mabie s 
 handwriting on a letter that had come from the West. As 
 soon as an opportunity offered, she questioned her mother 
 as to her news from Helen. Mrs. Sidney hesitated, then de 
 cided to tell the truth. The mortgage on her son-in-law s 
 farm was about to be foreclosed. Pleasant had written to 
 her, imploring help, but she was unable to give it. 
 
 "I don t believe it would be wise to send Pleasant money, 
 if I had it to send," she concluded. " He would manage to 
 get rid of it someway without paying off the mortgage. The 
 Ethiopian can t change his skin. I d have told him so, only 
 I was afraid Helen would see the letter." 
 
 Agnes sat still and looked at her mother in extreme dis 
 tress. She was thinking of her sister s condition, with the 
 lassitude and discomfort of which she could, in her own 
 weakness, so keenly sympathize. 
 
 " I can just barely make both ends meet," Mrs. Sidney 
 went on. " Mattie s sickness just about played me out." 
 
 " You can t stand it, mother ! You can t work so hard ! " 
 cried Agnes, her anxiety shifting. There was an instant s 
 hesitation, during which her heart was wrung by her own 
 impotence to help in this crisis. Then she said abruptly, 
 " Why don t you let Beatrice help you ? " 
 
 Mrs. Sidney turned and looked at her daughter. " My 
 strength will be as my day, if I trust the Lord," she said 
 with a different tone ; and she added more gravely, " If I ac 
 cepted Beatrice s money I should be countenancing her way 
 of life." 
 
 " What will Pleasant and Helen do ? " Agnes asked 
 presently. 
 
 " I don t know. I have written to him that they can 
 come on and go on your father s farm. It would be the best
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 257 
 
 thing they could do. The house is pretty old, but I have 
 had some new sills put in to support it. Pleasant doesn t 
 want to do it. He says people won t respect him for com 
 ing back to live on his mother-in-law. Pleasant s very par 
 ticular about his self-respect. He s got some fine pigs, too, 
 and he wants to stick to pork-raising. If he hadn t paid out 
 so much for pigs, he d have kept the farm." 
 
 Agnes did not press the matter further. She did not tell 
 her mother that she too had received a letter from her 
 brother-in-law soliciting her aid. The letter had been 
 written without her sister s knowledge, but it narrated in 
 some detail Helen s feebleness and discouragement over their 
 impending misfortune. Agnes had a slender opinion of 
 Pleasant s financial ability, but she shrank from exposing 
 him, and her sympathy for her sister had become a passion 
 since her own marriage. Her recollections of the farm did 
 not encourage her to believe in the feasibility of her mother s 
 solution. It would be impossible for them to be comfortable 
 there. 
 
 She thought over the situation during the day, and that 
 night she called Ferdinand in to her before he went to bed. 
 It was hard for her to do it, but she put down her pride, told 
 her husband the situation, and begged him to give her money 
 enough to save her sister s home. As soon as he began to 
 speak she was sorry she had made her request. He asked her 
 many questions about the Mabies, pinned her down to con 
 fessions she never had wished to make, and at last, after elicit 
 ing the exposure of Pleasant s and Helen s condition, he said 
 that he was willing to buy the place himself and hire the 
 Mabies as his tenants. This Agnes declined instinctively. 
 She was learning to dread a mood that came over her from 
 time to time which made life seem to her a web where she and 
 those dear to her were caught flies and Ferdinand the 
 spider. 
 
 After he left her she could not sleep. All this misery for 
 want of a few hundred dollars and her husband worth hun 
 dreds of thousands! She rose and went to her desk at last
 
 258 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 to count over the money she still had left of her own. Then 
 she took out the account book and added in what she had 
 saved from housekeeping money and which she was holding 
 subject to Ferdinand s order. Even though she could use it 
 all there would still be about fifty dollars lacking. She went 
 back to bed worried and restless. 
 
 In the night an idea came to her. She had recently bought 
 and paid for some table-linen at one of the stores. The entry 
 had been made in her account book and had been approved 
 by Ferdinand. But the goods had not been used. In the 
 morning she drove to the store and asked the privilege of 
 returning the linen. The request was granted and the money 
 refunded. Agnes put it with all she had on hand and sent it 
 on to Pleasant. 
 
 One anxiety for the present was silenced, but another of 
 a different nature replaced it, for the entry of the linen pur 
 chased remained unchanged in her account book. She had 
 yielded to a great temptation. 
 
 During the following months this secret, her growing 
 worry for her mother and sister, her at last certain knowl 
 edge of the hopelessness of any real sympathy from Fer 
 dinand, the increasing difficulty in tactfully managing her 
 husband, the loss of respect and confidence in herself, the 
 strain which she was under to dissemble her unhappiness and 
 depression, all these, along with physical weakness and weari 
 ness, began to tell noticeably upon her. 
 
 Ferdinand was the first to feel the lack in her of physical 
 elasticity and mental buoyancy. After waiting what he con 
 sidered a more than reasonable time for her to recuperate 
 from her son s birth, he began to make significant remarks 
 about the advisability of other members of the family besides 
 Aunt Margaret interesting themselves in Christian Science. 
 He began to take Agnes quite methodically to all the lighter 
 theatrical entertainments that wandered their way. When 
 Agnes expressed a dislike for vaudeville, he replied that she 
 needed it; while Agnes observed that under the pretext of 
 benefiting her he was developing a taste for a species of
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 259 
 
 entertainment that was unutterably wearisome to her. It 
 seemed to. her, too, that her lack of vitality hastened in her 
 husband the development of certain sinister characteristics 
 and tendencies which until now had been held in abeyance. 
 It was no longer possible for her to remain blind to the fact 
 that his will was the ultimate factor to which all their dif 
 ferences must be resolved. 
 
 At last he began to express openly his impatience at her 
 continued depression, and when he found that she no longer 
 responded to his stimulants, the home life bored him more 
 than it ever had done before. He looked on with scarcely 
 concealed irritation at her devotion to their children. He 
 told her that she was getting morbid, allowing them to absorb 
 her duty to him. It seemed to her that he ceased looking for 
 the mental understanding and companionship between them 
 which he formerly had expressed himself as expecting. It 
 was, therefore, no shock to her when he told her one day, 
 what she felt he had told himself already, namely, that she 
 was a weakling, unable to adjust herself mentally or physi 
 cally to her surroundings. 
 
 Having reached this point, with an inward sense of rank 
 ling injury Ferdinand made up his mind that the only course 
 consistent with his dignity was to make the best of what 
 threatened to be an unsatisfactory bargain. He would not 
 confess to himself that he had made a mistake of judgment 
 in selecting her. The fault lay in her willfully refusing to 
 develop along the lines he had expected. She had shown her 
 ability to do this at first, and. he suspected that the flagging 
 of her energy was a symptom of waning devotion to himself. 
 Her involuntary cry contrasting him with Donald, recalled 
 instantly though it had been, rose oftener in his memory, 
 and he found himself watching her for other indications of 
 fickleness and discontent. 
 
 No one but Donald suspected how far Agnes depression 
 was drifting. He saw that it was accompanied by a cor 
 responding coolness and indifference in Ferdinand. After 
 watching Agnes closely for some time and thinking anxiously
 
 260 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 over her matters and Tom s, Donald made a business trip to 
 New York the spring following Stephen s birth, and while in 
 that city he made a point of calling upon Miriam Cass. 
 
 Early in June it came about, quite naturally, that Miriam 
 came up to Winston for her first visit to Agnes since they 
 left college five years before. Their regular correspondence 
 had developed an unexpected strength and depth in their 
 friendship. Their mental companionship had become a con 
 firmed and eager necessity for both. 
 
 When they met, Miriam held her friend a long time, a hand 
 on each shoulder, looking at her intently ; then releasing her, 
 she said with a smile that was half -sweet, half -ironic : " It has 
 been better that we weren t together these five years. We 
 have kept all the idealism, and separation has made our inter 
 course a refuge and a luxury, but it is lovely to meet again," 
 she added, the old smile which Agnes knew so well vanishing 
 in a splendor of emotion which was a new and rich enchant 
 ment to the young wife. 
 
 The old boldness and power Agnes from the first had 
 recognized in Miriam were still there, but there was a new 
 ardor and a deepening sympathy. A kind of impatient full 
 ness of humanity took the place of the old caustic spirit. On 
 the other hand Miriam noticed the steady luminousness into 
 which her friend s old flighty enthusiasm had concentrated. 
 She felt respect for the judgment and the controlled will 
 which were even more apparent in Agnes herself than they 
 had been in her letters. 
 
 The richness, wise understanding, and healthful exhilara 
 tion which came to Agnes life with Miriam s visit told at 
 once upon her physical and mental well-being. The spring 
 and buoyancy came back into her mind. Miram s bitter and 
 loving drollery whipped her into answering sallies. Trans 
 figured nonsense flashed again, here and there, like will-o -the- 
 wisp through her conversation. Fits of laughter, ending 
 breathless and speechless, again overtook her. She fell to 
 walking straight again, giving the old piquant twist to her 
 hair; the flush of sunrise crept back to her neck and arms,
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 261 
 
 and quick, vital gestures punctuated remarks which again 
 came out frankly. 
 
 Donald s sore and self-accusing conscience felt unwonted 
 ease as he watched the success of his venture. Before long 
 a second hope began to grow within him. Miriam seemed to 
 touch and bring to life what was most manly and ambitious 
 in Tom. Beatrice was forgotten, and Tom gave up without 
 a struggle to an adoration of Agnes friend that was pathetic 
 to witness. She was Tom s superior, Donald knew, and older 
 than he, but their tastes were similar, and Tom was lovable. 
 His Aunt Stella had married Ferdinand s father. Might not 
 Miriam marry Tom? 
 
 Ferdinand s feelings for his wife s friend were not easy 
 to decipher. Miriam treated him with a mixture of suavity 
 and inscrutable deference which the simple Donald misread 
 as unaffected courtesy; which Tom interpreted, much to his 
 own discomfort, as an indication that Miriam was humiliat- 
 ingly taken in ; which Miss Margaret thought was apprecia 
 tion; and which Agnes alone realized was the perfection 
 of tact.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 "I 
 
 CH hatte einst ein schones- 
 Tom!" 
 
 Tom scowled at the words on the music-rack in front of 
 him and said rapidly on the key he had just reached in sing 
 ing, " Fire away, mater ! What is it ? " then touched the 
 third note above sonorously with the first syllable of 
 " Vaterland." 
 
 " What is that song you are singing ? It is a very dull 
 song. All the songs you sing now are dull. Where did you 
 get them?" 
 
 As Mrs. Ballington put her question Donald glanced up 
 from the paper he was reading and asked encouragingly, 
 " They are the songs Miss Cass suggested, aren t they, 
 Tom? " and without waiting for Tom to commit himself, 
 Donald continued to his mother, " It s better music than Tom 
 has been singing. After a little while you ll like them, 
 mother." 
 
 Behind Tom s back Donald and his mother exchanged a 
 swift look, accompanied on the part of each with a gesture. 
 Donald s pantomime said, " Fall in with the music. It s a 
 good thing," while the dowager answered with an expression 
 which came easily to her face and hand, implying, " Oh, well, 
 I suppose I must make the best of it." 
 
 Donald had been watching his mother with uneasiness dur 
 ing Miriam s visit, her manner recalling painfully to him 
 the period of his own courtship of Agnes Sidney. It was 
 even harder for her to give in to Tom s devotion to Miriam, 
 because her common sense argued the extreme advisability 
 of it, and Mrs. Ballington grudged concessions to common 
 sense as well as to any other common thing. She refrained 
 
 262
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 263 
 
 from criticism when with Tom, however, making up for it to 
 Donald when they were alone together, and this Donald ac 
 cepted cordially, knowing it to be a safety-valve for his 
 mother. 
 
 As soon as Tom finished the song he gave a supple wheel 
 around on the piano-bench and jumped up briskly. " Time 
 to go, Don ! The guests are assembled. The bridegroom 
 stays late. 
 
 The brothers said their adieus to their mother, took their 
 hats, and went together into the afternoon sunshine. A 
 spirit of perverse silence descended upon Tom, which Donald 
 did not venture to disturb. They went down the walk to the 
 gate, down the street to the car-line, boarded a cross-town 
 car, and rode for a couple of miles. 
 
 When they left the car they were in the neighborhood of 
 the Ballington farm. There still remained several vacant 
 lots, however, between them and Ferdinand s home, and 
 they struck across these, following a time-worn little path 
 along which a generation ago the Ballington cows had 
 come at night. It still meandered in its leisurely way 
 under the butternut trees across the newly laid-out city- 
 lots with their rectangular corners, ignoring the upstart 
 iron hydrants and the street lamps that mark of blase city 
 life where night never comes with sweet silence and rest. 
 Here and there a clump of bushes strove gallantly to repel 
 city limits and bring back the genius of the wood. As they 
 followed the path the two brothers instinctively fell into their 
 boyish custom Donald walking ahead, Tom strolling be 
 hind. 
 
 As they reached the largest butternut tree the Ballington 
 homestead came into full view, its trim brick wall and avenue 
 of symmetrical cedars standing out uncompromisingly in the 
 bright sunshine. Tom thrust his hands into his pockets and 
 stood looking resentfully at Ferdinand s domain. " The look 
 of that place just turns my stomach! " he exclaimed. 
 
 Donald looked back inquiringly. " What s the matter with 
 the place ? " he asked obtusely.
 
 264 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Oh, don t make me talk about it," Tom responded furi 
 ously. " This poor old cowpath and Uncle Tom s butternut 
 trees are a bad prologue to Ferdinand s necrological improve 
 ments. The little love for my kind I have left will turn sour 
 when brandy-soaked old Tompkins planks down his tons of 
 pressed brick on this lot and that vox et praeterea nihil, his 
 spouse, desecrates the ground once trodden by grandfather s 
 crurnple-horned white bull. I feel like the ghost of that bull. 
 I wish I were ! " he blurted a moment later ; " I d clean 
 out the upper circles of this town. I d toss em into the lower 
 part of eternity ! " 
 
 A slow smile on Donald s face answered this tirade. The 
 elder brother felt at last at liberty to speak. " It s no use 
 worrying about things you can t help, Tom," he said placidly 
 as they resumed their walk. " If you haven t anything worse 
 than Tompkin s new house to worry you, you re a lucky 
 man." 
 
 Tom s brows contracted slightly and he began to whistle 
 softly a strain from the song he had been practicing before 
 they started out. 
 
 After a moment, Donald continued hesitatingly, " I think 
 Miriam Cass visit has been a providential thing all around, 
 Tom." 
 
 Tom flushed darkly, but said nothing. 
 
 Donald went on earnestly : " She s an extraordinary 
 woman, and there s just one thing for you to do. Make your 
 self worthy of her respect and love. She certainly likes you, 
 and I think you have it in you to win more from her." 
 
 Tom met his brother s eyes frankly. " I know you wish 
 me well, Don," he said affectionately, " but you and I both 
 know I am not worthy of her; still, notwithstanding Fred s 
 insinuations about me, I haven t committed any unpardonable 
 sin yet." 
 
 " I don t think you ever could get your own consent to 
 commit an unpardonable sin, Tom," responded Donald 
 gravely. 
 
 " Well," Tom began more briskly, " you might " He
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 265 
 
 broke off with an embarrassed laugh, then finished irrele 
 vantly, " Well, I guess we ll let it go at that." 
 
 " Do you want something, Tom? " asked Donald encourag 
 ingly. " I ll do anything for you I can. Do you want money 
 again ? " 
 
 " Well yes, thanks. That wasn t just uppermost in my 
 mind, however. I was thinking that you take so much stock 
 in in praying, you know why, damn it! here s a case of 
 need at your own door. If the throne of grace doesn t help 
 me out in this deal, I guess I m out of the race." 
 
 There was a huskiness in Tom s voice that made Donald s 
 eyes blur. " Tom ! " he exclaimed. " My dear brother ! " 
 
 " Oh, don t rub it in ! " Tom interrupted quickly, as he 
 hastened his pace. " You needn t order the funeral flowers 
 just yet. Here we are at the family vault," he resumed a 
 moment later as they approached Ferdinand s gate. " We re 
 in the right mood to march down the avenue abreast." 
 
 They entered Ferdinand s yard and Tom walked solemnly 
 down the path between the cedars. 
 
 When they had nearly reached the house there was a col 
 lapse of his stiff carriage which preluded an exclamation from 
 him. " There she is in the side yard under the apple-tree ! " 
 
 They hurried over the smooth-shaven lawn and approached 
 the apple tree under which Miriam Cass was sitting reading. 
 She rose when she saw them coming and walked slowly for 
 ward to meet them. 
 
 A thrill of fear and exaltation swept all Tom s nerves. He 
 felt with a passion of despair and adoration an irradiation of 
 genius over the deep bronze hair, the stern set of the black 
 brows, the scarcely perceptible line it might be of sadness, 
 it might be of cynicism drawn from the sensitive nostrils 
 down to the corners of her mouth. It flashed from her hawk 
 like gray eyes and magnetized her old unobtrusive manner. 
 
 She shook hands cordially with the brothers and returned 
 with them to the rugs spread out beneath the apple trees. 
 Agnes thirteen-months-old baby was asleep near by in a 
 hammock.
 
 266 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Tom took his place a little behind Miriam where he could 
 watch the sun on her burnished hair and the bold yet finely 
 cut outline of her features. 
 
 " I m afraid we interrupted your reading, Miss Cass," 
 Donald began. " Go on and finish your chapter. Here 
 comes Agnes. We can talk to her." Donald rose as he spoke 
 and Miriam looked toward the house. Agnes was coming 
 toward them across the lawn leading little Estelle by the 
 hand. 
 
 " Ferdinand sent up word he d be fifteen minutes late," 
 Tom said to her at once. 
 
 Miriam moved slightly and made a gesture inviting Agnes 
 to sit down beside her. 
 
 Agnes, however, smiled a refusal, went over to the ham 
 mock, lifted the baby, and smiled again at the others as she 
 started toward the house. The baby moved its head about 
 on her shoulder, now exhibiting a head worn bare of hair at 
 the back, and now a face ludicrously like Ferdinand s. 
 
 Little Estelle started forward, too, both arms out, in a 
 hurry, and tumbled down. " Never mind, Estelle. I ll carry 
 you," said Donald, and he picked her up and overtook Agnes. 
 
 Tom pulled a pillow toward him, cushioned the trunk of 
 a tree, and leaned back against it, clasping his hands behind 
 his head. As soon as the others were out of hearing he began, 
 " I ve been wanting to ask you ever since you came what 
 your conclusions are about Ferdinand. Do you like him? " 
 
 Miriam s eyes smiled. " You don t," she said. 
 
 " Right, there ! " replied Tom promptly. " Agnes would 
 have done a long sight better to take Don." 
 
 Miriam looked quizzical. " Mr. Ballington has some ad 
 mirable traits," she commented quietly. 
 
 " So have I ! " blurted out Tom, " but you d never think of 
 marrying me, would you ? " 
 
 He had not realized the full import of what he was saying 
 until after it was out. Then he turned pale with a sense of 
 the irrevocableness of his blunder. To be suddenly launched 
 all unprepared into a proposal of which he scarcely had dared
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 267 
 
 dream in the utmost flight of his imagination filled him with 
 dismay. * 
 
 Miriam s impulse was to laugh, when something in his look 
 checked her. 
 
 Tom leaned forward with decision. " The Lord knows, I 
 didn t think what I was saying," ,he began incoherently. " A 
 man doesn t propose to a woman like you quite so rapidly. 
 But what s the use? You might as well know it. I m not fit 
 to black your shoes. If I thought I were, I would ask you if 
 I could do it. If I thought the time ever would come when 
 you d take me for your shoeblack, I d wait and be happy. 
 What a fertile ass I am to be talking to you like this. For 
 God s sake, tell me you forgive me, or excuse me, or ignore 
 me. You ve done Agnes a world of good since you came. She 
 needed a change and stimulus very badly." Tom s manner 
 underwent a change in the last two sentences. He instinc 
 tively tried to ward off his catastrophe. 
 
 Miriam, however, disregarded his attempt. " I appreciate 
 the fact that you blundered into saying something that you 
 did not intend," she responded slowly, " and I m going to 
 answer by saying something I did not intend to say. You 
 have the making of a fine man in you and you ought to live 
 so that you wouldn t feel you had insulted a woman by ask 
 ing her to marry you." 
 
 Tom s face turned a deep crimson. " You re right," he 
 replied with an effort after a moment, " and if you cared 
 about it ever so little, I d try to get within gunshot of being 
 such a man." 
 
 " It doesn t make any difference whether I care or not," 
 Miriam replied steadily ; " we have to be our best selves inde 
 pendently, or we aren t our best selves at all." 
 
 Tom s lip trembled, but he answered bravely, " I know it. 
 Of course I had no right to ask you to care. I m going to 
 make a try of it anyway, just for having known you. You 
 won t grudge me that." 
 
 A gentleness came over Miriam s manner which was dan 
 gerous to Tom s self-control. " I do care. I m a lonely
 
 268 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 creature myself. I never shall have anything but friendships 
 in my life, and, if you will, you can make one of these." 
 
 A look of gratitude and humility passed like a refining 
 fire over Tom s face. " Thank you," he said. He was think 
 ing of Miriam s inner life into which he had seen. For the 
 first time he realized something of the sacrifice she had made 
 for her profession. It abashed him, but at the same time it 
 made him rebellious. What was art to stand between such a 
 woman and happiness? She would be the greater sculptor 
 for marrying. 
 
 As he looked at her his eyes were drawn beyond her by a 
 figure turning in at the gate and coming up the walk. It was 
 Ferdinand, and Tom s quick mind leaped to a kindred situa 
 tion. Agnes had had a future in her voice, and she had given 
 it up for marriage. The logic of the wise saying, " No man 
 can serve two masters," was borne in upon him, as matri 
 mony, in the person of Ferdinand, advanced relentlessly up 
 the walk. 
 
 " Here he comes ! " he said in a dead-and-alive tone. 
 
 Miriam looked up and saw Ferdinand coming across the 
 grass toward them. From her first sight of him this summer 
 until to-day, her last day in Winston, Miriam always had 
 experienced a curious sensation whenever she and Ferdinand 
 met. It was the instinctive bracing of her nerves for the de 
 fensive. Like Ferdinand, however, she never was visibly con 
 fused, and she gave him a smile as slight as his own as he 
 approached, and waited for him to speak. 
 
 He removed his hat and said, looking from one to the other, 
 " I am a little late. I think we had better go right in to din 
 ner." He held out his hand to assist Miriam to her feet, and 
 walked slowly beside her while Tom sauntered along on the 
 other side. 
 
 " Were you reading? " asked Ferdinand. 
 
 " No, I was talking with your cousin." 
 
 " I saw you were carrying a novel. Occasionally I find 
 time to read fiction myself. Agnes has gone into it rather too 
 freely, it seems to me; and while we are on the subject I would
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 269 
 
 like to suggest to you that you use your influence with Agnes 
 to read more judiciously. I ve been surprised to see that she 
 has taken to reading Fielding lately." 
 
 "You have read him, haven t you?" asked Miriam seri 
 ously. " I have myself." 
 
 " You are ready for it, Miss Cass, while Agnes is hardly 
 prepared to use the same liberty of choice." 
 
 Miriam walked on in silence between her two companions, 
 looking at the ground. Tom s collar began to choke him. 
 When they reached the walk leading up to the front steps he 
 broke the silence. 
 
 " Agnes is just as ready for it as Miss Cass," he exclaimed 
 indignantly, looking first at Ferdinand and then at the woman 
 he loved. " I can tell you exactly why she is reading Field 
 ing. It s because you re always quoting him." He abruptly 
 checked himself as he saw the corners of Miriam s mouth 
 twitch. 
 
 They entered the house without further conversation. 
 
 As they reached the dining-room Miriam paused in the 
 doorway to look at Agnes. The eye of the artist took in the 
 beauty of the picture. Agnes stood in front of the golden- 
 cherry buffet putting a huge bunch of Marechal Neil roses 
 into a Russian glass bowl. A thin ray of afternoon sunlight 
 fell across her, throwing into relief the beautiful head, and 
 lighting up the subdued colors of her Roman silk blouse, 
 belted in at the waist. Her back was toward them and she 
 looked straight and young, the raised arms supple and 
 muscular. 
 
 At the sound of their approach she turned her head over 
 her shoulder, then, with a vivid smile, clasped the bowl of 
 roses with both arms and turned toward the newcomers, 
 looking through and over the flowers at Miriam. " For you 
 and me," she exclaimed, " from Donald and Tom ! We are 
 in the vale of Kashmir in the month of roses." 
 
 " Well, Agnes," returned Tom, " you just stand there the 
 rest of the evening and hold them. You ought to be pre 
 served as you are. If I had a wand I d wave it over you ! "
 
 270 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes stooped a moment over the roses, drew a long breath, 
 turned and replaced them on the buffet. 
 
 As she came forward to the table Tom noticed that she 
 was wearing cameos at throat, waist, and cuffs. As soon as 
 they were seated he leaned forward and examined them. 
 
 "Where did you resurrect those?" he asked delightedly. 
 " You can t fool me. Those are two hundred years old if 
 they re a day. And the setting belongs to the same period. 
 If you ever want to pawn them, I m your man." 
 
 Ferdinand s brow contracted. 
 
 Agnes laughed. " Miriam brought me these," she said. 
 " She gave me the waist, too. Don t they go well together ? " 
 
 " Well, they re not like the rest of your things," Tom com 
 mented with satisfaction. " There s a kind of old-aristocracy 
 air about you in those. You always look fine, but somehow 
 I can t get away from the thought that most of your other 
 things are the same material that Mrs. Mortimer Tompkins 
 might buy, or any other rich person," he finished, without 
 glancing at Ferdinand. " Now I might have bought these 
 myself." 
 
 Ferdinand smiled. 
 
 " If you mean that they re within reach of your purse," 
 he commented, " I guess Mrs. Tompkins would have the best 
 of it. Those cameos are very expensive." 
 
 " Of course they are," returned Tom affably. " That s 
 another reason why I would have bought them, while Mrs. 
 Tompkins would think twice about it." 
 
 Ferdinand disdained to respond, and Miriam, feeling the 
 awkwardness of the conversation, turned to Tom, holding out 
 her hands for inspection. " Royal compliments are in the 
 air. The visiting monarch has received his parting gift." 
 
 Tom wondered if it were satire or pleasure in her tone as 
 his eye was caught by a ring on the first finger of Miriam s 
 hand. It was a pear-shaped jade lozenge in a massive set 
 ting, the jade outlined by a continuous row of small but bril 
 liant emeralds. 
 
 " Did Agnes give you that? " he asked incredulously.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 271 
 
 " That s pretty good for America ! " He pretended to be 
 still looking at the ring, but in reality he was studying with 
 passionate renunciation the compact and flexible hand held 
 . out without a tremor disturbing its statuesque repose. 
 
 " Ferdinand picked it out," said Agnes. " I think he 
 showed excellent taste." 
 
 " Agnes and Mr. Ballington gave it to me this morning. 
 It is truly a beautiful remembrance," Miriam added. 
 
 Tom withdrew his eyes. It was with difficulty that he re 
 frained from remarking, " I wonder which one of Tiffany s 
 clerks he got to select it for him," but he contented himself 
 with asking querulously, " Why do you wear it on the first 
 finger? " 
 
 " It s true I ought to wear it on the thumb," said Miriam 
 reflectively. " It s a weak concession to public opinion. 
 Sennacherib and Alexander Borgia wore theirs on the 
 thumb." 
 
 Ferdinand looked up inquiringly. Aunt Margaret was 
 hopelessly mystified. Meantime Tom s fury of rebellion was 
 reaching the danger point. Ferdinand, by a deliberate sub 
 terfuge, under cover of his wife, had given Miriam a ring! 
 Tom had wild thoughts of combining with Aunt Margaret 
 and Eliza in the purchase of an Assyrian thumb ring which 
 should eclipse the jealous emeralds which Tiffany s clerk had 
 induced Ferdinand to buy. 
 
 There was a gleam of amusement in Miriam s eye as she 
 glanced side-long at her dinner-companion. She divined what 
 was going on behind his grim face. A moment later she put 
 her hand up to her throat and drew from beneath the embroid 
 ered collar a little string of old coral which Tom recognized 
 as one Agnes had worn the evening of her arrival in her new 
 home. It had been given to Agnes father by an old sea cap 
 tain, who got it in the South Sea. " One more gift," she said. 
 " This is my amulet." As she slipped it back again she re 
 sumed her previous manner. " I shall will the ring to Es- 
 telle, who, I hope, will have the courage to wear it on her 
 thumb."
 
 272 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Miriam s eyes were so full of kindness and humor as she 
 looked at Tom that his resentment was suddenly assuaged. 
 " She s seen through him all along," he thought with a leap 
 of ecstacy. " She s willing I should know it while he hasn t 
 a suspicion of it." Meantime the dinner progressed rapidly 
 as an early start was to be made for the lake. Miriam spoke 
 appreciatively of the old glass and silver which were used 
 to-night in greater display than hitherto. Agnes replied 
 with a look of pleasure, " Aunt Margaret and I set the table 
 ourselves in honor of your last evening." 
 
 After supper they went to the lake. They took their seats 
 in a rowboat, Ferdinand at the oars, and the boat slipped out 
 upon the water, with Tom silent in one end, and Agnes trail 
 ing her fingers through the water at the other, both of them 
 heavy-hearted over Miriam s approaching departure. For 
 some moments there was no sound but the dipping of the 
 oars. 
 
 Presently, with a sigh, Tom began to play his guitar softly. 
 A moment later in a tenor voice he sang, " Ich hatte einst ein 
 schones Vaterland." He looked up at the stars as he sang 
 the three short stanzas. Miriam s eyes were fixed on the 
 water. When he had finished he laid his guitar across his 
 knees and leaned upon it looking at her. 
 
 After a little silence Miriam roused herself. " Sing * Gelb 
 rollt mir zu Fiissen, Agnes," she demanded, and Tom slowly 
 brought his guitar into position again. 
 
 Ferdinand stopped rowing and the boat drifted while 
 Agnes voice floated out over the water with its old daring 
 and a fullness of tragic meaning that was new. The barbaric 
 pride and swing of the beginning sinking into the half -articu 
 late sob at the end of the song made the party feel as though 
 some disembodied spirit were crying after the life that had 
 slipped away from it. Tom shivered and turned up his coat 
 collar. " I feel as if the angel of death had just flown over 
 us," he exclaimed in an unsteady voice. 
 
 Miriam leaned forward with a determined look in her gray 
 eyes. " Agnes," she said, " you have a great future in that
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 273 
 
 voice. I want you to remember what I say. From now on I 
 want you to practice an hour every day. Such a gift as that 
 is the greatest thing a human being can be endowed with, 
 and it s blasphemy to let it fust unused." 
 
 Agnes fingers trailed in the water and she did not look up. 
 " I know it is," she said, " and I am going to practice hence 
 forth." 
 
 A moment later she found Miriam s eyes still gazing in 
 tently at her. A quiet seemed to settle over the party upon 
 their return trip. Even when they drew near town and saw 
 the pavilion gleaming like a jeweled order upon the breast 
 of the lake, and passed the other rowboats, gay with music 
 and bright colors, it did not affect the mood of the five who 
 were together for the last time. 
 
 When they landed, Donald again walked with Agnes and 
 her husband, leaving his brother alone with Miriam. As they 
 reached the farm he hesitated and looked toward Tom, but 
 Tom was already saying good-by, and the brothers walked 
 away together. 
 
 " Are you willing to tell me what passed between Miss Cass 
 and yourself, Tom? " Donald asked as soon as they were out 
 of hearing. 
 
 " She refused me," replied Tom briefly. " But it s the 
 best thing that ever happened to me. She d been a fool if she 
 hadn t. Says she isn t going to marry anybody. I guess 
 she s the only woman that ever meant it. Anyway, I would 
 rather be her friend than the husband of anybody else in the 
 world. Now, you see, this time I mean business ! " 
 
 Donald started to reply, when Tom cut him short. " Shut 
 up, Don ! I know all you ve got to say. We re both in the 
 same boat with the women. I don t say that celibacy is an 
 attractive state, but if we ve got to enter it, we ve got to 
 ornament it." A moment later he added with emotion in his 
 tone, " I never realized before all you ve had to stand. If I 
 had to sit around in the same office with Miriam Cass husband 
 I d shoot him inside of half an hour." 
 
 " No, you wouldn t, Tom," said Donald gloomily.
 
 274 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " No, I d strangle him ! I d kill him very slowly and pain 
 fully." 
 
 Donald made no reply to this primeval remark, and they 
 made the rest of their way home in silence. A feeling of de 
 pression was weighing upon the elder brother. He had little 
 faith that Tom would remain in his present renunciatory 
 state of mind, nor was he in sympathy with Miriam s notions 
 about platonic friendships. They were unnatural and had 
 wrought endless mischief in the world. She should have re 
 fused Tom for an adequate reason because she did not love 
 him, or thought herself too old. Love, not art, is the arbiter of 
 marriage. He was dissatisfied with Miriam s coldness. Then 
 he reflected that this might be natural in a woman older than 
 Tom who was absorbed in her work. At least she had given 
 Tom a temporary inspiration, while Agnes would permanently 
 benefit by the fresh current of life and of interest Miriam 
 had brought with her.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 TV/fEANTIME.as the other three walked up the path to the 
 farmhouse Agnes hurried ahead a little toward Miss 
 Ballington, who stood in the doorway to welcome them. 
 
 " Is the baby all right? How was he during the evening? " 
 she asked anxiously. 
 
 " He s asleep now, dear. I rocked him off once or twice." 
 
 Agnes kissed the faded cheek. " It was good in you to 
 give me this nice evening, Aunt Margaret," she said. " I m 
 very grateful." 
 
 " I ve a little lunch for you in the dining-room," Miss Bal 
 lington responded happily. " Eliza wanted to go out and 
 I let her, but I got a tiny little lunch myself." 
 
 " Eliza ought not to have left you," said Agnes with sur 
 prise and displeasure in her tone. " But never mind, it was 
 lovely in you to get something ready for us." 
 
 They all went to the dining-room, Miriam accompanying 
 Miss Ballington and entertaining her with an account of 
 their boat ride. " I wish you might have been with us," she 
 said as they sat down to the table. 
 
 Miss Margaret s pride in her own unselfishness expanded 
 beautifully under the general appreciation of herself and her 
 repast. She beamed upon each in turn and gave an ornate 
 and detailed account of the way in which she herself had 
 spent the evening. She had been reading her favorite poem, 
 " In Memoriam," and she gave a florid and stately little 
 eulogy on friendship and its power in the world. 
 
 Ferdinand listened with his smile of superiority. He had 
 heard Miriam speak slightingly of the poem once, and it was 
 with the consciousness of saying something agreeable that 
 he began in his turn to disparage it. He also took occasion 
 to comment with indulgence upon his aunt s impossible ideal 
 
 275
 
 276 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 of friendship. Friendships were utilitarian; pure, disin 
 terested friendship was a bird of an extinct species. He 
 glanced toward Miriam during his remark with the comfort 
 able assurance of having one appreciative listener. Some 
 what to his disappointment their guest did not seem to be 
 listening to him, but Agnes recognized in her friend an ex 
 pression she had come to know. It meant that Miriam s usual 
 tolerance of all men s opinions had fallen from her like a veil, 
 leaving bare a nature as hard and unyielding as flint. 
 
 As a matter of fact Ferdinand s remarks about his wife 
 that afternoon, to which Tom had taken exception, had been 
 rankling in Miriam s mind ever since they were spoken. They 
 had given the last touch to an antagonism which had been in 
 stinctive in Miriam five years before, the first night she had 
 ever seen Ferdinand, and which had been steadily becoming 
 fixed. Her unfailing tact of manner toward her friend s hus 
 band had been achieved only by a persistent effort of will. 
 
 After the conversation had drifted away from the danger 
 ous topic to a harmless discussion of Stevenson and South 
 Sea Island scenery, and Agnes was breathing free again, 
 Miriam trusted herself to look toward her host as she 
 addressed a remark to him. As Miriam s gray eyes crossed 
 Ferdinand s steady blue gaze, Agnes was conscious of a flash 
 such as springs from the clash of flint on steel, while Ferdi 
 nand, too, felt an unwonted sensation, an instant s recoil. 
 
 " You ought not to talk about the South Sea Islands till 
 you have been there, or, at least, you ought to be sure of the 
 source of your information," Miriam said, smiling. " Your 
 friend s criticism of Stevenson is ridiculous. I have been 
 there. And now, since it is my last night," she said, with 
 more graciousness than she so far had been able to assume, 
 " I am going to take an old friend s liberty and dispute with 
 you. A little while ago you were talking about friendship 
 in the same way that you have just been talking about the 
 South Sea Islands." 
 
 Her slight shrug and gesture of differential disapproval 
 pleased Ferdinand it was so feminine.
 
 277 
 
 "I doubt if you know what friendship is," she continued 
 thoughtfully, her manner changing. " I sometimes think it 
 isn t as common as it once was we say so much less about it 
 than our great-grandfathers did. As for me, I owe the best 
 part of myself to youi* wife here. You and I are something 
 alike, Mr. Ballington. We both need to be educated in things 
 of the soul." Miriam rose as she spoke, but paused with 
 both hands on the back of her chair, looking steadily at her 
 host. 
 
 Ferdinand watched her closely, wondering at the expec 
 tancy with which he awaited her next words. 
 
 "You don t like to yield a single point, Mr. Ballington. 
 Neither do I. We are hard people. I have the hardness of 
 the jesting Sadducee, you of the upright Pharisee. Our 
 friend here," and she turned with inexpressible tenderness to 
 Agnes, " is neither a Pharisee nor a Sadducee, but a Galilean, 
 and we can no more resist her without damning ourselves than 
 this world can resist her Master. She is broader than you 
 or I ever will be, sees deeper into life. She is doing for us 
 both what no other influence ever can do. The friendship of 
 such a soul is the greatest blessing in the world." 
 
 Ferdinand was uncomfortably conscious of an inexplic 
 able melancholy stealing through the atmosphere, a repeti 
 tion of the mood which had fallen upon the party on the lake 
 after Agnes song. He wondered if he caught the drift of 
 what Miriam was saying. 
 
 There was a moment s silence; then Miriam took her hand 
 from the back of the chair, smiled at her host, said good 
 night, touched Aunt Margaret s shoulder lightly, thanking 
 her once more for her hospitality, and, without speaking to 
 Agnes, turned and went toward the door. The instant her 
 back was turned her smile vanished, and as she went up the 
 stairs to her room she struck her right hand into her left 
 palm, " If God should do it," she thought, " it would be all- 
 wise. If I should, it would be murder in the first degree. 
 God appears to have gone hunting, or peradventure He 
 sleepeth."
 
 278 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 A few moments later Ferdinand followed Agnes slowly up 
 to their rooms. He found himself watching his wife with un 
 accustomed interest, trying to discover what there was in 
 her to call forth Miriam s late eulogy. He was rewarded by 
 a fresh zest in her physical appearance. 
 
 " You re looking very well again, Agnes," he said, feeling 
 a pleasurable prick of novelty in complimenting her. For 
 the first time in weeks he felt something of the old attraction. 
 
 Agnes looked up at him gravely, and went over to arrange 
 the baby in his crib. Then she turned back to him. "I m 
 going to stay with Miriam to-night," she said. "I don t 
 know when I shall see her again, and there is much I want to 
 talk about." She went over to him and kissed him good-night, 
 as usual. 
 
 " Don t stay awake too long," he said, the flash of interest 
 already faded. 
 
 Then he entered his own room, while she went down the 
 hall to Miriam s.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 AS Agnes opened Miriam s door she saw her friend kneel 
 ing before her trunk, while Miss Margaret sat near the 
 open window talking to her. The light breeze was grateful 
 to the little lady s flushed cheeks as she discussed in an ani 
 mated monologue, interrupted by occasional appreciative in 
 terpolations from Miriam, some of the things which were 
 nearest to her heart. Soon after Agnes entered, however, 
 and began to help Miriam fold and pack the soft and mellow- 
 toned fabrics strewn upon the floor and chairs, Miss Mar 
 garet rose and wished the younger women, as was her wont, 
 a good night s sleep and pleasant dreams. 
 
 Miriam and Agnes filled and locked the far-traveled trunk 
 and portmanteau, and then put out the light and sat for a 
 time on the window-sill, looking into the starry and moonlit 
 heavens and over the gently rising country to the dark prom 
 ontory where Winston College stood. They spoke of 
 memories, living for an hour or more entirely in the past. 
 
 At last Miriam stood up and turned away from the win 
 dow. " It s very late, Agnes. We must go to sleep." But 
 they began to talk again as soon as they had gone to bed. 
 
 A broad stream of moonlight falling across the room to 
 the foot of the bed filled the room with light. 
 
 " If I were you, Agnes," said Miriam at last, calling her 
 thoughts resolutely to the present, " I should get rid of 
 Eliza. I ve been thinking a good deal about it lately. This 
 second girl your mother sent up from Kent isn t going to 
 be able to live with her. I don t believe anybody could but 
 you and Aunt Margaret. It will be easier for you to have 
 two good girls than one Eliza." 
 
 Agnes sighed. Then she spoke with decision. "I intend 
 to get rid of her, Miriam, and soon, but it s not easy to dis- 
 
 279
 
 280 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 lodge an old servant. Eliza has been here ever since Ferdi 
 nand was born. He says it s only women who can t get on 
 together peaceably in the same house. He thinks Aunt Mar 
 garet s to blame, and he even suggested boarding her at Miss 
 Matcham s boarding house. Of course that would kill Aunt 
 Margaret. Ferdinand and I must go out of this house if 
 necessary, but never Aunt Margaret. It s her home." 
 
 " Another thing I ve wanted to speak to you about, 
 Agnes," continued Miriam, "is the music. There is no 
 reason why you shouldn t do much with your voice. You are 
 young and strong, and even when the children are little by 
 practicing carefully you can keep your tones. Then, too." 
 she added earnestly, " there s nothing like it to soften the 
 harsh things of life. For that reason I live with a musi 
 cian in New York. I never model so well as when she is 
 playing. I noticed when I came here four weeks ago that you 
 were despondent, fagged in mind and body, and now that you 
 have gone back to singing again you have back your youth." 
 
 Agnes waited a moment, then replied slowly, " Twasn t 
 the music that was the matter with me, Miriam. I had some 
 thing on my mind." 
 
 "That s just it," commented her friend. "If you had 
 kept right on singing you could have sung your cares down, 
 as the good brothers and sisters used to sing down long- 
 winded talkers in revival meetings back in Vermont. You ll 
 have something on your mind again some time. Sing it 
 down ! " 
 
 " Miriam," said Agnes with resolution, " my conscience is 
 troubling me." 
 
 " Well, so does everyone s," Miriam answered sadly. 
 
 " But mine has good reason," Agnes continued. " Miriam, 
 I ve always felt that I was guilty of my father s death." 
 
 There was a startled silence. 
 
 "During my mother s absence I neglected him. We had 
 no girl and Aunt Mattie couldn t cook. Beatrice Mott was 
 visiting in Kent then, and I was carried away. I don t think 
 it expresses it too strongly to say my father was starved."
 
 ,THE BALLINGTONS 281 
 
 " Have you ever told this to anyone else ? " asked Miriam 
 abruptly. 
 
 " No. I thought it would hurt my mother too much. If 
 I should tell anyone, it would be Ferdinand. I ve tried to be 
 honest with him." 
 
 " Well, Agnes," said Miriam gently, " it may be true that 
 you neglected your father during the last of his life, but I ve 
 never heard that spinal meningitis is the result of starvation. 
 Nor would it ease your father s spirit for you to tell Ferdi 
 nand that you killed him." 
 
 " But this same negligence and incapacity have shown 
 themselves again and again in other relations," Agnes went 
 on with a self-control that would not have been possible from 
 her four weeks before. " I never seem to know how to grap 
 ple with a situation until it s gone by. I didn t treat my 
 mother rightly, and I think I have lost my chance to influ 
 ence my husband on serious questions. I was ignorant and 
 hysterical when I married, and you know how hard it is to 
 gain back a good opinion once lost." 
 
 " These are things we all have to face," said Miriam. 
 " We may count ourselves happy if we find out how to grap 
 ple with a situation after it has gone. Most people never 
 do that." 
 
 Agnes voice fell lower and became more tense as she con 
 tinued. "My husband has told the truth to me ever since 
 we were married. I have wished many times that he wouldn t. 
 For some time past now I ve been overwhelmed with shame in 
 contrasting my attitude toward him with his toward me. 
 For a year now I have deceived him continually in one re 
 spect. I needed some money a year ago, and, in order to get 
 it without his knowledge, I falsified my housekeeping ac 
 counts. Since then I have sent things home several times 
 without his knowledge which he supposed I was buying for 
 his own house. Now my books are far from right. It s the 
 same old story, beginning with a little theft and drifting on. 
 I tell you," she said with bitter scorn, " I know how these 
 absconding bank clerks get into it. Here s poor old Aunt
 
 282 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Margaret, who hasn t any more head for figures than a 
 chicken, she ran the house honorably for twenty years; and 
 my father s daughter " Here she suddenly stopped. 
 
 " Of course you had a reason for it," Miriam interrupted 
 hastily. " Never mind telling me what it was. How much 
 are you behind ? " 
 
 "Four hundred and thirty-seven dollars." 
 
 "Well, I think you were very economical," said Miriam, 
 with what Agnes considered ill-timed levity. " You must 
 let me replace that money and keep it as our private arrange 
 ment. After that see to it " 
 
 Agnes took her friend s hand affectionately. " That s like 
 you, Miriam, but the only decent thing for me to do is to 
 confess the whole thing and start in fair and square. There 
 must be perfect honesty between husband and wife." 
 
 Miriam hesitated. Should she leave Agnes naked and 
 innocent in her arduous paradise, or should she be the ser 
 pent of worldly wisdom in her friend s tree of life, clothe and 
 send her out into a darker but more real world? 
 
 " That is the right spirit, Agnes," she sai4 at length, 
 " and I m glad you have it." 
 
 She was going to stop there, but the other impulse was 
 too strong. She continued energetically, "I m very glad 
 you have it. But a woman must have something more than 
 the spirit of making confidences with the very best man who 
 ever lived. Men seldom are as confiding to their wives as 
 wives think they ought to be to their husbands. You say 
 Ferdinand never has hesitated to tell the truth to you. Is it 
 because he is honest, or because he isn t ashamed of it? Ha,s 
 he ever told you what he considers to be one single weakness 
 in himself? of one mistake? of one error? " 
 
 Agnes was silent. 
 
 Miriam continued, " I thought not, and I must say that 
 in this particular he has shown himself wiser than you. 
 I don t believe the man ever lived who was not forced to 
 confess to himself sometimes that he had done the wrong 
 thing. It doesn t follow that he ought to rush up on the
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 283 
 
 housetop and proclaim his fault, nor even down into the 
 house and tell his wife about it that is, provided he rectifies 
 it. Someone says that more trouble has been caused in 
 domestic life by morbid confession than by deceit." 
 
 Agnes was shocked. 
 
 Miriam continued unmoved. " I know it s a hard doc 
 trine too hard for the wicked. They ought to confess every 
 time. Only the righteous ought to hold their tongues. I beg 
 you not to tell Ferdinand about this money, nor about any 
 other peccadilloes you may be guilty of. I tell you, Agnes, 
 you will make an irretrievable mistake if you undertake to 
 tell anybody in this life everything you do. Don t commit 
 any faults, but don t tell about them if you do. He never 
 will forget them, and the time will come when you will wish 
 he didn t know." 
 
 Agnes was silent, thinking drearily that they were not 
 peccadilloes, but sins, and therefore she must tell Ferdinand, 
 although she knew that she would suffer for it. There was 
 but one path for her, one of perfect integrity. There must 
 be no deceits behind. Concealment of her past faults would 
 be cowardice and lack of will-power, the same things which 
 had led her into them. The only hope of a fortunate out 
 come of her life with Ferdinand lay in the development of a 
 controlled and wisely directed will, a power in her which he 
 could recognize and respect as he did his mother s memory. 
 
 As she did not reply Miriam continued : " Why do you 
 allow Mr. Ballington to deprive you of financial equality, 
 Agnes? If you were the active wage-earner would you not 
 recognize him as participating in the right to dispose of your 
 income? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Doubtless you think that self-sacrifice in this matter is 
 better than what seems to you a vulgar insistence for a 
 separate purse." Miriam spoke in a matter-of-fact tone. 
 The matter so personal and sore to Agnes had long been 
 one of liberal and impersonal interest to her friend. " But 
 let me tell you," she went on more earnestly, " if this were a
 
 284 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 question of spiritual liberty instead of material, you would 
 see at once what is your duty. You are hurting your hus 
 band as well as yourself by failing to assert your just claims. 
 It is no more moral to condone a material wrong than to 
 submit to a spiritual wrong. We submit to injustice not for 
 ourselves only. That s the point. We strengthen tyranny 
 everywhere when we falter before it ourselves. If you won t 
 assert yourself against injustice in money matters or any 
 other tangible affair, you will be forced some time to face it 
 in something more momentous. Moreover, you will come to 
 that final struggle without prestige against an opposing 
 force accustomed to dictatorship." 
 
 After a considerable pause Agnes answered, " I know 
 that the sordid and material forms in which spiritual ques 
 tions clothe themselves confuse and get the best of me. I 
 do not think it cheap or vulgar to meet them, but I am afraid 
 of the consequences which direct grappling with them may 
 bring to me. They will raise very large problems for me, 
 larger than you realize, and I cannot yet see clearly how I 
 ought to solve them." 
 
 The silence which followed was rich in mutual understand 
 ing. At length Miriam broke it : " To go back once 
 more, Agnes, to a pleasant topic your old friend Profes 
 sor Stoddard is going to start a summer conservatory up 
 here, to be a permanent thing, I believe, and I ve no doubt 
 that he would be eager to obtain your services as an assistant 
 teacher. He never has forgotten your voice, always asks 
 after you every time I see him. You had better seize every 
 opportunity of a musical kind. We never know what is 
 going to happen to us in this world. There are two reasons 
 why a woman of your talent ought not to be a mere house 
 keeper. One is that Mr. Ballington might lose all his money 
 and die of the shock, leaving you with a family to support. 
 There is your mother doing it. It is happening every day. 
 The other is that the great goddess Nature will revenge her 
 self upon an unthankful debtor. For my part, I consider 
 that the moral obligation imposed by an undoubted gift
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 285 
 
 should be perhaps the determining factor in marking out a 
 woman s life. I never should feel right myself to marry. I 
 feel that I have another work lying closer to me. You are 
 happier than I am in having your children, but you are also 
 encumbered. If the time ever comes when your burden gets 
 too heavy, if you are called upon to sustain losses of any 
 kind " she spoke the last words slowly and Agnes under 
 stood what lay behind them " then I want you to remem 
 ber that I am free and able to help you and that you are the 
 nearest thing to me." 
 
 A thrill of energy and hope tingled along Agnes nerves. 
 An unlooked-for power had placed itself behind her. Defeat 
 vanished from the perspective of the future. If it came to 
 the worst, she might begin over again, and in Miriam s 
 vocabulary there seemed to be no " too late." 
 
 After a time she responded in a tone of high resolve, " You 
 have put new life into me. Life is going easier from now on. 
 It gives me infinite rest and peace to think of you behind me 
 in the battle of life. I shall remember what you have said." 
 
 When the town clock struck two both were asleep.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 \\7HEN Tom arrived at the station the next morning to 
 see Miriam off for New York his eyes fell upon Ferdi 
 nand s neat suit-case, ready for travel, standing near Miriam s 
 on the floor. "What s that? " he exclaimed suspiciously, his 
 ready color rising, as he looked at Agnes for an explanation. 
 
 Miriam interposed. " Mr. Ballington is going to make the 
 trip down to New York with me," she said, and then handed 
 her umbrella to Tom, remarking, " I ve been trying for ten 
 minutes to snap the strap together and no one has offered to 
 help me." 
 
 Tom bent over the refractory clasp silently, his heart beat 
 ing like a trip-hammer with rage at this move of Ferdinand s. 
 
 " Yes, I m going on through to Washington," explained 
 Ferdinand, magnanimously making Tom the confidant of his 
 plans. " I had to go, anyway, and I thought I could see to 
 Miss Cass luggage." 
 
 Tom glanced at the umbrella with an insane impulse to 
 lift it and smite Ferdinand to the earth. 
 
 " He is going down to see about his patents," Agnes added. 
 
 Tom pulled himself together and chatted moodily until the 
 train came in. Then he pushed Ferdinand aside as the latter 
 was stooping to pick up Miriam s suit-case. " You have your 
 own to carry," he said grimly. He assisted Miriam into the 
 car, arranged her comfortably, gave her a couple of the latest 
 magazines and a newspaper, lifted his hat formally and left 
 her. Ferdinand was waiting to enter the seat. 
 
 After the train had gone, Agnes and Tom rode down 
 together to the city, Agnes talking affectionately of Miriam 
 and what her friendship meant. The station was situated on 
 a hill overlooking the town ; they drove down slowly, and 
 before they reached the car-shops Agnes had communicated 
 her spirit of bravery to him. He went into the office, hung 
 
 286
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 287 
 
 up his hat, opened his big ledger, eyed it as though it were a 
 battle-field, and began his campaign. 
 
 Agnes, too, was entering, she knew full well, on a struggle 
 which would tax her to the uttermost. Whither it might lead 
 her or what might be its outcome it was futile to forecast. 
 
 Two obvious necessities confronted her at the outset : one of 
 them Eliza s dismissal, the other the confession of her deceit 
 to Ferdinand. Now that she had determined to make this 
 confession she was anxious for Ferdinand s return, that it 
 might be over speedily, and she waited somewhat restlessly as 
 the days passed and his short notes and telegrams announced 
 a still further delay. She had determined to leave Eliza s dis 
 charge until her husband s return, in order to vindicate her 
 self from the cowardice which tempted her to get rid of the 
 Irishwoman while he was away, and thus to avoid a collision 
 with his will. 
 
 Each day, however, seemed to increase by geometrical pro 
 gression the domestic friction. Eliza took advantage of 
 Ferdinand s absence to tyrannize over Miss Margaret, while 
 she sulked before Agnes face and threatened behind her back. 
 After a week of it Agnes resolved to put an end at once to 
 what would be soon an impossible situation. 
 
 The crisis between her and the old servant came suddenly 
 one day. 
 
 When it was over Agnes went into Miss Margaret s room 
 and shut the door. "Aunt Margaret," she said quietly, "I 
 have discharged Eliza." 
 
 Miss Ballington began to tremble. She had felt this 
 coining, and, much to Agnes perplexity, had striven pain 
 fully to prevent it. At last Agnes knew the reason. Her 
 altercation with Eliza had brought out several revelations, 
 one of them explaining much that had seemed curious in Miss 
 Margaret s relations with the cook. Sympathy with her 
 aunt followed swiftly upon the discovery. 
 
 " She says, Aunt Margaret," said Agnes, going over to the 
 couch and taking hold of her aunt s hand, " that you owe her 
 some money. Is that so, dear? "
 
 288 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes could feel the little form quiver as Miss Ballington 
 looked up with a supreme effort to retain dignity and self- 
 control. " The little Flynn baby had no milk, Agnes. They 
 all were starving." 
 
 " How much is it, Aunt Margaret ? " Agnes asked, with a 
 slight pressure of the feverish hand. 
 
 Miss Ballington did not answer. Agnes repeated her ques 
 tion gently. 
 
 Miss Margaret raised her distressed face once more, and 
 said with more assurance, " Donald always gives me money on 
 my birthday, and perhaps Sarah would buy my camel s-hair 
 shawl. She always has wanted it." 
 
 " But it must be paid now, dear. Eliza says she won t go 
 till she gets it. You must let me know and I will pay it out 
 of the house-money." 
 
 Miss Margaret drew her hand away spasmodically. " But 
 then Ferdinand would know!" she said breathlessly, and she 
 added with a frightened whisper, " I daren t have him know." 
 
 Agnes waited a moment, thinking. 
 
 " Is it really nearly two hundred dollars, as Eliza says ? " 
 she asked at last. 
 
 She read an affirmative answer in her aunt s face, and 
 then she realized that the loans had been going on, perhaps, 
 for years. This had been Miss Margaret s way of surmount 
 ing financial stringency, as falsifying accounts had been her 
 own. 
 
 The two women set to work to find some solution, and 
 though Agnes insisted for a time that Ferdinand should be 
 told, she knew in her heart from the beginning how it would 
 end. What she was prepared to meet for her own misdoing 
 she had not the heart to put upon the only survivor of the 
 old generation of Ballingtons. Moreover, there was an added 
 reason. Flynn s case was a notorious one. He was a skilled 
 workman who had insisted in disregarding one of Ferdinand s 
 pet regulations at the shops and whom Ferdinand had made 
 it a point to force into submission by way of example to the 
 rest. To his surprise and mystification, Flynn, with a large
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 289 
 
 family dependent upon him, had managed to exist through a 
 hard winter, and had just succeeded in obtaining a better 
 position in a new steel plant. There was no telling to what 
 lengths Ferdinand might be incensed against Aunt Margaret 
 should he learn that she had been supporting Flynn s family 
 during the late unpleasantness. 
 
 " Never mind, Aunt Margaret," Agnes said at last, " we 
 are losing time talking here. You can easily get the money, 
 and there s no reason why you shouldn t. I m going to ask 
 Donald to lend it to you." 
 
 She went to the telephone, hesitated, then wrote a note 
 instead, and carried it out to Sam at the barn, telling him 
 to deliver it at once. As he was leaving she said to him, 
 " See that you give it to Mr. Donald Ballington himself, 
 Sam." 
 
 The man tipped his hat and went off. 
 
 Within an hour he came back with a package, which Eliza 
 brought upstairs to Agnes. The inflamed little eyes of the 
 Irishwoman had a canny look as she handed it over. Agnes 
 tore it open with indescribable relief. Donald had sent the 
 money f o.r her aunt with a single line saying, " Thank you." 
 She at once paid Eliza, and took a receipt. 
 
 To her surprise the Irishwoman, who at first had insisted 
 that she should remain until Ferdinand s return, now an 
 nounced that she should leave before dinner. Some hours 
 later they heard her thumping down her trunk, a stair at a 
 time, without Sam s assistance, from the third floor to the 
 kitchen. She left the premises in sinister taciturnity late in 
 the afternoon. 
 
 The uneasiness which Agnes felt in seeing the hostile figure 
 go off through the garden was dissipated, as she turned back 
 to the kitchen, by the cheerful face of the strong second 
 girl from Kent. 
 
 " I ve got the dinner almost ready, Mrs. Ballington," the 
 latter said, in the tone of one who was giving a blessing from 
 the Lord. " And if you like, ma am, I ll send up to Kent this 
 afternoon for my sister Joan to come."
 
 290 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Agnes went at once upstairs to her desk and wrote to 
 Ferdinand of the change that had taken place in the house 
 hold. 
 
 Then she sat still with her pen poised in the air. It would 
 be better, while she was about it, to clear her conscience at the 
 same time. The pen dropped to the paper, and she wrote out 
 plainly the unhappy story of the diverted money and the 
 tampered accounts. 
 
 She was about to add Donald s wedding gift to the con 
 fession, but stopped, feeling that she had no right, having 
 accepted it, to involve him in difficulty because of it. So she 
 wrote this to her husband : 
 
 There is one other thing I should like to tell you, and if it concerned 
 myself alone I should. It happened before we were married. My 
 chief regret concerning it is that you could not know it. As it is, 
 I cannot gratify my desire to tell you more than this. 
 
 When she sealed the letter she held it in her hand an instant. 
 " This means untold shame to me," she reasoned clearly, " but 
 at last I am square with the world, and I can start again." 
 After dinner she mailed the letter. 
 
 Five days later Ferdinand returned. 
 
 The trip south had been satisfactory to him in a business 
 way, and it had been a recreation as well. He occasionally 
 allowed himself these relaxations from his methodical and dis 
 ciplined course of life, having the comfortable conviction that 
 only those can enjoy who prepare themselves for a few golden 
 hours of pleasure by months and even years of industry and 
 sobriety. While in Washington he had gone around with a 
 couple of spirited and accommodating political friends, and 
 when the time came for leaving he was permeated with a glow 
 of content. He had learned how to combine two characters 
 generally considered antagonistic, those of the Stoic and the 
 Epicurean. He had left business without haste, and he was 
 returning without regret, and on the whole he reminded him 
 self of Huxley s " calm, strong angel," who plays the chess 
 game of life with less able opponents.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 291 
 
 During his absence from home he reflected off and on in 
 moments of leisure upon Agnes returning spirits, and her 
 ability to hold the respect of such a woman as Miriam Cass. 
 
 He had found himself unable to get on a more confidential 
 footing with Miriam when he was alone with her during the 
 journey than he was when Agnes was present. He had tried 
 to resume conversation about Agnes and about himself, but, 
 without realizing how she did it, he was conscious that she 
 parried his beginnings and directed the conversation to imper 
 sonal topics. He acknowledged at length that she intended 
 to speak intimately with him where his wife could hear her, or 
 not at all. His irritation toward Miriam was counter-bal 
 anced by his admiration of her wisdom, and it was with the 
 latter sensation uppermost in his mind that he turned his 
 attention away from her. 
 
 Along with his reviving hopes in his wife had gone a dis 
 quieting sense of his neglect of her the last year. He wished 
 that he had put through without interruption his original 
 plan for conducting their marital relations; not that he had 
 overstepped a man s privileges unduly, but he was above the 
 ordinary man s privileges, and he had started out upon ideal 
 lines laid down by enlightened masculine reason. 
 
 It was at such a moment of reflection that he received his 
 wife s letter. The announcement of Eliza s discharge, 
 astounding as it was to him, was dwarfed in importance as he 
 passed on to the confession at the close of the letter. Surprise 
 and anger that for so long a period such subterfuges had been 
 employed without his suspicion were speedily swallowed up in 
 another emotion. He dated the receipt of the letter and then 
 put it up carefully in a private notebook. With the excep 
 tion of her half-confidence, he would consider his score with 
 his wife balanced, and upon his return they would both of 
 them, as he expressed it, " begin over." The half-confidence, 
 however, rankled in his memory. 
 
 He half expected to find Agnes waiting for him at the 
 train, was disappointed to find Sam alone, and was surprised 
 at his own eagerness for his wife as he rode home.
 
 292 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 As he entered the house he heard the children s voices in 
 the library, and went there first, expecting to find their 
 mother. 
 
 " Where is Agnes ? " he asked of his aunt, who was holding 
 little Stephen in her lap. 
 
 " She went up to her room this very minute, dear," answered 
 Miss Margaret, noticing the brilliance of his eyes. 
 
 He left the room, went upstairs, knocked at his wife s door, 
 then opened it without waiting for an answer. 
 
 Agnes was waiting for him, apparently unoccupied. He 
 noticed, too, that she wore the maroon dress in which he 
 especially liked to see her. She looked at him anxiously, but 
 did not speak. 
 
 Ferdinand crossed the room, bent down and kissed her, told 
 her he had come home earlier than he had intended, that he had 
 hoped to see her at the station, that he had looked for her 
 first in the library, and that Estelle had wanted to follow him 
 upstairs. Then he talked to her a little about the possible 
 future for his invention. 
 
 To all this she responded with nervous acquiescence. 
 
 At last he broached the matter of her letter, limiting his 
 discussion to the financial part of it. 
 
 "Why is it that you shrink from my advice on business 
 matters, Agnes?" he finished. "I am a business man. It is 
 absolutely useless to try to help Pleasant Mabie if you allow 
 him to manage his own affairs. You have thrown all that 
 money away. Anyone will tell you that I am an unusually 
 successful financier, and it s because I won t be worked on by 
 my sympathies to chuck money into the stove. Experience 
 has taught me what I know, and you should be willing to 
 accept facts from me." 
 
 " I am willing to do that, but I could not consent that my 
 sister should become your hired help," said Agnes, disap 
 pointed and worried that Ferdinand took no note, apparently, 
 of the ethical side of the question. 
 
 " The only thing which need concern hired help is that it 
 does its work well," said Ferdinand imperturbably.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 293 
 
 Agnes met his eyes seriously. " How could she do her work 
 well? You would not be satisfied with what Helen could do. 
 You would demand as much from her as though she were a 
 stout German peasant woman." 
 
 " It was her own choice to marry a farmer. I am sorry for 
 her ; but, of course, that doesn t mend matters." 
 
 As she did not speak, he took up the conversation again. 
 " It seems curious to me," he said, scrutinizing her, " that 
 you always have felt such reluctance to my knowing how you 
 spend your money. I have no such feeling with regard to 
 you." 
 
 " You can decide for yourself how you wish to spend it. 
 I have to submit to your judgment." Agnes spoke gravely, 
 knowing that the inevitable consequences of the stand she had 
 decided to take would soon be upon her. Ferdinand s igno 
 rance of the seriousness of the crisis between them intensified 
 her own earnestness. 
 
 " I furnish you with all the comforts of life," said Ferdi 
 nand, glancing around the room, and then touching lightly 
 the rich gown she wore. 
 
 " Except liberty," said Agnes briefly. 
 
 " Certainly. It is the husband s prerogative to decide 
 matters for his family." The persistent failure of his wife to 
 affect his mood as he had a right to expect after an unusual 
 separation, also her refusal to appreciate the full extent of 
 his magnanimity, were beginning to irritate him. 
 
 " Would you permit another person to make your decisions 
 for you ? " asked Agnes thoughtfully. 
 
 " No. It is a man s privilege that he may make his own," 
 said Ferdinand, who was at last aware of something behind 
 all this. 
 
 Agnes was silent for some moments. Then she said slowly, 
 without raising her voice, but with the hereditary note which 
 had rung through Kent ever since Dr. Sidney first brought his 
 wife there to live : " Ferdinand, I wrote to you that I was 
 going to make a new start. It remains with you to decide 
 just what that start will be. Henceforth I must have a
 
 294 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 definite sum of money to use as my own. Will you give this 
 to me?" 
 
 " What are you going to do about it, if I do not ? " asked 
 Ferdinand coldly. 
 
 " I hope you will not refuse. If your sympathies were as 
 well developed as I hope they some day will be, I should not 
 demand this. But I want " 
 
 She was about to say, " I want to help my mother occasion 
 ally without your feeling at each little gift that she is depen 
 dent upon you." She prudently checked this impulse, how 
 ever, remembering that Ferdinand had casually remarked 
 upon several occasions since Pleasant s letter, " I am already 
 supporting three families, and now my wife s brother-in-law 
 has applied to me." She feared that his next allusion to the 
 subject might include her mother as the fifth family. 
 
 "Well?" inquired Ferdinand, waiting. 
 
 " If you do not give it to me," she answered, " I shall 
 earn it." 
 
 "How? * 
 
 " I shall ask Professor Dimmock for students to coach. I 
 shall apply for a position in Westminster choir, and next 
 summer I shall become an assistant, if possible, in Mr. Stod- 
 dard s summer school." 
 
 " What about the children ? You are forgetting them, are 
 you not ? " said Ferdinand in a hard voice. 
 
 " I have considered the children," Agnes answered. 
 
 " This alternative of yours implies a threat," he said after 
 a moment. 
 
 "It states a determination," she answered very low. 
 
 " Very well. I will consider it." His glance met hers with 
 what might have been courtesy or might have been hate. 
 
 With a sudden change of feeling she reached out and took 
 his hand. " If you knew how miserable this makes me ! " she 
 cried earnestly. " I can t bear to have you leave me like this, 
 although I know I am right. Only listen to me a moment. 
 To us wives our position seems unjust. I know that hysteri 
 cal women always say what I am going to say, but it is true
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 295 
 
 that we take our lives in our hands when we marry. We 
 stake everything we have. If it were merely a business trans 
 action, it would be the highest-priced position open to human 
 beings. The reality is that if our husbands give us anything, 
 it is called a * gift, and if they give us much, they are called 
 * generous. Is it right that mature and reasonable beings 
 should be dependent upon gifts after they have given up 
 incomes ? " 
 
 Ferdinand suffered his hand to remain in hers till she had 
 finished. Then he withdrew it. " Are you ready to go down 
 to dinner? " he asked. 
 
 They went down together, each silent and cold. Miss 
 Ballington in her frantic efforts to make the meal pass 
 pleasantly put the finishing touches to the discomfort of the 
 other two. 
 
 Ferdinand, contrary to his habit, put on his hat and went 
 out directly after dinner. He wished now that he voluntarily 
 had offered to do for Agnes what she had demanded, but 
 he revolted at being forced to change his methods. 
 
 Agnes told her aunt with humiliation and disappointment 
 the result of her effort to obtain an allowance, part of which 
 was to have been given to her. Miss Margaret s face fell at 
 the news, and she went off crying. 
 
 Agnes put her baby to bed, then spent the evening in the 
 library trying to read, but tormented with apprehension as 
 she saw approaching near her the necessity which she had 
 hoped against hope might be diverted. She went upstairs 
 before her husband returned, and lay long awake thinking of 
 her mother s needs for the coming winter, of the inevitable 
 sickness and pain in store for Aunt Mattie, of Helen expect 
 ing her sixth child and of Ferdinand, accumulating capital 
 and fifty thousand a year. 
 
 When Ferdinand returned he came into her room. "Are 
 you asleep, Agnes ? " he asked softly. 
 
 " I am awake, Ferdinand." 
 
 "I have considered your request and decision. I cannot 
 disarrange my entire system of management to accommodate
 
 296 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 your whim. At the same time I will not refuse you money 
 to a reasonable amount for any purpose which upon careful 
 consideration seems to you sufficient ground for spending it. 
 I say you may do this whether it meets with my approval 
 or not. But you must confer with me first." 
 
 There was a short unbroken silence. 
 
 Then Agnes replied. "Ferdinand, your condition is a 
 denial of my request. I will not accept it. I am sorry to 
 offend you, but I shall be more independent if I earn my 
 own money." 
 
 " You persist in your determination then ? " 
 
 "I do." 
 
 " Then I have nothing more to say. I might, of course, 
 request Professor Dimmock and the trustees of the church 
 to disregard your caprice, but I have more consideration for 
 your feelings than you have for mine. You are, therefore, 
 at liberty to pursue your own course of action. But " 
 he paused, then continued as though he were reciting a for 
 mula " I wish to impress it upon you that you do this in 
 distinct opposition to my wishes, with the knowledge that you 
 diminish my affection and respect for you, that you take 
 upon yourself the responsibility of any harm which may 
 befall the children when you leave them. That is all. Good 
 night." 
 
 He waited a moment for her to speak, but she said nothing. 
 Then he left the room and closed the door between their 
 apartments. 
 
 Agnes when alone once more questioned herself closely as 
 to what she had determined to do. " Why should I hesitate 
 to take this step? My mother would not hesitate if she knew 
 her motive was justifiable. It doesn t worry her what other 
 people think. But what if something should happen to the 
 children? Something might just as naturally happen while 
 I was out driving with Ferdinand. He doesn t go to church 
 himself, and it is no more than fair that the father should 
 bear their responsibility for one day in seven. After all, 
 will he respect me less for taking a self-respecting stand in
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 297 
 
 our mutual relations? I am inclined to think he will respect 
 me more." 
 
 She did not sleep that night, but, hour after hour, watched 
 the heavy vibrations of the dark, watched the dawn creep 
 under the curtains and slide nearer and nearer her bed, 
 touching into grim prominence as it came the different ob 
 jects in its path her desk, her table, and the other reminders 
 of her daily work. It was not the first time she had been 
 of those who watch for the morning, but once she never would 
 have believed that a night in which she gave up once for all 
 long dreams of youth could have contained for her also so 
 much of courage and energy and hope. For that night, 
 whatever its agony and its renunciation, put an end forever 
 to the melancholia which had threatened in the last year to 
 engulf her. As she dressed for breakfast she felt a sense 
 of relief. She no longer had anything to hide, and she had 
 dared to act for herself. As she went downstairs she told 
 herself that the fresh start was made, and that it was good. 
 
 The deeper question to which this move of her was soon 
 to lead did not confront her yet. Other wives had fulfilled a 
 double duty. Unsympathetic as Ferdinand was, she never 
 theless believed that with wisdom she could be both wife and 
 wage-earner.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 N July, Beatrice Sidney was summoned by telegram to New 
 
 York. She arrived barely in time to see her father alive. 
 The old General had gone down to the seashore, as he ex 
 pressed it, to " set em up with an old friend." It was a hot 
 day and the enthusiasm of the cocktails lifted the burden 
 of years, so that he proposed going into the surf. The two 
 joyful old blades went down together into the sea. It was 
 soon noticed by the other bathers that General Mott was 
 behaving strangely, and he presently was forced out of the 
 water by the bathing guard, sank upon the sand insensible, 
 was carried back to the city and never regained consciousness. 
 
 Beatrice s mourning for her father was vehement and sin 
 cere. For weeks she was subdued beyond her wont. Then 
 her old restlessness began to revive. One day in November 
 she informed Fred that she was going over to Winston to 
 have Thanksgiving dinner with Agnes. " You can have 
 Aunt Kate and Aunt Mattie and Quinn here with you," she 
 said genially when leaving. " I ve ordered all kinds of things, 
 and Aunt Kate can see to them. There are some Thanks 
 giving presents from me in the escritoire. Hand them around 
 during dessert." She gave Fred a couple of French kisses 
 and hurried away from his expostulations. 
 
 Thanksgiving eve she walked in upon Agnes and Ferdi 
 nand as they were eating dinner, drew up a chair beside Aunt 
 Margaret at the table, spoke to the waitress, who had once 
 worked for her in Kent, telling her to bring back a bit of fish 
 only, that she didn t care for the soup, and then fell to talking 
 heartily of Mrs. Sidney and Fred and Dr. Quinn and other 
 Kent people Agnes knew. 
 
 " To-morrow, Aunt Margaret," she said, wheeling around 
 to Miss Ballington and pinching her knee under the table, 
 " you and I are going to have a good time. We ll go to the 
 
 298
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 299 
 
 foot-ball game ! " she finished, her eyes twinkling across 
 the table at Ferdinand. Tom was the only member of the 
 Ballington family who approved of foot-ball, Ferdinand con 
 sidering it a game for rowdies. 
 
 Beatrice stayed with Miss Margaret most of the evening, 
 offering cordially to occupy her room with her at night; 
 which plan the little lady accepted, pleased that Beatrice 
 enjoyed talking with her. 
 
 Before they went to sleep that night Beatrice had learned 
 all that Miss Margaret had to tell of Miriam Cass and of 
 Tom s devotion to her. " I don t think they can be exactly 
 engaged, dear," Miss Margaret confided, " but Tom is cer 
 tainly in love with her deeply." 
 
 Miss Margaret no sooner had made the announcement than 
 Beatrice started humming with great spirit a tarantelle, 
 snapping her fingers in the air for an accompaniment of 
 castanets. 
 
 " Do put your arms in," said Miss Margaret nervously. 
 " You ll catch cold in those lace sleeves. One of them is torn, 
 too. You aren t snapping your fingers at Tom s being in 
 love, are you ? " she continued confusedly. 
 
 " E non che sono poco vezioso ! " sang Beatrice with aban 
 don. " Not a whit, not a whit, Aunt Margaret. Why, who 
 knows better than I do how Tom falls in love? " A moment 
 later she put her soft, dark hand over Miss Margaret s eyes. 
 " You go to sleep, pet," she continued authoritatively. 
 
 Beatrice herself did not sleep, however. She drew her lace- 
 covered arms in close and lay still and straight, as she gen 
 erally did in those private sessions with herself wherein she 
 reviewed unpleasing situations. 
 
 " Two things to do," she thought darkly, a swarm of recol 
 lections and anticipations rioting in her brain. " First, treat 
 Ferdinand so he won t object to my coming here when I like, 
 and it will be the hardest thing I ever did, too. Second, look 
 after Mr. Tom. He has been neglecting me for a long time. 
 If he won t come to the lake house, I ll come here. Miriam 
 Cass is too old for him."
 
 300 
 
 When she had organized her plans, she shut her eyes, 
 mumbled over a baby prayer she never had neglected since 
 her mother died, and then went resolutely to sleep. 
 
 In the morning she was up and dressed before even Miss 
 Margaret, whose early rising was a family nuisance, and 
 Agnes was awakened by the sound of the two playing and 
 singing old ballads in the green room downstairs. Miss Mar 
 garet s ghost of a voice was drowned by Beatrice s strong 
 alto, save now and then on the high notes, where the thin voice 
 came out with piercing shrillness in its effort to keep the 
 key, while Beatrice frankly fell off a quarter of a tone. 
 
 After breakfast Beatrice went round with Aunt Margaret 
 inspecting the various new things in the house. Then she 
 announced that she would go out marketing with her, saying 
 that she always learned so much from seeing Aunt Margaret 
 buy. 
 
 Miss Margaret was so pleased with this compliment, whose 
 irony was lost on her, that she straightway ordered the car 
 riage without remembering that the stores were all closed 
 on Thanksgiving Day. 
 
 "Never mind," said Beatrice dauntlessly; "I d just as 
 soon hear you talk as see you market. We ll ride, any 
 way." 
 
 " It s so sweet in you to want to go with me," said Miss 
 Margaret all in a flutter. " I m afraid it s selfish in me. 
 You d have a much nicer time with Agnes." 
 
 " My dear," said Beatrice in a half -whisper, " I feel as if 
 I were with my grandmother when I m with Agnes, while you 
 are just my age." 
 
 Miss Margaret was in imminent danger of losing her head 
 over this continuous adulation, but she conscientiously strove 
 against it. 
 
 " Poor Agnes isn t old, dear. She isn t very fresh always. 
 Ferdinand was saying just this morning that she didn t look 
 very fresh. He thinks these church rehearsals are too much 
 for her. She s been up nights a good deal with Stephen, too, 
 lately."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 301 
 
 " I guess Ferdinand must be losing his eye-sight," said 
 Beatrice satirically. " Agnes looks better than she has any 
 time the last three years. Getting used to being married, I 
 guess. Fred says all Winston is going to church again just 
 to look at her sing. Here, let me hold that funny little shawl 
 for you ! " 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Miss Margaret, dropping into a chair, 
 " I ve got it folded wrong again, Beatrice. This is the third 
 time. The sides without the fringe on are always the ones 
 that get on top." 
 
 " Rip off the fringe then and sew it on the other two sides," 
 volunteered Mrs. Fred Sidney, whisking the shawl out of 
 Miss Margaret s lap and shaking it open with a resounding 
 snap. " I ll help you. We ll begin at the two ends and sew 
 toward the middle. There, I ve got it all right now. Come 
 along downstairs." 
 
 As they opened the door into the library they found Agnes 
 reading aloud to her husband. Beatrice went up behind her 
 and looked over her shoulder. " Patent records ! " she ex 
 claimed. " Well, I declare ! Ferdinand, you picked out your 
 wife just as shrewdly as you do most of your business." 
 
 Ferdinand rose irritably and went to the window. Then 
 he said something which he previously had made up his mind 
 to say as soon as he had heard that Miss Margaret and 
 Beatrice had ordered the horse. He addressed Miss Mar 
 garet, but there was a significant warning for Beatrice in his 
 tone. " If you are considering driving to Aunt Sarah s, 
 Aunt Margaret, I must request that you don t stop at 
 the shops and disturb Tom. He is doing extra work to-day 
 and will be held closely to his time." 
 
 Miss Ballington looked over at him in surprise, but Bea 
 trice s eyes instantly grew hard and bright. " Oh, ho ! " she 
 cried. Then she made a wide circle around Miss Margaret 
 in an elaborate minuet step, and, still circling, approached 
 nearer and nearer to Ferdinand, as though she were weaving 
 some incantation. 
 
 Ferdinand did not move from the window where he unwill-
 
 302 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ingly watched her implacable approach. He always had 
 hated those strong and flexible curves, and now she was com 
 ing with a mingled leisure and abandon which repelled him 
 doubly because it showed off her figure to such undeniable 
 advantage. 
 
 When she reached him she made an eighteenth century 
 courtesy. " So Tom s followed Fred s example and turned 
 clerk ! Well, one s enough for me. We ll leave him alone ! " 
 
 She watched him a moment with a look of great satisfac 
 tion at her successful acquiescence, then turned back to the 
 other two. " Come on, Aunt Margaret. Sam s waiting," 
 she said in high good-humor. 
 
 As she reached the door she paused and turned back to 
 Ferdinand, who had not taken his eyes from her. Lifting 
 her hand to her right temple, she gave a salute. Then she 
 whirled around and vanished after Aunt Margaret. 
 
 " How much longer is your cousin expecting to stay 
 here ? " asked Ferdinand of his wife when the outside door 
 had closed. 
 
 " I don t know," said Agnes, picking up her book again. 
 
 " She has pretended to come to see Aunt Margaret and 
 you," said Ferdinand crossly, " but of course you know she 
 comes to see Tom. I don t know that you can expect any 
 thing better of old Mott s daughter, though," Ferdinand 
 continued contemptuously. " That man s funeral was a dis 
 grace to the community. A regiment of women he had mar 
 ried off to his tenants were there, weeping and wailing a good 
 deal more than they would have done for their husbands." 
 
 Agnes found the place where she had left off reading. 
 " Shall I begin at section four? " she asked, looking up in 
 quiringly. " Or wait the second paragraph of section 
 four." 
 
 " Before we begin again there is another matter I want to 
 speak to you about," he said. " Mr. Bucher was in town yes 
 terday. It seems he lent your mother four thousand dollars 
 last winter and took a deed of her home. Were you aware of 
 this?"
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 303 
 
 " Yes," said Agnes, closing the book and looking at him. 
 " The simpler way to state the fact is to say she sold him the 
 house for four thousand dollars." 
 
 Another care she had been bearing in secret for almost a 
 year was out at last. 
 
 " Hardly," returned Ferdinand, smiling slightly. " It was 
 not an unconditional sale. Bucher promised not to dispose 
 of the place under two years, when either she or Dr. Quinn 
 expect to buy it back a woman s piece of business." 
 
 " I can tell you the facts," said Agnes, " if you care to 
 know them ? " 
 
 " Yes. I should have been glad to know them before this," 
 replied Ferdinand. 
 
 " Pleasant has been running behind more than anyone 
 knew. My mother knew nothing about it till she went out 
 there when Helen was sick last winter. Then she found out 
 that he had been borrowing money and that my father s 
 friend, Dr. Clisdale, had signed notes with him. Mother 
 insisted that everything be settled up then and there. They 
 were pushing Dr. Clisdale hard." 
 
 " That was his own lookout," commented Ferdinand. 
 
 " You know my mother never would let him suffer for 
 Pleasant s sake. The result was that she sold her own home 
 and paid the notes." 
 
 " How about Mabie s farm? " asked Ferdinand. 
 
 " The mortgage was foreclosed." 
 
 " I thought you had paid up the interest for two years out 
 of my money." 
 
 Agnes flushed scarlet. " He paid the interest for only 
 one year out of what I sent and asked the man to wait for the 
 other year s interest. He went into some fancy poultry-rais 
 ing with the rest of the money." 
 
 " You acknowledge then that I was right about sending 
 money to Mr. Mabie ? " 
 
 Ferdinand could not conceal his triumph at this vindication 
 of his sagacity. 
 
 " Yes."
 
 304 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 "How does your mother expect to buy back her prop 
 erty ? " he inquired after a moment, and he could not forbear 
 adding humorously : " Out of your church-money ? Or will 
 she live out at the farm she has made such a point of 
 keeping ?" 
 
 " Dr. Quinn expects to buy the place," returned Agnes, 
 not noticing the latter part of his remark. " Mother in 
 tended that he should have it. He is going to let her have 
 her home there always, and he is going to give her an inter 
 est in his invention besides." 
 
 " There s no telling whether his invention will ever amount 
 to anything," said Ferdinand dryly. " It will be a long pro 
 cess if it does. He can t afford to push it. He made his mis 
 take when he declined my offer." 
 
 Agnes made no reply. 
 
 Ferdinand opened a drawer in his desk and took out a 
 document. " What are Mr. and Mrs. Mabie going to do ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " They are going to run the farm on shares for one more 
 year. Pleasant has promised mother that if he doesn t suc 
 ceed then he will come East." 
 
 Ferdinand opened the document and handed it to Agnes. 
 " I have relieved Bucher of the old place," he said. 
 
 Agnes half rose. " Mr. Bucher sold you our house ! " she 
 cried involuntarily. " He has sold it after he promised " 
 
 " Yes. He is hard up, and he seemed gratified when I 
 offered to take it off his hands. I m inclined to think he may 
 go down as Balch did. The condition your mother imposed 
 burdened him, but I told him that of course I should regard 
 that condition also." 
 
 Agnes hesitated. She felt that she and all her family were 
 caught in a net. Indignation at Mr. Bucher and at her hus 
 band prevented sane thought or speech for some moments. 
 But at last she pulled herself together. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she said earnestly, " I cannot understand 
 how Mr. Bucher came to do this unless you led him to suppose 
 that he was doing my mother a kindness. He must have
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 305 
 
 thought that you would be generous with her. Now I want 
 you to be generous with her. Give my mother her home." 
 She had risen and approached him as she spoke. 
 
 " It is useless to give to your mother," said Ferdinand 
 judiciously. " She always will scrimp herself for the Mabies. 
 It would be wiser to let her scrimp in order to get back the 
 house. Besides, who knows what she can get for it from 
 Quinn?" 
 
 " But, Ferdinand, you don t realize how severe mother s 
 scrimping is," insisted Agnes. " She works too hard for a 
 woman of her age. She will break down." 
 
 " Hasn t that aunt of yours any blood-relations ? " asked 
 Ferdinand speculatively after a moment of reflection. 
 
 " Yes, but none who can or will help her." 
 
 " They won t, of course, so long as your mother does. 
 That woman will outlive your mother. They are a long- 
 lived pair, however," he finished. " If your aunt s family 
 won t help her, the State will provide for her." 
 
 " Ferdinand ! " exclaimed Agnes, outraged by his words. 
 
 " Or she might go to the hospital," continued Ferdinand, 
 feeling that perhaps he should have made more allowance for 
 the fact that he was speaking to a woman. " Your father 
 worked to get a hospital in Kent for just such cases. Your 
 family should have the benefit of it." 
 
 " Don t say another word, Ferdinand ! My mother never 
 will desert Aunt Mattie, so long as she has a crust for 
 herself." 
 
 Ferdinand sat down, opened the record book, and handed 
 it to her, as he said with an air of finality, " When the last 
 crust is gone, you will find me ready to talk with you again. 
 You were at the words, patented by T. Robertson. 
 
 Agnes also reseated herself and took the volume. Her 
 voice trembled as she began to read, but before long she had 
 it under control. 
 
 The reading continued for some two hours, until the others 
 returned. 
 
 " Here we are ! " cried Beatrice, pushing her companion
 
 306 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 into the library. "Put up your books, good people. 
 Thanksgiving ! " 
 
 " We had such a nice time," said Miss Margaret brightly, 
 ** and, do you know, whom should we meet but " 
 
 " Old Miss Sewell ! " interposed Beatrice, suddenly throw 
 ing all her wraps in a heap on the lounge. She went on 
 volubly recounting all that Miss Sewell had said, while Miss 
 Margaret collected the heap of garments from the sofa and 
 carried them out into the hall. 
 
 As oon as she was outside the door Beatrice stopped. " I 
 guess you two don t want to be interrupted," she said, with 
 a breath of relief at the narrow escape from having it dis 
 closed that they had met Tom on the street and that he had 
 been driving with them. " I m going up with the children till 
 dinner." Then she followed Miss Margaret into the hall. 
 
 Ferdinand picked up a marked newspaper and handed it 
 to Agnes. He had been admiring her persistence and self- 
 control in reading to him during her recent agitation, and it 
 was with a conciliatory manner that he said, " Senator Bal- 
 four s speech of yesterday is the finest thing of the year." 
 He knew that this would please her, for Senator Balf our had 
 been her father s roommate at college, and both Mrs. Sidney 
 and Agnes had followed the statesman s career with interest 
 and pride. 
 
 " I am glad," said Agnes simply, taking the paper. 
 
 " When he comes up to this part of the country we will 
 make a point of meeting him," continued Ferdinand. 
 
 He gathered up the papers as he spoke, with the comfort 
 able feeling of having accomplished a good deal during the 
 morning. Even Beatrice seemed tolerable. Agnes had been 
 as reasonable as she could be about the sale of the house, had 
 acknowledged her folly in sending money to Pleasant, and, 
 take it all together, the official thanksgiving which was an 
 nually forced upon him was less disagreeable than usual.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 "DEATRICE made flying trips to Winston all through the 
 winter, but her coming did not seriously affect the regu 
 larity of life of any of the Ballingtons except Miss Mar 
 garet. Agnes wondered at the conciliatory attitude Beatrice 
 maintained toward Ferdinand. On his part he paid little 
 attention to her when she came. He was absorbed in his in 
 vention, which he was just patenting in America, and which 
 he expected to introduce on the Continent during the next 
 summer. 
 
 Agnes was even more surprised and delighted at Tom s 
 poise under his old comrade s attentions, at his faithfulness 
 in the routine of business and his wistfulness and earnestness 
 whenever they talked together of Miriam. Her correspond 
 ence with Miriam took on pleading for Tom. She begged 
 her friend to reward the efforts which had been inspired 
 by her. 
 
 It seemed hard to Agnes when Miriam answered unswerv 
 ingly, "I am happy at what you write me of your cousin s 
 life, but his reward will be what he achieves in himself. Respect 
 for one s own soul, not anything another can give, is the only 
 starting point for a successful life. I hope your fears for 
 Tom are groundless, but I have known those who develop only 
 through mistakes, perhaps sin. If his conscience does not 
 keep him from these, I could not really help him spiritually, 
 even though I might direct his course of action. You use 
 your husband s parents as a case in point. Doubtless Estelle 
 Landseer did, as you say, preserve the first Tom Ballington 
 from fatal indulgence. Did this preservation make him the 
 stronger and better man? There are too many protected 
 children in the world. We need self-reliant men and women." 
 
 The latter part of February Tom planned a business trip 
 to New York. Both Donald and Ferdinand guessed the 
 
 307
 
 308 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 reason for it and made characteristic comments to Agnes. 
 Donald s was solicitous. " Do you think it can do any good 
 for him to go on thinking about Miriam? She never will 
 marry him. Would it not be better for him to forget her? " 
 Ferdinand s remark was more sententious. " Miss Cass* 
 friendships with younger men, I suppose, vary the monotony 
 of art." 
 
 The night Tom left he went to see Agnes and confided to 
 her his intention to call upon Miriam. " You are the only 
 one who knows it," he said, pleased with his own secretive- 
 ness. 
 
 Agnes responded cordially, but she had been thinking over 
 Miriam s letter, and the fear lest Tom might be disappointed 
 sobered her words. "You must remember that Miriam is 
 older than we are, Tom. She is less egoistic, more self- 
 sufficient. I know better than anyone else what her friendship 
 means. The best part of it is something you don t guess." 
 
 Tom felt a note of warning in her voice. " What is that? " 
 he asked. 
 
 He was struck with the unconscious power of her face and 
 manner as she re j oined, " It is a confirmation of one s own 
 soul. Her friendship is straight and sound and so clear 
 sighted in its fullness of feeling that when she gives it, it 
 comes as a crown of glory. She never gave it to anyone who 
 had not first deserved it except me. She gave it to me be 
 cause she knew I never would stop trying to be worthy of it. 
 She will be doubly sure before she ever gives it to a man." 
 
 They spent a quiet evening together, singing and talking. 
 Tom unconsciously was coached by Agnes in topics which 
 she knew to be of interest to Miriam, and he finally started 
 off in an optimistic state of mind. 
 
 He reached New York in the morning, but he held himself 
 to the firm s business during the day. 
 
 When evening came he stopped at a florist s on the way 
 uptown and bought a bunch of violets. Then, with a high- 
 beating heart, but with a sense of self-respect in the knowl 
 edge of what his life had been since their parting, he sought
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 309 
 
 the apartment on Forty-third Street, where, much to Mrs. 
 Silas 5 consternation, Miriam was living with a musical friend 
 a little younger than herself. 
 
 Tom found his way to her door. He felt a palpitation of 
 the heart as he saw the double card inscribed, 
 
 MIRIAM CASS. 
 ETELKA RAVACZY. 
 
 He listened before he pressed the bell. It was quite still. 
 Immediately after he had rung, however, a peal of laughter 
 came from the rooms inside, striking him almost as an answer 
 to his ring. In a panic of embarrassment he thrust the vio 
 lets into his pocket, crushing them as he did so. Their odor 
 penetrated the air as he heard the sound of footsteps within. 
 Another moment and he was facing a tall girl with coarse 
 black hair, oblique eyes, and straight brows. In spite of 
 her simple manner Tom felt abashed by a bizarre power in 
 her. She looked at him with courteous inquiry. 
 
 "Is Miss Cass at home?" he asked. 
 
 " She is. Will you step inside ? " 
 
 The girl stepped back, drew aside a curtain behind her, dis 
 closing a group of men and women within, and called lightly, 
 " Miriam ! " 
 
 Tom stood on the threshold trying to compose himself. 
 At first he did not see Miriam. He took in the general ap 
 pearance of a large room. The walls were rich but plain in 
 tone. A shelf ran all the way around the upper part, on 
 which a row of steins and curious and barbaric jugs and 
 vases were thickly ranged. A grand piano stood in one 
 corner, with iron lamps each side the keyboard. Against an 
 old tapestry curtain a number of daring clay models were 
 hung. A marble bust of Stevenson done from the life stood 
 in front of it. Curios from all over the world, rich old 
 cloisonne from Japan, Benares brass from India, mosaics 
 from Italy, Chinese ivories, temple-gongs from Thibet, a 
 teak-wood cabinet filled with rare Chinese pottery, covered 
 the walls. In one corner there was hung, wreathed about with
 
 310 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 great sprays of coral, a trophy of walrus tusks, an enor 
 mous swordfish s weapon, harpoons, Esquimau and Malay 
 fish spears, and many curious implements of nameless use 
 collected by Captain Cass on all the shores washed by the 
 oceans. 
 
 Opposite was sitting a man whose face was well 
 known to the public as that of a rising politician. In the 
 center of the room, seated around a card table, were four 
 persons. Two tall candles diagonally opposite each other 
 across the table, their flames reflected in the polished mahog 
 any, lighted up the group. Tom s gaze fell upon Miriam, 
 who was seated with her back toward him, her mass of black- 
 bronze hair vivid in the candle light. Next to her a square, 
 stocky figure, nerved with the " rigor of the game," stooped 
 over the table. A hale, despotic old face, featured like 
 Miriam s and crowned with thick, grizzled, black-bronze hair, 
 proclaimed him Miriam s father, the much-wanjdering Ulysses 
 of the sea, Captain Cass. 
 
 As Miriam heard her name she laid down her cards, rose 
 as she made a laughing remark to her father, which called 
 forth a vehement protestation from that gentleman, and, 
 without waiting for him to finish, turned and came toward 
 Tom. The captain raised his voice and pursued her with 
 words which were intended to bring her to reason. Miriam s 
 eyes were full of merriment as they fell upon Tom, but their 
 expression instantly changed, as she recognized him, to one 
 of surprise and pleasure. 
 
 " Why, Tom," she exclaimed, " have you snowed down ? 
 Come in. If Providence provides another we can have a 
 second whist table. I m so glad you re here to meet my 
 father." 
 
 Tom laid aside his hat and coat and followed her into the 
 room as she talked. She led him at once to Captain Cass. 
 
 " Father, this is Mr. Ballington, from Winston." 
 
 " How do you do, sir? " said Captain Cass in a business 
 like way, wheeling around in his chair to face Tom. He did 
 not offer to get up, and, as he shook hands with the newcomer,
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 311 
 
 Instinctively turned his cards face down on the table before 
 him, as a safeguard from the perfidious eyes of his daughter. 
 
 " She says I might as well play with my cards wrong side 
 out," he continued discontentedly, explaining to Tom the 
 ground of his recent controversy. 
 
 " These are our friends, Professor and Mrs. Whitney," 
 interposed Miriam, nipping off her father s harangue with 
 experienced promptitude. Captain Cass gave an unwilling 
 grin, and winked at Tom as much as to say, " I ll finish it in 
 a minute." 
 
 Professor Whitney rose to shake hands. He was a tall 
 man with a scholarly head, keen eyes, and polished manners. 
 His wife, a weary-looking woman who was slightly deaf, 
 responded to the introduction with a bow only. 
 
 Miriam then drew forward the foreign girl who had been 
 waiting a little behind her, with the words, " Etelka, Mr. 
 Ballington. Miss Ravaczy is my violinist-comrade." 
 
 Then, turning to the politician, Miriam added, "Mr. 
 Strong." 
 
 " I see I am interrupting your game of cards," said Tom. 
 " Go right on with it." 
 
 " I am relieved at the interruption, Mr. Ballington," said 
 Professor Whitney, still standing. " I am just beginning 
 to learn whist. I either have a hand that a way-faring man 
 though a fool couldn t help playing, or I have one that would 
 make the wisest man on earth sit down on the ash-heap." 
 
 Miriam laughed under her breath, but before she could 
 speak the captain broke in. 
 
 " Sit down ! Sit down, Whitney ! " he exclaimed, fanning 
 the air irritably with his free hand in the direction of the 
 Professor. " The young gentleman wants us to go on. 
 Strong and the young lady over there aren t playing." The 
 Captain felt his inability to pronounce Etelka s name, and 
 with a motion of his hand he waved Tom toward the settee. 
 " Your play, Miriam ! " finished her father briefly. 
 
 " Mr. Ballington is from out of town, father," said Miriam 
 remaining by her father s chair. " You will excuse me "
 
 312 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Sit down ! The game is almost done," repeated the 
 Captain peremptorily. 
 
 " Let me take your hand, Miss Cass," suggested Mr. 
 Strong, coming forward. " I have been watching the game." 
 
 The Captain leaned back in disgust, while Miriam gave 
 Strong her cards and retired with Tom and Etelka to the 
 seats by the wall. 
 
 " How is Agnes ? " she asked at once. 
 
 " She s very well and sent her love to you," said Tom, the 
 conventional words making him feel formal and ill at ease. 
 
 " Is Mr. Ballington the husband of the Mrs. Ballington 
 of whom I hear so many things? " asked the musician, look 
 ing at Tom gravely. 
 
 " Not a married man yet ! " answered Tom, more and more 
 discomforted. " I m a cousin of Ferdinand Ballington. I 
 see you have Agnes here," he added brusquely, nodding at 
 the farther wall where he had noticed several studies of his 
 cousin s head. 
 
 " Yes, I did those from memory. Do you think they are 
 like her? " Miriam s eyes followed his critically. 
 
 " Exactly, when she looks that way. It s a pity she doesn t 
 look that way oftener." Tom had intended to give a compli 
 ment, but Miriam s sudden smile made him conscious of the 
 fact that he had done the opposite. 
 
 Without attempting to mend matters he changed the sub 
 ject. "You have a lovely room here," he began diffidently. 
 " May I go round and look at the things after a while? That 
 sea corner over there," and he pointed with animation in the 
 direction of the coral, " has an Arabian-Night spell for me. 
 Coral is my fetish." 
 
 " I like the room," said Miriam, " best of all when Etelka 
 practices here. I have my studio in beyond there and I can 
 hear her when I m at my work. Perhaps she will play for 
 us to-night." 
 
 " I will play if you wish it," replied that young lady 
 seriously. 
 
 " Meantime, look around if you like," Miriam said kindly,
 
 313 
 
 turning to Tom. " You may go in the studio, too, if you 
 care to." 
 
 Tom rose feeling constrained and unhappy. This was 
 the world he had hungered for in his teens, the world he had 
 found in books and in imagination while his youth slipped 
 away from him in the ugly treadmill he was born to. Now 
 he was out of place in both worlds. As he walked through 
 the room with Miriam at his side explaining the different 
 objects, his undisciplined admiration of the beautiful collec 
 tions was struck through with rage and bitterness for his lost 
 years. Anger at his mother, Donald, Ferdinand, his dead 
 father, contempt for his own weakness in letting his life 
 be controlled by others, surged rebelliously within him. 
 What good had these months of hard work in the office been 
 to him? He never would arrive at companionship with 
 Miriam through such smothered existence. 
 
 They were interrupted by laughter and the shoving of 
 chairs back from the card-table. Captain Cass look of 
 complacence announced that the game had gone to suit him. 
 " You re coming up, Whitney ! " he said, drawing back his 
 arms to stretch his back and shoulders. 
 
 Then he swung toward Tom. " Glad to see you, Mr. 
 Ballington. Very staunch woman, your mother-in-law. 
 Miriam made me call on her last summer when I went through 
 Kent." 
 
 " This is Tom Ballington, father," corrected Miriam, " a 
 cousin of Agnes husband." 
 
 " Poor relation of his ! " added Tom, looking squarely at 
 the old gentleman. He was infuriated by this second con 
 founding of himself with his detested relative. Miriam must 
 have been talking a good deal about Ferdinand. 
 
 " You live on the old stamping-ground of the Iroquois 
 Indians ? " asked Professor Whitney courteously. " A most 
 interesting region. I am working up a paper on the origin 
 of their political ideas, and I went over the ground very care 
 fully last summer." 
 
 " Yes. We have an Iroquois necropolis in our back yard,"
 
 314 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 answered Tom, feeling easier. " Don and I used to dig 
 there." 
 
 " There are legends to be heard, no doubt? " asked the 
 Professor, raising his eyebrows a trifle. 
 
 " Oh, yes, there s a great yarn," said Tom, brightening 
 up. " There was a chief of theirs who " 
 
 " Whitney ! " broke in the yarn-satiated old seaman, ad 
 dressing his friend, " that Dawson was a fool. I told him 
 so to his face, after the lecture. He stood up before his 
 audience and got off that old gag about defying the law 
 of gravitation when he raised his arm. I told Miriam that 
 was all I needed to know of him." 
 
 " Why didn t he defy the law of gravitation then ? " ex 
 claimed Tom bitterly. " He overcame it by his muscle." 
 He did not forgive Captain Cass for quenching his attempt 
 to take part in the general conversation. 
 
 " You d better read Huxley, young man," said Miriam s 
 father good-humoredly. " Well, Miriam, I ll go out on that 
 business now. Good-night, Whitney. Good " 
 
 "Won t you stay a little longer, father? " asked Miriam. 
 
 " night, ladies. Good-day, Mr. Ballington." And with 
 an abrupt bow Captain Cass left the room. 
 
 The politician, whose easy silence Tom had resented, 
 looked leisurely toward him now and inquired if he were 
 staying long in New York. 
 
 " No. I expect to leave to-morrow. I am here on busi 
 ness," Tom answered. 
 
 He looked at Miriam as he spoke, and the look pierced her 
 sympathy. She put a warm friendliness into the smile she 
 gave him in return, which started Tom s heart throbbing. 
 He forgot art and science. After all, she was a woman as 
 well as an artist and a scholar. He tried to think of some 
 of the subjects he had talked over with Agnes, and said at 
 a venture, " You have become interested in Hungarian litera 
 ture, Agnes tells me? " 
 
 "Indeed ! " exclaimed Mr. Strong, turning toward Miriam. 
 " You hadn t metioned that to me."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 315 
 
 Professor Whitney let his fine eyes rest upon his wife as 
 he said, " In my old age I am affording much amusement to 
 my family by learning to play cards and to read novels. I 
 have just discovered that nothing so illustrates racial differ 
 ences as the novel." 
 
 Racial differences! Tom gave an inaudible groan. Had 
 he started this? Once more he was left on one side by the 
 current of conversation, which flowed busily on in a compari 
 son of the Russian, Hungarian and English novel. Whitney 
 was interested in the philosophy of fiction, Strong in the 
 politics, Miriam in the genius and the social theories of the 
 authors. 
 
 Tom, who always read for the story, felt childish and 
 foolish and sank into a despondent silence. 
 
 Miriam seemed to realize his mood, for she presently broke 
 off and went to the piano. " Etelka has promised to play 
 for us," she said, smiling at her friend. 
 
 Tom s hopes revived. Here, at last, Fate was affording 
 him an opportunity. Nature had done well by him in one 
 respect ; she had given him a voice. While Etelka was tuning 
 up her violin he cleared his throat quietly, preparatory to 
 his Rubinstein songs. As she settled the instrument under 
 her chin and questioned it with her bow before beginning, 
 Tom leaned back in comfortable anticipation of the " Cava- 
 tina " by Raff, or the " Legende " by Wieniawski, or possibly 
 Handel s " Largo." 
 
 A moment later an ear-splitting discord, insisted upon 
 fortissimo by piano and violin alike for several bars, galvan 
 ized him into an erect position. The discord resolved itself 
 into a melody so exquisite and far away that it fell like balm 
 on his soul and tears rushed to his eyes. Almost impercepti 
 bly the music drifted into a dance-rhythm, and he was drift 
 ing away with it when he was stunned by a recurrence of 
 the discord, and Etelka took the violin down from her 
 shoulder. 
 
 Embarrassed by the unexpected close, his eyes involuntarily 
 sought the clay models on the wall and he examined them
 
 316 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 anew in the hope of discovering what influence such music 
 as this had on Miriam s work. He was concluding that there 
 was something of the same abrupt energy, daring, and grace 
 in both, when Etelka began playing again. This time the 
 music was massive, grand, somber a fugue whose classic 
 counterpoint was unintelligible to Tom. He soon gave up 
 trying to follow the ever-complicating voices, and looked 
 hopelessly at Miriam s face kindling into exaltation as she 
 played on with ever-deeper feeling and humility; while 
 Etelka, on the other hand, seemed to dilate and blaze before 
 their eyes like some genius of the elements, struggling 
 heavenward through the network of sound. 
 
 Tom felt his last hope leave him as the music stopped a 
 second time, and Strong sprang up, went to the piano, and 
 began turning over the leaves of music as he discussed with 
 Miriam and Etelka in turn of this and that passage and ex 
 pressed unqualified delight in a composition which was to 
 Tom one long excruciation. 
 
 After Etelka had repeated one or two phrases at Strong s 
 request, she put up her violin and came over to Tom. " Now 
 it is Mr. Ballington s turn to sing," she said in a matter-of- 
 fact way. 
 
 " I can t sing," declared Tom, looking across at Miriam, 
 despair in his heart. A gulf had opened and was momen 
 tarily widening between him and somebody he had thought 
 he knew. Some way the artist and the woman were one. They 
 could not be separated. What was in the fugue was in her. 
 Tom felt dimly that it had to do with the whole of her, mind 
 and soul. His refusal seemed a signal for the company to 
 ply him with urging. Tom looked around upon them and his 
 mood changed to one of defiance. 
 
 " Very well, I will sing ! " he said, rising and seating him 
 self at the piano. 
 
 His eyes darkened and a dull color came into his cheeks 
 as he mechanically went through one of his little Rubinstein 
 songs. All his faith in its beauty had been destroyed by 
 Etelka s fugue.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 317 
 
 When he had sung it to the bitter end he turned around 
 doggedly, but took care not to meet Miriam s eyes. He 
 could have thrown himself on the floor and sobbed, as the 
 group of listeners thanked him. 
 
 Presently there was an odor of coffee, and just as the 
 hostesses were beginning to serve a salad the door burst open 
 and Captain Cass returned, red in the face and out of breath. 
 He swung himself out of his greatcoat and cap and rubbed 
 his hands together briskly before joining the company. 
 
 "You should clear your decks before you begin action, 
 Miriam ! " he said, kicking aside a fox rug and placing his 
 chair upon the bare floor. He ate from the table. The 
 others held their plates in their laps. 
 
 " That is the third time Blackwell has told me that he 
 would be at home when he wasn t," resumed the Captain 
 grimly, after a pause. " When I finally catch him, as I shall, 
 he will wish he didn t have any home." 
 
 Tom eyed the speaker with swelling resentment. How was 
 it that he was so at home in this circle? He had no business 
 to be. Yet he assumed equality with the casts on the wall 
 and the music on the rack. His kind of energy and daring 
 outraged his daughter s, and neither he nor she appeared to 
 know it! 
 
 After the intermission there was more music, but Miriam 
 could not persuade Tom to sing a second time. Presently he 
 rose and said good-night. 
 
 " We shall see you again, I hope ? " said Miriam as she 
 followed him to the door. 
 
 " I think not." Tom paused. " I shall leave in the 
 morning." 
 
 " Won t you stay over another day ? I will take you 
 to see the relief I have just hung in the Academy of 
 Design." 
 
 Miriam understood his look and urged him cordially. 
 
 Tom knew a stab of happiness. She wanted him, after all. 
 He was about to accept the invitation when Miriam turned 
 to Mr. Strong and added, " We will postpone our engagement
 
 318 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 till the day after to-morrow." Then she turned back to Tom 
 expectantly. 
 
 He replied instantly, " It is impossible for me to stay." 
 The last vexation was too much for him. He wanted to con 
 trol himself here, but habit was too strong. The words 
 were uttered before he could check them, though h cursed 
 himself for a foal as he spoke. " Good-night," he finished 
 abruptly. 
 
 He bowed, took his hat and coat, and went away without 
 one backward look. 
 
 Miriam had her hand on the door to follow him. She felt 
 Agnes eyes urging her to do it. But she dropped her hand 
 and turned back to her guests. Tom was going off like a 
 willful child in unreasonable despondency. He should have 
 stood up to it like a man. It was inevitable that he should 
 have been ill at ease during the evening. It would not be 
 well for him if she should obliterate the discomfort he had 
 experienced. She believed he had the strength of purpose to 
 translate that memory into persistent effort. Agnes letters 
 had proved that he was under her friend s influence and 
 guidance, and, in that relation, he would run no danger of 
 sentimental complication. Hitherto he had been treated as 
 a child. In no way could strength come so surely as in facing 
 discouragement manfully. She had learned her own greatest 
 lessons so, and victory, hardly achieved, brought with it a 
 supreme happiness. To leave the field clear for such a vic 
 tory, in spite of her sympathy, she felt was the best she could 
 do for Tom. 
 
 But who can count upon the feverish impulses of the human 
 spirit? Miriam had underestimated Tom s disappointment 
 and overestimated his strength of purpose. 
 
 The next morning Tom took the early train for home. All 
 the way he found it impossible to call up the picture of 
 Miriam without a sense of mental distance and overwhelming 
 loss. He dozed off in the afternoon, and woke up when the 
 train slowed up at a station. Through the car-window he 
 saw the statue of an Indian, tomahawk in hand. It was Kent.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 319 
 
 A temptation attacked him. Beatrice was waiting for him 
 there she liked surprises. 
 
 A wild craving for outlawry was accompanied with the 
 thought that there would be no doubt of her welcome. 
 
 With a muttered oath he snatched up his valise, ran out 
 of the car, and jumped to the platform at Kent.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THHE following summer, as he had planned, Ferdinand left 
 for England and the Continent, to be gone till fall. He 
 spent the summer introducing his patent to the attention of 
 railroad men across the water. It was always his motto that 
 a man must see to things himself if they were to be done 
 thoroughly. 
 
 During his absence Agnes was free to live her own life. 
 She made her plans before Ferdinand left. She obtained a 
 position as teacher in Mr. Stoddard s summer music-school 
 and sang at the Conservatory concerts as well as in 
 church. She spent many days in Kent with her mother and 
 aunt. She caught eagerly at the privilege of re-living that 
 short period of her life after her father s death wherein she 
 had been her mother s chief support. It seemed a good omen 
 to her that Fate had reconsidered for once, not only given 
 back a vanished opportunity, but given her ampler power to 
 utilize it. She was earning what seemed to her mother and 
 Aunt Mattie a large income, and it was most grateful to her 
 to use it chiefly in relieving the pitiful economy of her 
 mother s family. Then, too, however brave a face Mrs. Sid 
 ney had put upon her expedients, Agnes realized as she never 
 had done before that the last five years had told heavily upon 
 even that indomitable will and vigorous physique. 
 
 The separation from her husband offered Agnes another 
 opportunity which she seized as earnestly as she did the one to 
 regain elasticity and independence. This was a chance to put 
 before Ferdinand, without being interrupted or forced away 
 from the subject, certain questions which demanded settle 
 ment: first, the moral education and the individual rights of 
 the children, together with her own rights ; another concerned 
 
 320
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ferdinand s plans with regard to her mother s home; still 
 another, Aunt Margaret s right to an allowance. Her hus 
 band s replies were disappointing. He answered her letters 
 kindly but evasively, and his own were filled with absorbing 
 accounts of his business success. As they came, one by one, 
 she watched with anxiety the developing passion in her hus 
 band for financial power. Every step toward that but 
 increased his impatience for more. She saw more clearly 
 than she ever had seen how consuming his ambition was. 
 His cold and self-contained nature seemed voracious for sym 
 pathy in one respect only, and that was this lust for money- 
 power. 
 
 As the bright, full days of summer passed swiftly on toward 
 fall, and Ferdinand s letters followed one another unmoved by 
 the reiterated appeals in her own, the reconsideration of fate 
 for which she had been so thankful began to take on a grave 
 significance for Agnes. It grew upon her that, unless she could 
 make some impression upon him while he was away, her hus 
 band s return must be the crisis of their married life. The 
 eagerness and hope of June had passed gradually into per 
 sistent argument through July, and by the middle of August 
 she found herself facing alternatives of action, either one 
 of which must bring with it renunciation. 
 
 There were no services the last two weeks of August in 
 Westminster Church in Winston, and Agnes took occasion to 
 go to Kent and stay over Sunday with her mother. She 
 talked late with her mother Saturday night and overslept 
 Sunday morning in consequence. She came down the stairs 
 of her old home late in the morning, and paused a moment in 
 the front doorway looking out into the quiet street. The 
 inhabitants of Kent were in church, and the sounds of hymns 
 and Gregorian chants came from the Presbyterian church 
 near at hand and the Catholic church further away. The 
 sun was hot and the air full of the stifling moisture of the 
 newly-sprinkled street. Agnes listened until the music ceased, 
 then turned and looked through the downstairs rooms, calling 
 Mrs. Sidney and Aunt Mattie. There was no reply, and not
 
 322 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 finding them In the kitchen she went out to the back door and 
 looked into the garden. 
 
 At the farther end she saw her mother expostulating with 
 Aunt Mattie, who was endeavoring to spray a rose bush with 
 the garden hose. Mrs. Sidney was arguing that the Sabbath 
 was not a day to use the hose, while Aunt Mattie replied that 
 any day that dried up flowers was a day for spraying. The 
 little inclosure of fruit trees, garden vegetables, and old- 
 fashioned formal flower beds was dripping from its late shower 
 bath, and birds were diving and fluttering and chirruping 
 with almost June-like abandon in the wet grass. 
 
 Agnes eyes traveled in delight along the* cinder walk which 
 pursued its economical way close to the high board fence in 
 whose shade vegetables could not well grow. At the farther 
 end of the garden, however, the walk swerved to the left, 
 passed under a grape-arbor and ended at the barn door. The 
 spicy perfume of nasturtiums was in the air, and a florid mass 
 of dull-red dahlias flaunting in front of one of the posts of 
 the arbor completed the mid-summer fullness, the cessation of 
 eager, aspiring effort, the rest and leisure which hung over 
 the scene. 
 
 For a moment Agnes yielded to the nirvana which stole 
 back over her with drowsy memories of other Sabbath morn 
 ings when as a child she had looked upon those same scenes 
 idly and wished she could lie under the grape-arbor and dream 
 instead of going to church. A moment later she called out, 
 " Mother, are you staying home from church to take care of 
 your rose bushes ? Why didn t you call me ? " 
 
 The two women at the other end of the garden looked up, 
 and Aunt Mattie s crippled hands, slipping on the wet hose, 
 sent an unexpected jet of water against Mrs. Sidney s 
 shoulder. It broke and dispersed in spray over the rest of the 
 ample figure, and, with an exclamation of dismay, Aunt 
 Mattie dropped the hose, sending an aimless stream of water 
 hissing into the sod. 
 
 " Turn off the water up there, Agnes ! " Mrs. Sidney called 
 in a carefully controlled voice ; and then, turning to her depre-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 323 
 
 eating companion, she said in a half-vexed, half-humorous 
 tone, "That s the fourth time you ve done that, Mattie. I 
 did think when you turned the hose on me the third time last 
 Wednesday that would end it." Then, shaking the drops 
 from her clothes, she took Aunt Mattie s arm and assisted 
 the cripple toward the house. Agnes noticed with amuse 
 ment that her mother had by no means lost the power of 
 enjoying a joke at her own expense, while Aunt Mattie looked 
 unnaturally humble. 
 
 "Well, I guess I m well punished for staying at home," 
 said Mrs. Sidney when they reached the steps. " I thought, 
 since you didn t have to sing in church to-day, that I d just 
 let you sleep and have a late breakfast. Meantime Mattie 
 nearly killed herself getting out here alone to water this 
 yard. She turned the water on and did the whole thing 
 herself." 
 
 A gleam of pride and triumph transfigured for a moment 
 Aunt Mattie s humility, confirming Mrs. Sidney s assertion. 
 
 " I had just gone out there to help her into the house 
 when she turned the last drops on me," Mrs. Sidney finished 
 as they reached the porch. 
 
 Agnes descended a step or two to assist in getting Aunt 
 Mattie into the house. 
 
 Then Mrs. Sidney insisted upon the other two women 
 sitting upon the front veranda while she changed her waist 
 and put breakfast on the table. A little later her cheery 
 voice called them to the dining-room. 
 
 Agnes sat down to the table with an exclamation of 
 delight. 
 
 " I tell you, mother, nobody but you knows how to get 
 up a breakfast like this. You have fixed places for yourself 
 and Aunt Mattie, too. I m glad you waited for me." 
 
 "Yes. You can t muzzle the ox that treadeth out the 
 corn," her mother returned, as she sat down with a long sigh 
 of relief. 
 
 The three chatted fitfully for a few minutes; then Mrs. 
 Sidney asked with gravity :
 
 324 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Has Tom Ballington given up caring for Miriam Cass, 
 Agnes ? " 
 
 " No, mother, I think not," returned Agnes, uncomfort 
 ably. 
 
 "Well, he is acting as though he never cared for any 
 decent girl," Mrs. Sidney went on. " It won t be long 
 before Fred Sidney s wife will be involved in a scandal. If 
 he cares for Miriam Cass, why don t you get her to use her 
 influence with him ? " 
 
 " She has used it, mamma, but Miriam is never going to 
 marry. Tom knows that she never will marry him." 
 
 "How does he know that?" demanded the old lady, lean 
 ing back in her chair. 
 
 " Mamma, you wouldn t have Miriam marry Tom the way 
 he is now, would you? Not that he s bad," Agnes added 
 hastily. 
 
 " No," Mrs. Sidney assented, " I suppose she is too good 
 for him. But a young woman ought to use her influence 
 for good, and I don t like this new-fashioned way girls are 
 getting of thinking they re above marrying. What is her 
 reason for never marrying ? " 
 
 Agnes looked thoughtfully at her mother. " Miriam feels 
 that she has a gift in carving which she ought to exercise. 
 She says that sooner or later the necessity for it, if she 
 should marry, would interfere disastrously with her domestic 
 happiness. She might have married either of two men whom 
 she respects highly and who have brilliant futures before 
 them, but she feels that she must work her own way." 
 
 " Well," replied Mrs. Sidney decidedly, " Harriet Beecher 
 Stowe wrote * Uncle Tom s Cabin while she rocked a cradle. 
 However, although I don t agree with your friend, I must 
 say I think it is better for a woman to stay out of it than it 
 is to go in and blaspheme it. There is Beatrice, who has been 
 married longer than you have, with no children, and carrying 
 on without any conscience about home or husband. It is a 
 bad situation when a self-willed woman holds the purse- 
 strings."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 325 
 
 " Yes," assented Aunt Mattie, " only self-willed men should 
 hold the purse-strings." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney glanced quickly at her sister-in-law, then at 
 Agnes, and with an effort suppressed something that she 
 evidently wanted to say. 
 
 Aunt Mattie continued. "General Mott always kept a 
 liberal establishment at home and then went and did as he 
 liked elsewhere. Beatrice keeps up her house well, too, and 
 Fred could have as much of her money as he wanted, if he d 
 take it. He is in a much better condition than Mrs. Mott 
 was, and, if he would give up the bank, Beatrice says he 
 never would have another thing to complain of in her." 
 
 " Mattie, I m ashamed of you," said Mrs. Sidney, con 
 siderably stirred up by this impartiality. " Sometimes it 
 seems to me as if your sitting around and looking on at 
 things had turned you into wood. You ought to be afraid 
 of passing lightly on moral matters the way you do. One 
 would think to hear you talk that General Mott was an exem 
 plary man, and that if Beatrice is like him that excuses her 
 for anything she takes it into her head to do. If you don t 
 use your moral sense in judging situations, Mattie, you won t 
 have any moral sense pretty soon. If I didn t know what 
 a good wife you always were to Stephen s brother," she 
 added more amicably, " I d think you didn t have any idea 
 of the sanctity of marriage. Marriage isn t a thing of 
 money." 
 
 " Neither Walter nor I ever found it so," reflected Aunt 
 Mattie. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney looked at her a few moments with many things 
 to say and no way to say them. Then with an effort she 
 brought her mind back to Beatrice. 
 
 "If Beatrice had some children to take care of," she 
 began again, " she wouldn t have time or energy to throw 
 away on Thomas Ballington." 
 
 Agnes looked across at her mother for a moment. 
 " Mamma," she said at last, " ever since I married I ve been 
 trying to decide just what is a wife s duty. You can t just
 
 326 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 say children are from the Lord. We all know that the Lord 
 doesn t have anything to do with a good many little waifs. 
 I believe with you that Beatrice would be better off if there 
 were children in the family. I am most thankful for my 
 own. I believe that children should be sent to families who 
 can care for them and that it s a sin to refuse the parental 
 responsibility of marriage. At the same time, mamma, look 
 at Helen. We all know that Pleasant could hardly take care 
 of himself alone. Helen might have taken care of a small 
 family. I could take care of my two. But what can she do 
 with six ? " 
 
 " Well," said Aunt Mattie impersonally, " she can care for 
 six a good deal better than she can care for ten a few years 
 from now." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney hesitated, then valor got the better of dis 
 cretion, and she replied dauntlessly, " I thank the Lord that 
 my children don t shirk their duty. The mother of the 
 Wesleys had eighteen children." 
 
 "How many of them grew up?" interposed Aunt Mattie 
 with interest. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney withered her with a glance, but did not offer 
 to answer the question. "Mrs. Wesley was a wonderful 
 woman and she was well rewarded in the lives of her sons. 
 If Helen lives to have ten children, the older ones will by that 
 time be able to help support the family. All the children will 
 be trained to thrift and unselfishness." 
 
 "It s a pity that Pleasant can t be trained, too," said 
 Aunt Mattie regretfully. 
 
 "Mattie," demanded Mrs. Sidney, roused to sweep her 
 antagonist from the field and put an end to these irritating 
 interruptions, " do you want all women to do the way 
 Beatrice is doing ? " 
 
 " They couldn t," said Aunt Mattie simply. 
 
 "I asked you," repeated Mrs. Sidney with fire in her eye, 
 " if you wanted them to ? " 
 
 "No," replied Aunt Mattie placidly, not properly realiz 
 ing the ignominy of her defeat.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 327 
 
 "Well, what do you want?" said her now thoroughly 
 exasperated sister-in-law. 
 
 " I don t know," replied Aunt Mattie with unprejudiced 
 candor. 
 
 Agnes could no longer control a desire to laugh, and this 
 was the last straw laid upon her mother s forbearance. She 
 was at last goaded into saying something which she never 
 had allowed herself to think before, much less to express, and 
 for which she never forgave herself afterwards. 
 
 "Well, if you had had some children yourself, Mattie, 
 you d be a good deal better off than you are now. You re 
 like all the other critics who find fault with people who are 
 doing the best they know how. If you were doing something 
 yourself you d have more right to talk. Meantime, I ll trust 
 the Lord s plan of running the universe rather than yours. 
 He, at least, knows what He s about, if we don t." 
 
 " I hope He does," replied Aunt Mattie doggedly. " He 
 was the one who decided I shouldn t have any children and 
 that I should be a helpless burden on you, Kate." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s wrath instantly cooled. " That was a 
 wicked thing for me to say, Mattie, and I hope you ll forgive 
 me. I was carried away because you blamed Helen for set 
 ting her shoulder to the wheel. She s had a pretty hard time, 
 but she s raising her children well. They re a good deal 
 better off than the single child of rich parents." 
 
 " Well," Aunt Mattie returned, ignoring the late personal 
 turn of the conversation, " I should be better satisfied if 
 Helen was setting Pleasant s shoulder to the wheel." 
 
 Agnes divined in her aunt s tone that her thoughts 
 were not altogether upon Helen s situation any more than 
 her own had been. The conversation had but made ob 
 jective the complications which she herself must face at no 
 distant time. The unsuccessful correspondence with Ferdi 
 nand had brought home to her the knowledge that her 
 summer s position of compromise between wifely duties and 
 financial independence could not be permanent. She knew 
 her husband was bitterly although tacitly opposed to it, and
 
 328 .THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 she now clearly saw that he looked forward to the time when 
 it would become untenable. He expected to demonstrate to 
 her that in the course of nature she could not be a normal 
 wife and an independent wage-earner. At the same time he 
 would make no concession in the way of settling an allow 
 ance on her. She knew him well enough to feel sure that he 
 was waiting for unconditional triumph. 
 
 In short, her brief assertion of personal rights had already 
 broadened into the gravest possible issue. This issue involved 
 nothing less than the alternative of living with Ferdinand 
 and bringing up an increasing family in entire dependence 
 upon him, or with at best short intervals of partial independ 
 ence when she might be able to resume outside work; or the 
 no less serious alternative of leaving him and living an 
 independent life with the knowledge that he would obtain and 
 keep control of the children as soon and for as long a period 
 as the law would allow. There was no middle course. When 
 it came to the point of leaving Ferdinand, and she now 
 knew that he would force the issue to that point, Agnes mind 
 staggered. Grave as were her accusations of her husband, 
 could they justify the breaking up of his family? 
 
 After she had finished her breakfast, in obedience to Mrs. 
 Sidney s peremptory request, Agnes helped her aunt out to 
 the veranda and stayed with her a few minutes. Then she 
 excused herself on the plea of writing some letters, and went 
 to her room. 
 
 Once up in her own room Agnes sat down to her table, 
 but, instead of writing, drew toward her and opened a 
 leather case full of old letters which she had brought home 
 with her. She took out one of the letters and glanced at the 
 indorsement. " To my daughter Agnes, to read when she is 
 about to decide on marriage. S. S." Her eyes lingered a 
 little on the familiar handwriting, then with a sigh she drew 
 out the letter. 
 
 It was but a few words on a single sheet of paper:
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 329 
 
 MY DEAR DAUGHTER: 
 
 In making one of the most far-reaching decisions of your life I want 
 you to remember the greatest facts of life. Love is underneath and 
 above us all like the everlasting arms. The law of love is the law of 
 God. But love is something -more than you know yet. It takes years 
 of suffering to make us understand it. Don t follow your imagination 
 in making this decision, but remember that all the great souls who have 
 loved most in this world have also endured most. You will have trials 
 and wearinesses and disappointments. Choose none but a man you can 
 trust and honor, and having married him forgive seventy times seven. 
 Marriage is for life and death, and there is only one way to live and 
 die. Our Master knew what it was. " And I, if I be lifted up, will 
 draw all men unto me." If we would be loved all our lives, we must 
 sacrifice ourselves all our lives. Only so can we draw. 
 
 God bless you. 
 
 YOUE FATHER. 
 
 Agnes knew the letter by heart, and now, as she read it 
 for the hundredth time, her eyes unconsciously rested long 
 on the sentence, " Choose none but a man you can trust and 
 honor." There was the rub. She could not hide from her 
 self the fact that she did not trust or honor Ferdinand. 
 Yet her situation was one she had brought on herself, and 
 when she did so she solemnly had vowed to love, honor and 
 cherish her husband so long as they both should live. She 
 had made the promise before she knew what it involved, and 
 she had mistaken the man whom she had married, but these 
 were not excuses a person of her Puritan training could 
 conscientiously plead. It should have been her business to 
 find out what she was doing before she married. 
 
 She leaned her forehead on her hands and endeavored to 
 think clearly. It was not the sacrifice of herself that she 
 shrank from in going back to Ferdinand s control. The 
 whole force of her early education and later training, of her 
 mother s example, and of her own observation, bore with 
 overwhelming insistence upon the one point, the necessity of 
 self-sacrifice in the life that was to be lived for the highest 
 good. What she dreaded was giving up the privilege of 
 helping her mother and sister, sinking to a powerless posi 
 tion in her own home, strengthening Ferdinand s arbitrary 
 will and behind all these, doing violence to the principles
 
 330 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 of liberty and justice in themselves. Was it possible that 
 the law of love, which is the law of God, required submission 
 to injustice? 
 
 Agnes had asked herself many times during the summer 
 just passed what it was that was meant by the word " love," 
 so vital to the marriage ordinance. She had been aware for 
 a long time that Ferdinand and she interpreted it differently 
 and that he considered her grudging in its fulfillment. To 
 him true wifely love appeared to entail, besides the primal 
 duty of bearing and raising children, a constant concur 
 rence with the husband s will, a satisfied recognition of his 
 reason, a grateful response to his affection, and ready sym 
 pathy with his needs. This summed up her moral obligation. 
 Very soon after her marriage Agnes had struck out from 
 her own conception of marriage-love the concurrence with 
 her husband s will; some time afterwards she had removed 
 the conviction of his reason ; her affection and sympathy had 
 changed gradually in character. Now she found herself 
 considering the responsibility of the most elemental of 
 wifely duties, " the primal duty of bearing and raising chil 
 dren." The seriousness of the question at stake made her 
 quail. She felt that she had reached the crux of her di 
 lemma. All society was built upon this relationship, and, in 
 return, fortified and protected it. No other relationship 
 went so deep or extended so far, as this which meant the per 
 petuation of the species. All the others existed for it or 
 grew out of it. How dared she consider breaking it? 
 
 Along with self -distrust, and directly challenging it, there 
 came to her troubled mind some words of Miriam s : " You 
 do not submit to injustice for yourself alone. If you evade 
 the material struggle, you prepare defeat for yourself in the 
 later spiritual struggle." If Ferdinand refused justice, what 
 right had she to evade the issue? 
 
 With a heavy heart she returned to her father s letter. 
 " Marriage is for life and death," he said. This, Agnes own 
 experience corroborated. Ecstasy, confidence, respect, all 
 gone, she nevertheless was aware in her contemplation of her
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 331 
 
 marriage of something which made it irrevocable and eternal. 
 It was not duty, nor was it the existence of her children. 
 Neither was it love, as that word is commonly interpreted. 
 It was a bond which to the pure in heart is indissoluble. 
 
 This bond her father knew. Miriam did not. The Scrip 
 tural text about a man s leaving father and mother to cleave 
 to his wife was not arbitrary. It was founded upon a law of 
 nature, and she was being pushed to the conclusion that to that 
 law she must bow. Violence to the marriage bond meant ruin 
 to society, violation of the soul. She must bear a less wrong 
 to avoid committing a greater. 
 
 With the tears running down her cheeks she put the letter 
 back in the case and drew toward her the unfinished sheets 
 she had begun the night before for Ferdinand. -" I must 
 draw my husband. I cannot drive him. My father is right. 
 We must sacrifice ourselves all our lives if we would make 
 men better." 
 
 As she quoted her father s lines, the gentle and saintly 
 spirit that had written them seemed close to her, under 
 standing her struggles, sympathizing with her self-renuncia 
 tion, sustaining her faltering courage, leading her with 
 unswerving steps along that ever narrower and steeper path 
 whose end was hidden in darkness. 
 
 Darkness ! for she had accepted a paradox, that the law 
 of God required what was unjust.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 LJ^ERDINAND arrived in New York the day before Sena 
 tor Balf our was to make the long-deferred visit to Kent, 
 and Agnes telegraphed her husband to meet her at her 
 mother s home and go with her to the reception for the Sena 
 tor afterwards. As this reception was to be given at the 
 home of Fred and Beatrice Sidney, Agnes was relieved when 
 the answering telegram came acquiescing in the plan. 
 
 Nothing but his long friendship with the Sidneys would 
 have brought Senator Balfour to Kent. The heterogeneous 
 company who had been invited to meet him in Mrs. Fred Sid 
 ney s parlors did not know this fact, however, and there was 
 not a cloud upon the civic pride which beamed upon him from 
 every countenance. Beatrice had asked Mrs. Sidney to 
 receive the guests with the Senator, and, buoyed up by his 
 companion s hearty pleasure in introducing him, the bored 
 old statesman felt a prick of interest himself. Between the 
 introductions they talked together. 
 
 Rather late in the evening he asked abruptly, " Who is 
 that just greeting your niece? " 
 
 Mrs. Sidney s eyes followed his, and she exclaimed with 
 unaffected satisfaction, " Well, there they are at last ! That s 
 Agnes and her husband. Ferdinand looks as though Eng 
 land had agreed with him. He s just got home to-day. He s 
 been patenting his new invention. Doesn t she look like 
 Stephen? I tell her if she behaves as well as she looks, she 
 won t disgrace her father." 
 
 Senator Balfour did not reply. As the daughter of his 
 old friend approached him he was stung by the realization of 
 lost youth. There is no death s-head so startling as a young 
 face that smiles at our age with eyes that answered our own 
 just so forty ye&rs ago. The keen, elderly face watching 
 
 332
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 333 
 
 Agnes approach reflected something of the emotion roused 
 by her appearance. The ironical mouth that the funny 
 papers found so easy to caricature changed its expression 
 suddenly as he went to meet her. 
 
 He held her hand in acknowledgment of the introduction, 
 and then, instead of the commonplaces he had been uttering 
 all the evening, he ended a few moments silent scrutiny, as 
 he released her hand, with the phrase, " The face that 
 launched a thousand ships." 
 
 His eyes wandered over the pearl satin of her gown and 
 the opals on her neck, and he thought that both seemed to 
 reflect her vivid flush, as she replied at once, 
 
 " The Scythian Tamburlaine? 
 Whose fiery eyes are fixed upon the earth, 
 As if he now devis d some stratagem. " 
 
 Balfour laughed aloud with the joy of one who discovers 
 that his fine carbuncle is a royal ruby. " My dear young 
 lady ! I supposed that I was one of the very last cave-dwell 
 ers who still read Marlowe. Your father and I used to spout 
 those lines forty years ago. Is it possible that you have read 
 Tamburlaine or did you cram beforehand, knowing my 
 weak point ? " His shrewd eyes twinkled through the shaggy 
 eyebrows he drew down over them suddenly. 
 
 A string trio began to play in one of the windowed recesses. 
 Sentor Balfour remained by Agnes side, conversing with her 
 interruptedly, while the group around them changed contin 
 ually. 
 
 As Ferdinand paused in one of the doorways to glance 
 through the rooms, Mrs. Sidney came up behind him and 
 touched his arm. " Ferdinand, I want you to notice Agnes." 
 
 " I have been noticing her all the evening." 
 
 " Then notice Senator Balfour, and remember that he is a 
 statesman. Then I want you to remember something I said 
 one time that you contradicted. Another time I want you to 
 be more careful about contradicting an old woman who knew 
 a statesman before you were born."
 
 334 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ferdinand was amused by his mother-in-law s triumph. 
 "Agnes is now the social peer of a statesman. She could 
 not have interested the Senator like that when I married her, 
 however. She has developed, you must remember." 
 
 Ferdinand was conscious of a listener behind him, and, 
 turning, saw Fred Sidney. 
 
 The newcomer spoke at once. "Have you time to come 
 into the den a moment, Mr. Ballington? There s a matter I 
 want to talk over with you." His manner and voice were 
 unusually friendly to his cousin s husband, but his eyes were 
 burning. 
 
 " Certainly," replied Ferdinand, wondering what Fred 
 Sidney could want to see him about, " I ll come now." 
 
 They went upstairs to the smoking-room, and Fred closed 
 the door. 
 
 " Will you smoke? " asked Fred, going to the table without 
 glancing at his companion. 
 
 " No, thanks." 
 
 Fred motioned Ferdinand to a seat, while he himself 
 remained standing, his hands thrust deep into his pockets. 
 
 " I hope," he said, still in the friendly voice that con 
 trasted oddly with the hostile eyes, " that you can forget for 
 a little while that you are an inventor and capitalist and that 
 I am a bank clerk." 
 
 "I don t know why you say that, Sidney," replied Ferdi 
 nand flushing slightly ; " I never thought the less of you for 
 being a bank clerk." 
 
 Then he noticed Fred s haggard face with its fever spots, 
 and a light broke upon him. The words "bank clerk" 
 recalled Beatrice s habitual jeer at her husband s occupation. 
 Ferdinand had already satisfied himself from his cross-exam 
 ination of Agnes, on the way to Fred Sidney s house, that 
 Beatrice and Tom were again entangled and that the quarrel 
 between Fred and his wife on the subject of the bank was 
 becoming acute. 
 
 " I imagine I know what you want to say," he began again 
 in an altered voice. "You have no idea of taking all that
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 335 
 
 talk about your business to heart, I hope? I have admired 
 
 your cool persistence, Sidney. When your wife loses " 
 
 The last sentences were fairly amiable. Fred doubtless was 
 about to ask him for advice. 
 
 " It is your wife and not mine I want to talk about," Fred 
 interrupted. 
 
 " I don t care to discuss my wife with you or any other 
 man," returned Ferdinand instantly. 
 
 Then he half regretted his words. Suspicion entered his 
 mind that Fred had some disclosure to make. His irritation 
 against him was somewhat allayed. 
 
 Fred s next words continued the assuaging process. 
 " Agnes was my cousin before she was your wife. We were 
 brought up together, and she is just the same as my sister. 
 During the summer she has been up here several times and I 
 have become worried about her." 
 
 "Do you mean she is working too hard?" asked Ferdi 
 nand. " It s her own doing." 
 
 " No," returned Fred quickly ; " her work has given her 
 more happiness than anything she has had since her mar 
 riage." 
 
 Ferdinand maintained a dignified silence. 
 
 " Agnes is unhappy," Fred went on distinctly. " Some 
 thing is troubling her. I know all the marks of concealed 
 misery." 
 
 Ferdinand s eyes became watchful. 
 
 After a slight pause he said carelessly, " Your solicitude 
 is unnecessary, Sidney. The first years of married life are 
 always hard on the wife. There s the physical strain and 
 the mental one of readjusting herself to a new environment, 
 but that is a morbid idea you have about concealed misery. 
 She is getting on better than most young wives. She will 
 drop this new fad herself, in time. I haven t hurried her. She 
 has had every opportunity to develop. Instead of worrying, 
 look how she has improved the last few years. She wanted 
 only time and opportunity to become what she has. She 
 has had both."
 
 336 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ferdinand had not intended to say so much when he began, 
 but he was thinking, while he spoke, of other things. 
 
 Fred s next words gave him a start. They were spoken in 
 a high and hard tone. " A person wants only time and oppor 
 tunity to die. I don t know what you call hurrying! You 
 have forced what you call her development to the limit of 
 endurance. First thing you know there will be a snap. You 
 needn t think she has been talking matters over with me," he 
 added as another thought struck him. 
 
 Then he stopped, passed his hand across his forehead, and 
 tried to quiet his mind. The long strain of his difference with 
 Beatrice was telling on his nerves. He warned himself that 
 this was not the way to gain consideration. He was rousing 
 anger. Ferdinand had risen and was about to leave the room 
 without a word. Fred bit his lip, then stopped him. " Wait 
 a moment, Mr. Ballington. I did not intend to use this tone 
 toward you. I was betrayed into it and I beg your pardon." 
 
 There was no response from the man watching him. 
 
 Fred continued with an effort to conciliate, " Agnes has 
 developed as few women do. She gives great promise for the 
 future. I am glad you see it and want her to realize it. I 
 am glad you have let her follow her own bent, too. If you 
 let her have the liberty she has had this past summer, for a 
 year or two longer, she will get back her youth and add to it 
 the vigor of maturity. You must see what the last months 
 have meant to her. If you can t see it, for God s sake take 
 the word of anybody who has known her ! " 
 
 Ferdinand turned to the door. 
 
 When he reached it, Fred spoke again from the middle of 
 the room. He had turned white and his voice shook. " God ! 
 You ought to be shot dead before you leave this house ! " 
 
 Ferdinand neither hastened nor retarded his steps. He left 
 the room without a glance behind and closed the door quietly 
 after him. There was an unusual color in his cheeks and his 
 eyes roved impatiently as he went down into the lower hall. 
 
 Agnes was singing in the music-room. It was a song whose 
 long notes gave her cello-like voice full sweep and grandeur.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 337 
 
 Her late training told magnificently in the purity and con 
 trol of the notes. 
 
 Ferdinand went to the door and stood watching her. His 
 recent conversation with Fred Sidney had but touched his 
 pride and sense of ownership had put an edge on gentler 
 feelings. His eyes followed his wife as she left her place and 
 crossed the drawing-room with Senator Balfour. For an 
 instant Ferdinand saw her pause and look up at her escort. 
 He caught the soft light of her hair, the splendor of her eyes, 
 the gleam of satin, and the changing flash of her opals. 
 Then she disappeared from his sight. 
 
 The evening had become wearisome to him and he wished 
 to go. He went into the parlor, passed around behind the 
 guests, and sat down on a window-seat. Scraps of conversa 
 tion reached him from different parts of the room; Tom s 
 voice, gruff and sulky, refusing to sing; the Reverend Mr. 
 Carter s flowing placidly and monotonously along as though 
 he were in the middle of the " long prayer"; a jovial ques 
 tion from Beatrice to her husband, asking if he thought she 
 were Job that he didn t pay any attention to what she was 
 saying. 
 
 Near him a voice which seemed to continue the song 
 sounded intermittently, answered by the whimsical inflections 
 of the Senator. Agnes certainly had succeeded in arousing 
 the famous guest s interest, and Ferdinand was struck by the 
 different way in which her remarks were received from the 
 indifferent responses he himself had drawn from the Senator 
 earlier in the evening. 
 
 He looked at his watch .impatiently, then rose and made 
 his way in the direction of Agnes voice. 
 
 She saw him coming and raised the cordial glass she was 
 holding in her hand, touched her lips to it, and elevated it still 
 higher in mute salutation. The Venetian glass cast an amber 
 light on her bare arm and neck. " We have missed you for 
 some time," she said with the Sidney smile, which ended in 
 sadness. 
 
 " Let us go," he replied briefly. " It is very late."
 
 338 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 She arose at once, said good-by to her friends, and went to 
 the dressing-room. 
 
 " Mrs. Ballington is going," said several voices as she 
 came down the stairs with her long cloak hanging open from 
 her shoulders, and a group of her friends gathered in the 
 hall. 
 
 Ferdinand stood waiting till she had passed through the 
 door and then he followed her. She paused in the vestibule 
 for a last good-by. 
 
 "Don t forget us, Agnes," called Fred from the hallway. 
 It cost him an untold effort to choke down his emotions into 
 those words. 
 
 Senator Balfour gave a slight sigh as the door closed and 
 then turned back to Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 As husband and wife went down the steps a gust of wind 
 rushed by them heralding the approach of a storm. 
 
 It grew darker and sultrier, the horses plunged going 
 down the hill, and just as they reached the little hotel where 
 Ferdinand had insisted on passing the night, on the ground 
 of not wishing to cause Mrs. Sidney unnecessary trouble, the 
 thunder began rumbling restlessly and the raindrops seemed 
 to burn here and there as they fell. 
 
 Ferdinand took the cape from Agnes shoulders when they 
 had gone to their room, while she stood looking through the 
 window-pane into the night. After he had laid it across a 
 chair he came back and stood beside her, putting his arm 
 around her shoulders. " What a rest it is to get home again," 
 he said with a sigh of relief. 
 
 They stood so for some time, each pursuing a line of 
 thought. 
 
 Presently the storm increased, drove the rain fiercely 
 against the window, then passed on into the north on the 
 wings of the bleak and melancholy wind. In the lull they 
 turned instinctively to each other. 
 
 " It is like the night we became engaged wind all night," 
 said Agnes. Her voice was low and anxious as she continued, 
 " I ve been remembering and thinking how beautiful first love
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 339 
 
 is. There s something less of earth in it than in what comes 
 
 after. What comes after is deeper, more vital, but " 
 
 She hesitated, broke off. 
 
 After a moment he said, with some constraint in his voice, 
 " You have been writing all summer, Agnes, that there were 
 certain things which we could no longer postpone deciding. 
 I have answered you that, so long as you hold your present 
 views, further discussion between us on these disagreeable 
 subjects can do no good. I will tell you now, however, that 
 upon many points since our marriage I have found that time 
 and natural development were all you needed to open your 
 eyes to reason, and that I am still waiting until time and 
 experience shall have convinced you of my wisdom in those 
 respects wherein we are still at variance." He added more 
 slowly, " I am sorry that you could not have learned from our 
 relations in the past to trust my judgment where you have 
 had no experience." He paused on the last sentence, and then 
 continued with the methodical patience that had become one 
 of his mannerisms, " I wished to spare us both domestic un 
 pleasantness and the gossip of the town, but if you must find 
 out everything for yourself, there is nothing for me to do 
 but to continue to wait." 
 
 Agnes told herself, while Ferdinand was speaking, that the 
 supreme moment had come, and it was with difficulty, so great 
 was her perturbation, that she kept her attention upon his 
 words and followed him from sentence to sentence, consider 
 ing each one conscientiously as it passed. Unless she could 
 succeed in reaching Ferdinand s sympathy, and through that 
 his will, the things she most dreaded would come upon her. 
 As an ignorant and volatile girl she had allowed her father to 
 pass his last days without care. That had been an unwitting 
 crime. During these summer days at her old home, among 
 his books and papers, her renewed grief in recalling it had 
 expressed itself now and then in her letters to Ferdinand. He 
 had been puzzled by these stray allusions to her girlhood and 
 to some cause which she had for remorse. Now, however, 
 Agnes was realizing the second and bitterer tragedy. In tak-
 
 340 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ing up her duty as a wife she must be prepared to give up for 
 the most part her salaried positions and be content to see her 
 mother in age again uncomplainingly take up the burden 
 that would have staggered her in her prime. Cleaving to her 
 husband meant literally forsaking her mother, and she must 
 forsake the second parent with all the agony of full knowl 
 edge, and witness the inevitable results. Nor was this all. 
 She must impotently see her children misunderstood and made 
 to suffer struggles dangerous to their intellectual and moral 
 equilibrium. 
 
 When he was done she stood still for a moment, grateful 
 for the support which the window casement unobtrusively 
 gave her. Outwardly she was calm, but in her heart she felt 
 forlorn and weak. Long before her husband s arrival she 
 had arranged logically what she had to say to him. It had 
 seemed that no reasonable mind could fail to be convinced 
 that her pleas were just. Now, however, she felt her confi 
 dence going; nor did she know any longer where to begin to 
 answer her husband. He seemed impregnable. In addition 
 to her natural reluctance to oppose Ferdinand, she was dis 
 tressed by the seeming ungraciousness of pressing such a 
 conversation at such a time. They were both weary and he 
 was just back after a long absence and a long journey, but 
 she knew that her chances of winning him were greater at 
 that moment than they could be again. 
 
 " Let us sit down, Ferdinand," she said, meeting his look 
 with a half -frightened, half -pleading expression, but at the 
 same time she motioned him to a chair with one of those swift, 
 firm gestures he knew and had once admired. "There is a 
 good deal to say, and it must be said now." 
 
 " If you insist upon further talk, had we not better defer 
 it till we reach home ? " asked Ferdinand. He still stood, 
 although Agnes had seated herself near a small table and he 
 could see by her clasped hands resting upon it and by her 
 dilated eyes that she was making ready to begin. " You for 
 get how late it is." 
 
 She unclasped her hands and drew the vacant chair nearer
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 341 
 
 her. Her husband s reference to. their home accentuated in 
 her mind the sense of fitness she already had felt in having 
 such a conversation take place in a hired room, a place of 
 accommodation, a caravansary, a spot around which no man s 
 memory clung. 
 
 " Sit down, dear, please," she said. " I know you are 
 tired and I am sorry to keep you, but it will be better 
 for us both." 
 
 He took the chair in resignation and waited with the dim 
 resentment he always felt when he knew his wife was going 
 to push him to saying in plain words what he thought and 
 what he was going to do. He realized that, baldly stated, his 
 views sounded brutal. It was dignified to say that a father 
 should train his children to obedience, that a husband should 
 protect his wife, that the head of the family should pay all 
 family expenses ; but to make him say that his arbitrary will 
 about the children s education could not be questioned, that 
 his wife must ask him for every dollar she spent, that his aunt 
 who had brought him up should be absolutely dependent on 
 his bounty, and that no consideration could change his 
 decision on these points, was irritating. He was not to blame 
 that nature and society had given him brains and made him 
 master in his own house. He resented bitterly Agnes 
 repeated demands for explanations and reasons that ended 
 ultimately in the simple, dogmatic statement, "I do so 
 because I think best," and the equally simple reply, " How do 
 you know what is best?" 
 
 "Well?" he urged as she did not begin. "Let us be as 
 quick as possible about it." 
 
 He took out his watch, looked at it, shook it a little, and 
 held it to his ear. 
 
 Agnes rested her arms upon the table and leaned a little 
 toward him, speaking in a gentle tone which yet somehow 
 struck Ferdinand as in accord with the renewed ticking of his 
 watch. It was equally exact, dogged. 
 
 " Ferdinand, I intended to talk about only those few points 
 upon which we must think and act alike at once or see our
 
 342 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 home suffer. But I see I can t begin on those. I must go 
 back to our relations in the past." 
 
 Ferdinand stirred and was about to speak, but she checked 
 him instantly. 
 
 " You make it necessary for me to go back when you say 
 that because I have changed since I married you, because, 
 under your influence, I have come to think differently from 
 what I used to, that therefore I ought to defer to your judg 
 ment in matters where I am still unchanged." As she con 
 tinued, the pleading in her eyes crept into her voice and her 
 whole attitude underwent a subtle change from reluctant 
 determination to appeal. " I know I was ignorant and 
 bigoted and uncontrolled when you married me. I am wiser 
 now, more rational, and I hope that I can control myself bet 
 ter, but we have not grown together, Ferdinand, as you seem 
 to think. We have grown apart and the distance widens 
 every day. You must see this fact with me, and help me to 
 alter it if it can be altered," she added almost under her 
 breath. 
 
 Ferdinand listened to her without changing his position. 
 Into his face, however, a watchful alertness was coming. 
 
 " You are making dangerous statements, Agnes," he said 
 quietly. " If you are speaking hastily, I would advise you to 
 reconsider." 
 
 " No, I am not speaking hastily, Ferdinand. It has taken 
 me all this time to know myself and trust myself to speak. 
 The reason I have not done it earlier is because I have been 
 too confused, too cowardly, too conscious of my own short 
 comings and sins, and, besides all this, because I have loved 
 you and clung to what love you have for me, dreading to lose 
 what was left of it by angering you." She dropped her 
 hands from the table to her lap, where they fell wearily as she 
 added, " Yet I have known for some time that this must come, 
 that I was wronging the love I promised you by putting off 
 talking through these things to the end." 
 
 Ferdinand waited during the pause that followed her last 
 words. "What is it you feel we must talk through to the
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 343 
 
 end ? " he inquired at length, wishing to get it over as soon as 
 possible. 
 
 " Ferdinand, I cannot have the respect you think I owe to 
 your general view of life, nor can I acquiesce in the way you 
 live that view. Since I do not and cannot think as you do, 
 considering the parental responsibilities we share alike, we 
 must arrive at a working compromise between your theories 
 and mine." 
 
 " What are yours, at present ? " asked Ferdinand in the 
 tone of endurance that he had persevered in since his wife 
 began talking. 
 
 There was a scarcely perceptible pause, after which Agnes 
 went steadily on. 
 
 " You and I differ primarily in our attitude toward the 
 rights of others. This would not matter so much if we were 
 not both under responsibilities to the same people; Estelle 
 and Stephen first, my mother, Aunt Margaret." 
 
 " Since when have Estelle and Stephen developed so much 
 individuality ? " interrupted Ferdinand with covert satire. 
 "What philosopher have you been reading this week? " 
 
 Agnes went on without noticing her husband s question. 
 
 "I think we should recognize that the children have indi 
 vidual rights. I think we should not be arbitrary in our 
 decisions. I think they should be treated with the same self- 
 control and reasonableness which we exercise toward our 
 equals. If Estelle is frightened in the future as she has been 
 in the past when she has committed some little fault, she will 
 become hysterical, and Stephen sullen and sly." A note of 
 anguish in Agnes voice marked off the last statement from 
 the preceding ones. She was putting an almost intolerable 
 memory into words as she continued, " I can, as you know, 
 understand from my own experience both of these states of 
 mind. It required all my mature courage and will to extri 
 cate myself from the sin of deceit. How can I expect my 
 little boy to resist it when you put an equal strain upon him ? 
 You will give him no sympathy yourself, and, if I do, you say 
 I am training him to disregard you. You force me to leave
 
 344 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 him without it, or to give it to him behind your back, or to let 
 the children see that we disagree." 
 
 Ferdinand rose and stood before his wife, looking down 
 upon her. " If my children have had the misfortune to inherit 
 hysteria and slyness," he said, roused to the short, metallic 
 voice which the men at the shops dreaded, " I do not intend 
 that it shall be fostered by environment. I refuse to listen 
 longer to your womanish whinings. You are carrying it too 
 far." 
 
 Agnes, too, rose, fighting down the grief and despair in her 
 heart. Her hand rested upon the table with the knuckles 
 pressing hard against the pine boards. 
 
 " I think, too, that our children must have some religious 
 training, Ferdinand. I had it, and, if your mother had lived, 
 you would have had it. How can you think it right to let our 
 children grow up unguided in their most vital development 
 while you coerce them severely in other respects. I do not 
 ask that they receive sectarian instruction. I couldn t give 
 it to them any longer if I would. I am an agnostic, 
 as you profess to be." The last phrase caught Ferdinand s 
 attention and he listened unwillingly as she went on, " In 
 reality you are not an agnostic. You are " she waited a 
 moment, and then said slowly, as though the words hurt her 
 " a materialist. Your mind is on material pleasures, ma 
 terial duties, above all, on money, and what money can buy. 
 You don t ask what is true, first of all, Ferdinand. You only 
 talk about facts. You interpret the deepest and most 
 spiritual relations of life by the hard and narrow philosophy 
 based on the few facts that you will see. How superficial 
 and false that philosophy is only a true agnostic could tell 
 you." 
 
 Ferdinand was further angered by this nice distinction of 
 terms and he interrupted her cynically. " I always have sup 
 posed that the agnostic dealt with facts as opposed to windy 
 theories, but perhaps I am wrong there as well as in my other 
 views." 
 
 Agnes made a supplicating gesture. "Ferdinand, don t
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 345 
 
 break my heart. I and our children are something more than 
 mouths to feed, bodies to clothe. We want room to grow in, 
 we want a husband and father to whom we can go with those 
 longings that are farthest out of sight in our souls because 
 they are too sacred to show to any but the noblest and best. 
 I married you believing that the outer union was but the step 
 to that. Did you never feel the longing to get away from 
 buying and selling, and live " she made a hesitating step 
 or two nearer to him " with me and our children in love 
 and perfect comprehension? Doesn t it sometimes come into 
 your heart to give yourself to me as you never have, to give 
 up to something stronger than desire? We all have some 
 thing back of passion in us. We have a deeper instinct to 
 give instead of get, to get away from ourselves to something 
 beyond us. Shall we never love each other so, away from 
 ourselves?" 
 
 Ferdinand looked at her as she spoke, heard the voice rise 
 and fall, felt the old subtle glow and exaltation stealing over 
 him. A faint wish to yield to the unknown power she de 
 scribed passed across his mind. Then he scorned his weak 
 ness. He picked up his evening coat and hat and moved 
 toward the door leading into the adjoining room. " It is 
 nearly one o clock," he said when he reached it. 
 
 " Will you say nothing more than that to me, Ferdinand? " 
 Agnes said in a trembling voice. 
 
 Without speaking her husband entered the second room, 
 leaving the door open. The room was dark and Agnes lost 
 sight of him as soon as he passed the threshold. 
 
 She remained where she was, erect and motionless. Then 
 she shivered, reached for her cape, drew it around her 
 shoulders, sank into the straight wooden chair by the table, 
 and clasped her hands tightly over her eyes. She had done 
 all that she could, and had lost. 
 
 Presently Ferdinand appeared again in the doorway. As 
 she heard his step she was instantly on her feet, holding the 
 cloak together with one hand at the throat. Her head was 
 poised with that upward lift and statuesque stillness hunters
 
 346 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 are familiar with in wild creatures surprised by the chase. 
 Her hair was pushed back from her face like a boy s, and she 
 looked at him with the boy s self -unconsciousness. 
 
 " Where are you going ? " asked Ferdinand, startled. 
 
 The uncertainty in his tone flashed a last hope into Agnes 
 brain. She caught at it at once. She had failed utterly in 
 telling bare facts to him. She had meant to be tactful. In 
 stead of that she had antagonized him had not appealed as 
 she might have done to those emotions which she had felt all 
 the evening were awake in him after their long separation. 
 
 " You think that I may be going, Ferdinand. You realize, 
 then, that I might be driven to it. You can t see all that 
 hangs on your decision to-night, however. If you did, you 
 surely would answer me differently. We have been apart for 
 months now. Absence has made this meeting like a beginning 
 of life together. We have made mistakes in the past. We 
 both know how and when. We never shall have this chance 
 to start right again. If we go wrong now, in the light of 
 past experience, it never can be rectified. Something, the 
 rarest and noblest in us both, will perish. Give me freedom 
 to live as your best and closest friend. Give me light and air. 
 God knows I m not begging for myself so much as I am for 
 our children. How can I be a mother to them if my heart is 
 crushed and my hope and faith chained like slaves? I can t 
 love you as I long to, past the injustice that threatens to push 
 in between us. You don t realize this. There is just one 
 way for a man and woman to live together and be happy. 
 They must trust each other and give each other liberty. Only 
 so can marriage be anything but a yoke too heavy for any 
 but the best and the worst of women to bear. I know you 
 will see this some time I believe you have come back to tell 
 me that you realize it now. Our first imperfect marriage will 
 be but a dream to the power and the glory of this. We are 
 two souls, two wills. Nothing but willing union can make us 
 one. Give me free will. Give me power to be a wife. You 
 have come for that you cannot have come for anything 
 else. You have been thinking of all we were to each other
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 once, and of all that absence has taught us we may be to each 
 other again if if life is not lost on us." 
 
 Her voice caught, almost broke, on the last phrase. She 
 had drawn near him, step by step, under the stress of pas 
 sionate pleading. She paused after every sentence, searching 
 his face for a signal of encouragement, and when it did not 
 come she hurried to the next, as though fearing he would 
 break in. 
 
 The beseeching in her voice became almost unendurable to 
 Ferdinand, and when she paused to gain control of her emo 
 tion he profited by the opportunity to put an end to the 
 painful scene. 
 
 "Let us spare ourselves any further conflict on these 
 points, Agnes. You yourself are my best argument for 
 refusing your own request. Whatever sorrow our marriage 
 has caused you has but made you better and wiser than you 
 would have been without it. There may be, as you say, two 
 souls and two wills in man and wife. I ve never attempted to 
 deny it. All I have contended for, and still insist upon, is that 
 the husband and father is the head of the family. I shall do 
 my best to be conscientious in the fulfillment of my duties. 
 I am sorry we cannot see things alike, but I have enough 
 faith in you to believe, as you do, that we yet will. Mean 
 time, I must request you to give up all expectation of a 
 change in our financial and domestic arrangements." 
 
 His wife looked at him without moving, and Ferdinand s 
 eyes wavered from hers and passed almost reluctantly over 
 the somber red of the cloaked figure. Then he compelled 
 himself to meet again her gaze, through which was emerging 
 a great obscure force which he dimly knew to be tragic. An 
 answering impulse flared up within him, defiant, hostile. It 
 was the instinct Fred had aroused earlier that evening, to 
 crush, if need be, that which threatened him in her. 
 
 He went up to her, put down the half -protesting, half- 
 supplicating arms, bent the dark head forward to his breast, 
 and held it there. After some time he said, " Agnes, this is 
 my first day home. Have you nothing else to say to me ? "
 
 348 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 She raised her head, drew up her hands, and put them 
 against his breast, pushing him back a little so that they 
 could see each other. He found himself looking into two 
 strange eyes, as fathomless, as quiet, as the night. 
 
 "What?" he asked, bending his head as though she had 
 spoken. 
 
 "Forsaking father and mother rich or poor in sick 
 ness and in health till death us do part," she said.
 
 PART V 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 FHE short fall was followed by a bitter winter. Old 
 inhabitants of Winston fell into a reminiscent strain 
 about a winter back in the forties when the water had frozen 
 on the dinner table and old Silas Ballington had lost half an 
 ear walking from his kitchen door down to the cow-barn. 
 
 Ferdinand had put a new furnace into his home and specu 
 lated in coal early in the winter. He made enough by the 
 latter device not only to pay for his heating plant, but to 
 present Agnes at Christmas time with a set of sable furs, 
 Miss Margaret with mink, Estelle with a coat and cap of 
 Thibet lamb, and the two-year-old Stephen with a long, 
 straight garment and cap of sealskin. He ordered for him 
 self at the same time an otter ulster with seal trimmings and 
 cap. When he presented these he asked Agnes to collect 
 all the old furs of the family, and these were sent for later 
 and taken away by the town furrier. Improvements were also 
 made in the house. 
 
 Agnes, on her part, had started in their new life together 
 with a determination to make a persistent effort to touch 
 and broaden her husband s sympathies. She told herself 
 that if she were patient enough and tactful enough she must 
 wear away his resistance. This course of hers was so quiet, so 
 free from feminine heart-burnings and moods, that the current 
 of their home life moved more smoothly than it ever had done 
 before. Superficial vexations there were, but Agnes purpose 
 in life now moved too far below the surface to be disturbed 
 by any but profound emotions. 
 
 She had come almost to believe that she never again could 
 feel the extremity of torture to which she formerly had been 
 sensitive, when she was forced to experience another of those 
 
 349
 
 350 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 shocks which seemed to threaten the springs of life. It hap 
 pened in February after the expiration of the two-years 
 grace granted Mrs. Sidney to redeem her home. Agnes 
 knew that some weeks before Ferdinand had received a letter 
 from Mrs. Sidney explaining that the winter had made unex 
 pected demands upon her purse, offering to pay him a part 
 of the money, and asking for another year in which to pay 
 the rest. Dr. Quinn had written also, corroborating Mrs. 
 Sidney s statement, and adding that he would be able in a 
 year to buy the home from her, and that at the same time 
 he would allow her life-residence there. Agnes never had 
 been able to get a frank expression from Ferdinand as to 
 what he intended to do with her mother s home. She knew 
 that he had not answered her mother s letter, and when she 
 saw him preparing to go to Kent instead of writing she began 
 to worry. She aid not, however, receive any satisfactory 
 answer to her questions, and it was not till Ferdinand s return 
 from Kent the following day that the subject was plainly 
 opened between them. 
 
 He spent part of the afternoon at his office, so that her 
 anxiety had time to grow, and when she met him in the hall 
 upon his arrival it was with great apprehension that she 
 asked at once, " Is it all right about the house, Ferdi 
 nand? " 
 
 He put away his cap and ulster before he replied, and then 
 said, with satisfaction in his voice: 
 
 " Yes, it is all right. Come into the library and I will 
 tell you." 
 
 Agnes followed him into the room with misgivings, and 
 although he offered her a chair, she stood waiting for him to 
 speak. 
 
 " I have been able to do better for your mother than I 
 expected," he announced. " I have sold the house for two 
 thousand dollars more than she herself asked Dr. Quinn 
 for it." 
 
 Agnes had expected that if Ferdinand should insist upon 
 selling the house she would at least receive warning of his
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 351 
 
 intention. It was, therefore, in a dazed and uncomprehend 
 ing voice that she began to reply. " You have sold the 
 house? But Dr. Quinn " 
 
 Then the blood rushed into her face and she did not finish 
 her sentence. She put her hand on the back of the chair 
 and steadied herself against a dizziness that came over her. 
 The utmost that she had allowed herself to think had been 
 cruelly exceeded. The roof had been sold from over her 
 mother s head in winter when she had a crippled relative to 
 care for. Where would they go? To Beatrice s, to Pleas- 
 ant s, to the little farm which her mother always had held in 
 reserve, but which was unfit for a home? The thought that 
 it was her husband who was filling her mother s last years 
 with needless sorrow, with implacable determination piling 
 burdens upon that failing but still cheerful spirit, while she 
 herself could neither hinder him nor help her mother, came 
 upon her with full weight of meaning. She tightened her 
 grip of her chair, refusing to credit the situation. 
 
 " I am not sure that I understand, Ferdinand," she said. 
 "It has come on me so suddenly. Do you really mean that 
 you have sold my mother s house away from her?" 
 
 " For two thousand dollars more than she herself asked 
 Dr. Quinn," repeated Ferdinand. 
 
 The expression of business complacence on his face began 
 to be qualified by something else a subdued but grim satis 
 faction at having requited Quinn for the slight the latter had 
 put upon him in refusing his patronage of the doctor s surgi 
 cal invention. He had managed his mother-in-law s business 
 so as to gain two thousand dollars, which he had determined to 
 use toward her support, and at the same time he had taught 
 Quinn the lesson that poor men could not afford to be 
 independent. 
 
 Agnes sat down and began to sway slightly back and forth 
 in her effort to control herself. 
 
 Ferdinand feared the result of the tumult of her feelings, 
 but he did not attempt to touch her. "Don t, Agnes," he 
 urged gently. " This transaction means at least two years
 
 352 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 support for your mother. The house is a poor investment, 
 and getting worse all the time. She is well rid of it. She 
 took the matter reasonably, as you do not." 
 
 As he spoke Agnes grew quiet. Her eyes wandered away 
 from him around the room without seeing any outward 
 object. She was calling up in memory the little house in 
 which she had been born, and in which her father had died. 
 She saw the office as it used to be, open on a spring morning, 
 with flowers where her father had placed them on desk and 
 window-sill. She saw the grape-arbors he had made, the 
 flower-beds he had planned, the blue myrtle-blossoms in the 
 grass about the steps. Each neat and well-kept room of the 
 house passed before her mind as though in farewell. 
 
 Then her thoughts returned to the one who would suffer 
 most in leaving that home. It was some time before she 
 could trust her voice to ask, " What did my mother say when 
 you told her?" 
 
 Ferdinand was relieved at the question. It indicated 
 returning reasonableness. " She took it very sensibly," he 
 said. " I think the first thing she did was to ask for a 
 month in which to move." He felt that his mother-in-law s 
 conduct, whatever may have been her lack of discipline in the 
 past, in this transaction had been exemplary. Like any fair- 
 minded person she had refrained from foolish complainings 
 and had realized the validity of his motives at least she had 
 not questioned them. He went on considerately, " Of course 
 I told her she could have all the time she wanted." 
 
 He waited, half expecting Agnes to come to herself. 
 
 As she made no reply, he proceeded to explain the advan 
 tages of the arrangement. " It isn t only the money I was 
 thinking of when I did this. You see it really relieves your 
 mother in many ways. Your aunt s own relatives will be 
 compelled to look after her now, a thing they should have 
 done long ago if I could have had my way. I am going to 
 make suitable arrangements for your mother to spend the 
 remainder of her life in some good family, and I intend the 
 two thousand dollars to go toward her board. She won t
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 353 
 
 have the care of a house, and she will be looked after herself 
 when she needs it. I told her that you and I would talk that 
 over together. I want to please you in the place we select. 
 Perhaps the Talbots will take her," he said reflectively. 
 "You said they were old friends of both your parents." 
 
 Agnes looked at him so curiously that he thought she was 
 going to say something, but she did not. Instead she walked 
 over to the window and looked out. 
 
 He occupied a little time straightening up some papers on 
 the table, and, as she still did not speak, he turned to go out 
 into the hall. 
 
 Instantly her voice arrested him. 
 
 " You have not told me yet to whom you sold my father s 
 house." 
 
 Her mind had leaped forward from her memories of the 
 house to speculation upon its future possessor. Who was there 
 in Kent besides Quinn who wanted the old place, and wanted 
 it enough to pay so much for it? 
 
 Ferdinand turned back to her. " It is a man who has 
 written me several times about it. His name is Malthus. He 
 is a doctor." 
 
 There was a pause. A look of abhorrence and incredulity 
 came into Agnes face. The name Malthus had been asso 
 ciated in her mind all her life with everything that was shame 
 ful. As it grew upon her that the one man in their native 
 place whom her father would have been glad to disgrace had 
 gotten possession of Dr. Sidney s office and home, and had 
 done this expressly because it was Dr. Sidney s home and 
 would cast a cloak of respectability over his own name, all 
 her pride and self-control were merged into denial of the 
 intolerable truth. 
 
 " No ! No ! Ferdinand ! " she broke out. " Please not 
 that! You don t know what you are saying. Indeed you 
 
 can t know. A good doctor can t I can t bear it ! I can t 
 
 bear it ! " 
 
 She went up to him and seized his hands, wringing them 
 as she stammered on. He thought as he looked at her that
 
 354 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 her face had withered and grown old, while the eyes vaguely 
 alarmed him. 
 
 " My father s life was spent for his profession," she said 
 brokenly. "All Kent will tell you that the honor of the 
 profession. No man living has disgraced it more than Dr. 
 Malthus has. My mother will not speak to him. Ferdinand, 
 I cannot live to see him go into my father s house." 
 
 She slid down to his feet and held herself there, choking 
 down sentence after sentence as they fought for expression. 
 Ferdinand was thoroughly disturbed, and tried to help her 
 up. But she shook herself free with a cry of anguish, and 
 then lay huddled up, absolutely still. 
 
 "We all know your father was honorable, Agnes," 
 Ferdinand said presently in a voice which he thought was 
 soothing. "His honor hasn t anything to do with the 
 house." 
 
 She caught her breath, but did not look up. Then she 
 corrected him with strained emphasis. "Two thousand 
 dollars worth ! " she said laconically. 
 
 After a moment s silence she rose to a half-sitting, half- 
 kneeling posture, and continued, " Why do you think Dr. 
 Malthus was willing to pay so much? You often have spoken 
 slightingly of my father to me. Since you have found out 
 that his name is worth something you should treat it with 
 more respect." 
 
 Agnes words struck Ferdinand. He was conscious that 
 he did think more highly of Dr. Sidney, and he was vexed 
 with himself for not having paid a higher tribute to his 
 father-in-law s memory by placing an additional thousand 
 or two value upon it. As he looked down at his wife he saw 
 that her mood had changed and that he had lost the chance 
 of granting her appeal since she would not renew it. The 
 change in her hardened him and he drew away from her. 
 Agnes glanced at him, and then turned her eyes away as she 
 rose once more with difficulty to her feet. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she said a moment later, distinctly, " I see 
 at last that I deserve this. I have made a mistake that is
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 355 
 
 now irreparable. Your return from England was the turn 
 ing-point in my life. I outraged my reason when I went 
 back to you. You have taken advantage of me, as you have of 
 everyone else, every time you have had me in your power. 
 You were glad when my condition made me give up my 
 salaried positions. You were glad to gratify your resent 
 ment against Dr. Quinn by selling my father s and my 
 mother s house. I ought to have left you when you came 
 home from England. I lost that opportunity also! I shall 
 not have many more to lose." 
 
 She ceased speaking for a moment, then wild recklessness 
 rushed up within her. " Before our betrothal you led my 
 mother and me to think you other than you were. Since our 
 marriage you have robbed me. If you had not, my mother 
 need not have lost her home, nor would we be at your mercy 
 now." 
 
 She could not look at her husband after she had spoken, 
 but turned away and walked with difficulty, as if she were 
 freezing, out into the hall. She had, too, the instinct of the 
 freezing to thaw herself out with the cold. It seemed to her 
 that her slow hands never could get the front door open and 
 let in the air. At last the bolt yielded and a gust of wind 
 brought her back to life. It stung her blood into action and 
 with her blood her shame. She waited a moment, then closed 
 the door and went back to the library. 
 
 Ferdinand was standing where she had left him, with that 
 careful absence of expression in his face which accompanied 
 unusual emotion in him. 
 
 She approached him and stood looking fixedly at him. He 
 did not move nor return her gaze. They stayed so, without 
 speaking, long enough for a woman who had been entering 
 the yard when Agnes closed the door to come up the front 
 steps, ring, and be admitted. 
 
 Neither of them heard her enter the house and she was 
 opening the library door, when Ferdinand at last found his 
 voice to say, " Because you feel it so, I will do what I think it 
 unwise to do." He had been realizing that her mental state
 
 356 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 might react disastrously upon his wife s physical condition, 
 and he had made up his mind to say the most generous thing 
 he ever had said to her. 
 
 He was interrupted at this point by the unceremonious 
 opening of the door, and some inflamed thing seemed pro 
 jected into the room. He saw the wind-reddened face of 
 Beatrice. 
 
 She pulled off her huge gloves and flung off the furs in 
 which she was enveloped, as though she were flinging away 
 all restraint with them, and her bold beauty took on inso 
 lence as she turned towards Ferdinand and began to speak. 
 
 " Your friend Malthus up in Kent says your papers aren t 
 signed yet, so I ve come down here to strike a better bargain 
 with you. Aunt Kate never would let me buy the house, 
 but I guess you will if I pay enough. I understand you are 
 telling around that you are selling the house for your mother- 
 in-law s sake. Now, then, I ll pay you as much as you want 
 to ask on those terms. If you refuse, you prove yourself a 
 lying scoundrel." 
 
 She held her check-book in her hand and was looking 
 over the table for a pen. As she picked up one she glanced 
 over her shoulder at Agnes and said, "Why, in Heaven s 
 
 name, do you live with ? " She made a motion with her 
 
 hand toward Ferdinand instead of speaking his name. 
 
 Ferdinand s face hardened at the insult. He was keen 
 enough to see the dilemma in which Beatrice s wit had placed 
 him, and he revolted at being coerced by her. There was a 
 moment s silence. Then, in words which were as ominous 
 to himself as to Agnes, he said, " The house is sold." 
 
 As soon as he had spoken he attempted to pass the unbidden 
 visitor and leave the room, but all that was good and all that 
 was bad in Mrs. Fred Sidney was aroused now, and met in 
 her hatred of Ferdinand. Her whimsical but staunch love 
 for Mrs. Sidney had become a passion with Beatrice. " In 
 spite of you, I m going to see you through, Aunt Kate," she 
 had repeatedly declared, and General Mott s daughter had a 
 free hand where her affections were touched. She had come
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 357 
 
 to Winston with the determination to " see Mrs. Sidney 
 through." Now, as she looked at Ferdinand, the grudge 
 which she with difficulty had held in abeyance swelled into 
 full virulence again. She was not only Mrs. Sidney s 
 avenger, but her own. As he took the first step toward the 
 hallway she divined his intention to escape, and to thwart 
 it she sprang into the open space between him and the door. 
 
 Agnes was too appalled at what followed to comprehend 
 what Beatrice said. A confused reminiscence went through 
 her mind of things she had heard about General Mott s 
 blasphemy when he lost his temper. It must have been from 
 the father that the daughter had learned the copious vocab 
 ulary she was using with more than masculine dexterity. 
 Insults and vituperations fell like a whip of scorpions upon 
 her husband, and Agnes watched with dazed horror the effect 
 upon him. His face changed and took on an expression of 
 fury and violence such as she never had seen. 
 
 Beatrice, too, caught it. An exultation in her power 
 urged her to a still more daring outburst. " Now that you ve 
 done your best to leave your mother-in-law without a roof 
 over her head," she said, backing toward the hall, " Agnes 
 will realize that she s married a pawn-broker. You specu 
 lator in other people s goods ! Put up the three balls over 
 your front-door! I ve heard you talk about my father, but 
 I ve heard him talk about you. He spent his money where 
 you make your profit. You re not fit for a decent woman to 
 live with, and if your wife hasn t found it out yet I ll open 
 her eyes ! " 
 
 She was out in the hall as she finished. There she turned 
 to Agnes and cried discordantly, " Come to us, Agnes ! 
 You ve got to go somewhere soon enough. Then your mother 
 will come, too." 
 
 She reached the door, flung it open, and went out, drawing 
 it to with a jar behind her. 
 
 A moment later it was violently thrown open, and she 
 stood once more on the threshold. 
 
 " Ferdinand ! " she cried.
 
 358 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 His face was livid as he strode toward her. He reached 
 the door and was forcing it shut on her. 
 
 " I forbid you to set foot in our house again, and every 
 one shall know that I ve done it. I hope I may never see you 
 again " she braced herself and grew purple in the face 
 "till I see you in Hell!" 
 
 She withdrew suddenly, and the door shut, almost dislocat 
 ing Ferdinand s shoulder with the shock. Agnes shrank 
 back, thinking that Beatrice must be injured. 
 
 But the next moment they heard her voice, as she went 
 down the steps outside, singing out of tune. 
 
 Ferdinand did not look at Agnes as he turned away from 
 the door and went upstairs to his room. 
 
 She returned to the library, and sank into a chair, her mind 
 dizzied by the license and blasphemy of Beatrice s outburst. 
 A fright for Fred took possession of her. In this case, 
 Beatrice s passion had been generous in its origin, but its 
 excess appalled her. Should her evil passions be roused and 
 the cause her own, nothing could stay her from plunging 
 herself and all she controlled to ruin. At that moment 
 Agnes could hardly tell which seemed more terrible to her, 
 the relentlessness of Ferdinand or the lawlessness of Beatrice. 
 
 Presently she heard her husband coming downstairs again, 
 and rose with a sickening heart to meet him; but he did not 
 glance at her as he took his hat and went to the door. She 
 noticed that he had written a telegram and was going out to 
 send it, and the bitterest moment of her life accompanied the 
 realization that the last hope of saving her father s house 
 was gone.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 "C^ERDINAND S manner to Agnes was oddly guarded and 
 taciturn during the days following his announcement of 
 the sale of her mother s home. He never once referred to 
 Beatrice s intervention, but a week later when Agnes told 
 him she was going up to Kent to help her mother pack her 
 things, although he did not demur to the visit, he concluded 
 a long series of instructions about protecting herself from 
 the cold by saying briefly, " You understand, of course, that 
 there is to be no more intercourse between us and your 
 cousin s family." 
 
 There was no one to meet Agnes at the station, for her 
 coming was unexpected, and she walked alone through the 
 familiar streets of Kent to the home which was her mother s 
 no longer. 
 
 When she reached it she stood still, looking at it for some 
 moments, the only figure in the quiet street, too pro 
 foundly stirred to trust herself to enter. The day was 
 very still and everything seemed motionless except the feath 
 ered flakes of snow which wavered down and poised irreso 
 lutely as if loath to add their ethereal weight to the already- 
 laden trees and buildings. Drifts of snow buttressed the 
 Sidney homestead, cut through by exact and clean paths from 
 the street to the office door and to the front door. Evergreen 
 trees had been cut and placed against the house as usual as 
 a protection against the cold, but little of the green could 
 be seen beneath loads of snow and the crystal ice-casings 
 which imprisoned what the snow could not, and which hung 
 in transparent pendants from the tip of every bough and 
 spine. The house itself was hooded with a mass of white 
 whose purity and beauty would have seemed a gentle covering 
 had it not been for the fringe of ice which hung in carved 
 tracery from the eaves down to the chamber windows. Not 
 
 359
 
 360 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 a living thing was in sight. The only flowers and shrubs 
 now to be seen through the office windows were white and deli 
 cate fronds in frost. The whole scene, beautiful and silent 
 as it was, to Agnes was a scene of death but death freed 
 from decay, arrested life. 
 
 At last she went up the steps to the office door and entered. 
 Dr. Quinn was not in, but the slate on his open desk announced 
 his whereabouts and time of return. Agnes walked through 
 the two offices and the sitting-room into the downstairs bed 
 room, where she found her mother hard at work, while Aunt 
 Mattie, propped up in a rocking chair, was watching her. 
 Mrs. Sidney was leaning over a half-filled wooden box, 
 rearranging its contents to better advantage. She turned at 
 the sound of footsteps, and then at sight of Agnes, exclaimed 
 a welcome which her daughter instantly interpreted as an 
 expression of relief as well as of greeting. The involuntary 
 tone told Agnes that her mother had been suffering for her, 
 and that she was comforted to see her daughter well and self- 
 controlled. 
 
 Agnes went up to the kneeling figure, took Mrs. Sidney s 
 face between her hands, looked into the clear old eyes, and 
 then kissed her mother silently. Then she turned with a 
 word or two of tenderness to Aunt Mattie. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney began to explain in a cheerful voice just how 
 and where she was going to move her household goods. Agnes 
 entered into the preparations without comment, sorted the 
 well-remembered chest of linen, and packed it with the ample 
 supply of blankets and patchwork quilts that bespoke her 
 mother s New England thrift. Mrs. Sidney praised her com 
 mon sense in not mourning over what could not be helped, with 
 many fine old Biblical phrases, and with the allusion to Job s 
 troubles and their happy period that has helped many saints 
 in sore distress to keep their courage and their faith un 
 broken. 
 
 Aunt Mattie was clearly living upon a lower level, for she 
 was heard to let fall these words after Mrs. Sidney s fervent 
 epitome of the patriarch s story : " I suppose Job never
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 361 
 
 mourned over his dead sons and daughters. He was per 
 fectly satisfied with the new ones the Lord gave him. I d be 
 just as fond of those old patriarchs if they hadn t been so 
 easily comforted with new wives, too. His old wife was a good 
 woman." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney warned her sister-in-law of heresy, but in a 
 more indulgent way than was her wont. Aunt Mattie was 
 not to be judged like other people. 
 
 " Why do you hurry so with the packing, mother? " asked 
 Agnes late in the afternoon, as they were finishing their 
 task. 
 
 " I want to be on my own property," replied her mother 
 decisively. " I shan t be contented till I get on Stephen s 
 farm." Then she laid her hand for a moment on Agnes 
 shoulder and added gravely, " I m glad Stephen doesn t have 
 to bear this. These things don t mean so much to me. Did 
 you ever notice, Agnes, that the Lord never sends trials to 
 anyone who can t stand them? " 
 
 " There was a man who taught his horse to eat sawdust," 
 soliloquized Aunt Mattie, " and just when the beast had 
 learned, he died." 
 
 " You needn t be afraid of dying yet, Mattie," replied Mrs. 
 Sidney. " Now, Agnes, we will go into the parlor and rest 
 awhile before I get supper. Quinn has insisted upon running 
 a big fire while I ve been packing and it s nice and warm in 
 there." 
 
 They moved in Aunt Mattie in her chair, and after they 
 were comfortably seated Mrs. Sidney took up some sewing 
 while she continued to controvert her sister-in-law s danger 
 ous skepticism. Agnes noted her aunt s quizzical gray eyes, 
 and suspected that there was a kindly motive for her policy. 
 
 Suddenly Mrs. Sidney dropped her sewing in her lap and 
 pointed to the window. " There comes Beatrice ! and, yes, 
 that s Thomas Ballington with her again. Run to the door 
 and call them in. I want to see those two together." 
 
 Agnes rose instinctively, but hesitated, and just then the 
 sleigh, with its tufted horses and Cossack-looking driver,
 
 362 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 turned toward the house. In its simple seat, a snug nest of 
 furs, were Tom and Beatrice, ruddy with the cold. As they 
 passed the house Beatrice swung back behind Tom, strain 
 ing her eyes to look into Mrs. Sidney s windows. Mrs. Sidney 
 promptly answered the look with a vigorous gesticulation 
 summoning Beatrice to turn back and come in. Agnes saw 
 Beatrice lean forward to speak to the driver, and then the 
 horses turned and came to a standstill. 
 
 Agnes exchanged a glance with Mrs. Sidney, who spoke 
 at once. " You needn t think to stop me, Agnes. The Bible 
 says that after you ve taken your friend by himself in vain, 
 to call in another. Thomas Ballington is the one to call in." 
 
 She hurried to the door, opened it, and called out just in 
 time to prevent the driver from starting on again with Tom : 
 " Thomas Ballington, don t go away ! I want you to come in 
 here, too." 
 
 Beatrice laughed back at Tom over her shoulder. " Come 
 along, Tom. Face the music." Then she ran up the steps 
 and enveloped Mrs. Sidney in her furs. " Here he is, Aunt 
 Kate ! " she announced a moment later as Tom entered, 
 closing the door behind him with sullen civility. 
 
 Beatrice pushed open the parlor door which Mrs. Sidney 
 had closed to keep out the cold. Agnes rose to meet her with 
 the memory of the scene when they had last parted in her 
 mind. But Beatrice came in buoyantly, pulling off her cap, 
 " to cool her head," she said. Her face, which had been con 
 torted with passion the last time Agnes saw it, was now good- 
 humored and laughing. Her eyes were bright, her hair, 
 roughened and matted by the cap, was damp and glossy about 
 her face. " Hello, dear ! " she cried heartily to Agnes. 
 " Hello, Aunt Mattie ! " And then she turned back again to 
 Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 " Sit down, Beatrice," said Mrs. Sidney, taking off her 
 glasses and wiping them. " Sit down on that cane chair, 
 Thomas Ballington. I have called you both in here, Beatrice, 
 to talk to you from the Lord. You are my niece and you 
 know well that I love you, but that shan t hinder me from
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 363 
 
 telling you that you are behaving like a lost woman. I don t 
 say you are such or that you intend to be. But your ways 
 are evil. You are young and gay and headstrong, and I 
 think you don t know the end of the course you ve entered 
 on. You ve got money and good looks and health, but these 
 aren t going to last always. They are bound to go, and what 
 then? " 
 
 Beatrice smiled at Mrs. Sidney, at Tom, at Agnes, at 
 Aunt Mattie, who had succeeded in getting out of her chair 
 alone and now hobbled painfully out of the room but said 
 nothing. 
 
 " What then ? " repeated Mrs. Sidney sternly. 
 
 " Why, then I suppose I ll grow old, Aunt Kate," replied 
 Beatrice, supporting her elbow on her knee, her chm on her 
 hand, and returning her accuser s gaze with one of impreg 
 nable cheerfulness. 
 
 "And what then?" 
 
 " Then ? " Beatrice gave a shrug as though apologizing 
 for being forced to introduce an unpleasing vision. " Well, 
 humanly speaking, I ll die." 
 
 " And what then," finished Mrs. Sidney in stentorian tones. 
 
 " Why, after that " Beatrice hesitated, but she was 
 
 determined to carry this through with spirit. Accordingly 
 she winked at Tom. The temptation was too much for her. 
 " After that, Aunt Kate, I expect to work, to shovel coal for 
 a living." 
 
 Beatrice s sides were shaking as she made the answer, but 
 this time she had miscalculated upon that sense of humor 
 which was one of the enduring links between Mrs. Sidney and 
 herself. The old lady s face clearly showed her disapproval 
 and grief at the stale and ill-timed flippancy. 
 
 " You are grieving God s Holy Spirit, Beatrice," she said 
 warningly ; " you are laughing at the eternal ruin of a soul. 
 You wouldn t have talked this way two years ago. You are 
 getting callous. But there is worse to follow. Think of the 
 rich man lifting up his eyes to Lazarus." 
 
 " I d never be as bad off as that man, Aunt Kate," said
 
 364 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Beatrice, reaching over to lay her hand reassuringly on Mrs. 
 Sidney s knee. 
 
 " Why not? " demanded Mrs. Sidney involuntarily. 
 
 " Because I d look up and see you in Abraham s bosom. 
 You wouldn t go back on an old friend who had seen better 
 days. You d get that drop of water down to me. Don t I 
 know you would, bless your heart ! " 
 
 The genuine love that rang through the reckless speech 
 strengthened Mrs. Sidney s purpose. She turned to Tom. 
 
 " Thomas Ballington, I want you to give me your word of 
 honor that you will use your influence with Beatrice to go 
 back to her husband and home." 
 
 " She s never left her home," sulked Tom, crimson with 
 humiliation and eying the floor. "Besides, I haven t any 
 influence, if she had." 
 
 " I don t ask you to use any more than you have," returned 
 Mrs. Sidney directly. " You can get a good deal more by 
 keeping away from Kent and going to work. You are a mill 
 stone about your brother s neck, young man an idler in a 
 world that is going wrong for lack of workers." 
 
 " I have my work," said Tom, choking down his anger. 
 
 " What is your work then ? What have you done to-day ? " 
 
 The questions impaled the young man promptly, and he 
 squirmed in silence. 
 
 "Thomas Ballington, what have you done to-day?" re 
 peated Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 " Tom played a game of 
 
 " I m not speaking to you, Beatrice." 
 
 " I know you re not, Aunt Kate. But I see Tom has a 
 dumb devil, and it isn t polite for you not to be answered. 
 Tom played a game of checkers with me this morning, and 
 wrote some letters this afternoon." 
 
 " Played a game of checkers ! Wrote some letters ! And 
 you call that work. That s just punctuating idleness." 
 
 Beatrice burst into appreciative laughter at the words. 
 Mrs. Sidney turned to her instantly, holding up her hand. 
 
 " Don t, Beatrice ! "
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 365 
 
 The old lady s voice had a ring of pain that subdued her 
 guest s levity. She continued in a lower tone. 
 
 " Beatrice, I m not the only one who is noticing you, even 
 if I am the only one who yearns over you enough to face you 
 in your iniquity. You are demoralizing this town. Many 
 things that are going on now and are winked at by good 
 society would not have been tolerated ten years ago. You 
 are a rich woman and a leader. The young people look to you 
 for all the latest fashions in clothes and manners. You give 
 liberally to the fashionable church, and, I will say, that you 
 give liberally everywhere else, too. The point is that you ve 
 a good deal of influence and that you re using it to tear down 
 safeguards that are already too weak to keep idle people out 
 of mischief. You ought to be an example and a help to the 
 hard-working and self-denying. Instead of that you make 
 life harder for them by scoffing at their old-fashioned virtues. 
 Such people as you will be the ruin of this country if you 
 can t be brought to your senses. You will destroy public 
 morality. Besides, Beatrice, there is only one end to all this. 
 You re not the kind to stop in time. Some day you will find 
 yourself an outcast." 
 
 " Not as long as I give good dinners and theater parties, 
 Aunt Kate. There are just two people in Kent whose good 
 will can t be bought. Those two are you and me. We are a 
 good deal alike, after all. The only difference is, you are 
 good and I am bad." 
 
 " It isn t your money that keeps good people s doors open 
 to you. It s Fred Sidney s name. It s an honorable name." 
 
 " Well, three cheers for Fred Sidney ! I ve told you a 
 million times I ve no grudge against Fred, Aunt Kate." 
 
 Then Beatrice sat up in her chair and squared her 
 shoulders. " But see here ! Who gave me my money and 
 position in the first place? My General. We all know he 
 wasn t any saint, but he was an easy man to live with. He 
 lived the way he wanted to, and didn t lie about it. He wanted 
 everybody else to have a good time, too. He left me all the 
 money there is in our family. When I married Fred I ex-
 
 366 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 pccted him to let me provide for him. If he d had the money 
 he d have thought it all right to provide for me and he d have 
 been mad enough if I d insisted on keeping a kindergarten 
 to earn my own clothes. But there he sticks in that bank, 
 an underpaid clerk! He won t take a cent from me. We 
 can t go off anywhere together except for two weeks in sum 
 mer, when it s so hot we d shrivel up on the way. I have to 
 go round alone. I d h ke nothing better than taking Fred 
 with me, but he can t leave. If there was any sense in it, it 
 would be a different matter. But it s nothing but his pica 
 yune pride. He s tying us both down here to satisfy that. 
 My father never expected it, and I didn t expect it. Now, 
 then, since I must stay here, I m going to get as much 
 pleasure out of this place as is to be gotten, and if he doesn t 
 like it, he knows how he can stop it." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney was about to rejoin when Beatrice cut her off. 
 
 " Oh, you don t know what I ve had to bear. I ve lost all 
 my moral sense lying about things in order to take care of him 
 properly. Just last week I wanted to get him an overcoat. 
 He ought to have furs. He wouldn t take them. Then I 
 forgot myself. There were some hot-house berries on the 
 table and I told him he might just as well take the coat as 
 to be eating those. He never ate another one. Since then 
 he has taken his luncheon downtown at that miserable temper 
 ance eating-house which can t nourish its rats and he 
 starves himself when he s at home." Her voice softened, she 
 paused, then finished, " I don t want to hurt your feelings, 
 Aunt Kate, and I m going to leave this minute. Come along, 
 Tom!" 
 
 She caught up her cap and gloves and put them on swiftly. 
 She wanted to kiss Mrs. Sidney good-by, but she knew it 
 was wiser not to delay, and she was already at the door, when 
 Mrs. Sidney s voice held her. 
 
 Beatrice s revelations had indeed made their impression 
 upon her aunt, but Mrs. Sidney was not to be put off from 
 the main point under discussion. 
 
 " Beatrice Sidney," exclaimed Mrs. Sidney, rising and ap-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 367 
 
 preaching her, " if you were my daughter, I should put you 
 in a house of correction." 
 
 " So you would, Aunt .Kate," Beatrice called back. " You re 
 the very salt of the earth, but the Lord knew who was best 
 for my mother. We mustn t rebel. For my part, I don t see 
 why you shouldn t be satisfied with Agnes." 
 
 Tom strode after her with a black face. The two went out 
 of the front door, and soon there was a jingle of bells as the 
 sleigh drove away. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney went back to her sewing with a look of dis 
 tress which pierced Agnes heart. 
 
 " Mother," she said, going over and kneeling by her 
 mother s chair, while she held the busy fingers still a moment, 
 " do not bear too many burdens. Nobody can direct Beatrice." 
 
 " If I d said the right words, Agnes," her mother re 
 sponded sorrowfully, " I could have reached her. She has a 
 good heart, but I don t know how. Stephen always did." 
 
 Agnes leaned her face against her mother s shoulder to 
 hide the tears which she could no longer keep back. She con 
 trolled her voice carefully, however, as she replied gently, 
 " You have more influence over Beatrice than anybody else 
 has, mamma. I realize that every time she and I talk together. 
 If it had been possible to influence her, you could have done it. 
 She appreciated that it was hard for you to say what you 
 did, and honored you for it. She knows you love her, but 
 there s something underneath in Beatrice s nature that even 
 you can t deal with. She is just as impregnable in her way as 
 Ferdinand is in his." 
 
 Agnes was thinking as she spoke of the scene when Beatrice 
 was last in Winston, of those few moments of unbridled 
 passion when both she and Ferdinand had dropped every 
 pretense and faced each other, each self-absorbed, irrecon 
 cilable, with invincible defiance. Again Agnes recalled with 
 curious wonder that it had been Ferdinand whose defiance had 
 been tinged with fear, and she felt instinctively that Beatrice 
 was somebody whom even Ferdinand could not manage. 
 This accounted to her now for Fred s passivity in dealing
 
 368 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 with his wife and for his own set refusals to yield to her. He, 
 too, had hardened in his course, giving up the hope of 
 influencing her, and she had given up persuading him. 
 
 Agnes stayed over another day with her mother, and then 
 with a heavy heart left for home. She felt that it was her 
 last visit to her old home, that she never would enter it again. 
 Her mother s persistent cheerfulness was almost more than 
 she could bear when Mrs. Sidney called after her as she went 
 down the walk to the gate, " In the summer we ll have you all 
 out to the farm. You tell Estelle and Stephen they shall 
 have pigs and chickens and all the pets they want. It s a 
 shame for children not to have pets ! You can play the little 
 organ in the country church there, too. Your grandmother 
 used to sing there. How glad old Mr. Jewell will be ! You 
 are bringing up your children to keep the Sabbath, aren t 
 you ? " 
 
 " I m trying to." 
 
 " That s right. Blessed is the man that keepeth the Sab 
 bath from polluting it." 
 
 Agnes went alone to the station. There was a wind blow 
 ing, and she made her way against the unfriendly gusts with 
 flagging steps. As she drew near the red building she saw 
 a man with gray hair standing outside as though waiting 
 for someone. He looked at her carelessly. Then they 
 started toward each other with mutual surprise. 
 
 "Why, Fred, I didn t recognize you! How good this is 
 of you ! How did you get off so early ? " 
 
 " Bucher let me out. There s a quarter of an hour yet. 
 The train s behind, as usual. Let s walk out this way. Does 
 it tire you to walk ? You were coming so slowly that I didn t 
 know you till you got right up to me. That hat makes you 
 looked different, someway." 
 
 The cousins linked arms and paced along the platform to 
 the little station yard. They turned into it, and Fred led 
 the way to the iron bench in front of the empty fountain 
 basin. They sat down and Fred asked sympathetically after 
 his aunt.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 369 
 
 " I left her with a smile on her face, quoting a verse from 
 the Bible after me. She s a wonderful woman, Fred. Why 
 can t I be like her! I can t tell you how I feel about this 
 sale of the house." Agnes rose to her feet impetuously and 
 started to walk away, then turned and came back again. 
 
 Fred felt a recurrence of his old rage against Ferdinand. 
 Agnes realized it, and said, as she so often had said to her 
 self of late, that one person must not judge another. No 
 two think alike. Her husband was a business man, who had, 
 as he thought, made an advantageous bargain. 
 
 Fred did not reply at once. When he did it was with an 
 abrupt announcement. "Agnes, Bucher advises me to get 
 a divorce from Beatrice." 
 
 She started and turned a stupefied face to his. Something 
 dreadful must have happened to make a conservative man 
 like Mr. Bucher advise divorce. She well knew that he would 
 be the last man to countenance it, and that this fact, coupled 
 with the long relation existing between him and Fred, would 
 lend great weight to his opinion. 
 
 Hard upon her astonishment there crowded a disquieting 
 memory. Her husband had said more than once of late that 
 Sidney was a tame fool, otherwise he would get rid of his 
 wife. It was a coincidence, too, that just now Ferdinand 
 and Mr. Bucher were having business relations. But she 
 shook off the unwelcome thought. 
 
 Fred continued with a colorless face, " I m going to tell 
 her to-night." 
 
 " Is this because of Tom ? " 
 
 "Yes. I went home last night and found them drinking 
 champagne. We had a talk before he left. He promised 
 to keep away from Kent, but he can t. You see she should 
 have married him, not me. It has taken me a long time to 
 see through that. There is nothing for me but just to cut 
 loose is there?" 
 
 He put the question with anguish. Agnes well knew that 
 the deepest tragedy of life never comes in earthquake or fire, 
 but in the horror of great darkness, where a man may lie
 
 370 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 down and die beside his own doorstep, thinking himself a 
 thousand miles off on the plain. Was the world all gone 
 wrong? Had they made some fatal error in their own con 
 duct? Could they, perchance, have touched the right springs 
 of action he in the wife, she in the husband? Could it be 
 possible that if they only put out their hands in the right 
 direction now, they could touch the portal of safety and 
 happiness ? 
 
 Fred waited a moment, and then repeated the question. 
 
 Agnes turned to him, leaning forward as she said with 
 one of her old restless gestures : " I shouldn t do it, Fred. 
 Remember it was for better or for worse ; and she never loved 
 Tom. Don t allow that thought to stay in your mind. She 
 did love you. Bucher is wrong. Somebody something 
 has misled him. This isn t love that Tom and Beatrice have 
 for each other. It is a kind of possession. They both want 
 something else." 
 
 Her face kindled. She struck her hand forcibly on the arm 
 of the bench and her voice had a ring of courage as she 
 continued quickly, " There is splendid stuff in both of them. 
 You can t give up. Try to compromise. Take all you can 
 that she gives you, and love her for it. You have been too 
 proud. She has a right to do for you. In time she will come 
 to see that she must give up some things, too. Don t talk 
 to Bucher. Talk to her. Come! Bucher and you and I 
 have no sort of backbone. Look at my mother. That is 
 the way to face life." 
 
 Fred looked at her with a spark in his eyes. It died out 
 in a moment, however, but his face brightened. They both 
 looked more like themselves, and involuntarily their minds 
 reverted to their old life together. Agnes felt a recurrent 
 rush of the old delicious faith in the world with God in His 
 Heaven over it all. She smiled at Fred with sudden 
 brilliancy. 
 
 " That is the way to face life," she repeated, " to settle 
 every little question as it comes up with good-will and 
 finality. Treat little things wisely as though they were
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 371 
 
 serious and large. Let others have their rights in the little 
 things, too. You haven t given Beatrice hers. You ask her 
 to give her life to you and you won t take her money. If 
 you take the real thing why not take its symbol? Oh, Fred, 
 it s wrong to refuse to share with her because you re a man. 
 
 It s as wrong as " She checked herself, then continued 
 
 in a different tone, " My father and mother were co-workers. 
 Each lived according to his own conscience, and when they 
 did not agree they came to a mutual understanding of how 
 much each must give up. You want Beatrice to meet you 
 spiritually. Show her that you are willing to meet her where 
 she craves union. Take your good things together. Make 
 your sacrifices together. Your money and your travels and 
 your work will be the accompaniments of a spiritual union." 
 
 "Agnes," said her cousin, "you make me feel like old 
 times. I feel as though we only had to look up to see Uncle 
 Stephen drive old Peggy up to the platform. Some good 
 people have lived after all. It ought to count when a poor 
 cuss does as well as he can, even if it is pretty poor." He 
 stopped, then made a motion as if to speak and stopped 
 again. Presently the words came : " It s hard for me to do 
 it, but I will try to follow your advice and see what comes 
 of it." 
 
 A whistle announced the approaching train and a rumble 
 and clanging bell jarred the air around them. 
 
 They rose and went over to the cars. " If you yield some 
 and talk only to her, I think she will yield, too," said Agnes 
 urgently. 
 
 When the train rolled out Fred stood watching it out of 
 sight. Then, with new endurance in his heart, he turned and 
 walked home.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 ]\/f RS. SIDNEY stood by her bedroom window and looked 
 out into the back garden. It was eleven o clock of the 
 last night that she was to stay in the home to which the doctor 
 had brought her a bride forty-five years before. The house 
 itself had changed but little, but she remembered, as she looked 
 out, how bare the garden had been when they first came. He 
 and she together had planted the trees, the grapevines, and 
 the rose bushes. The one tall poplar that now overtopped 
 all the other trees Stephen had stuck in the ground as a mere 
 whip once when they returned from a country ride. He was 
 lying now out there to the west, past the spires of the 
 Catholic church. Further to the west her baby was mistress 
 of a home of her own, and way on beyond where the land grew 
 level Helen was waiting out her lonely pilgrimage. Upstairs 
 Aunt Mattie was asleep in a cot. In the office Dr. Quinn was 
 patiently at work on his accounts. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney turned away from the window and knelt down 
 by her bed. She waited there for a long time for prayer to 
 come, as she had waited night after night previously, but at 
 last she pulled her heavy body up again, took up the lamp, 
 and went out to the office. When she opened the office door 
 Dr. Quinn turned in his chair. She started as she saw him. 
 
 " Is there anything the matter? " he asked in friendly 
 apprehension. 
 
 " No, Quinn, I started to come in here to speak to you, but 
 just as I turned the knob of the door I thought I was going 
 to see Stephen here at his desk. I guess I haven t been 
 sleeping enough." 
 
 He knew this, and he asked with half the physician s and 
 half the friend s gentleness, " Can I do anything for you ? " 
 
 372
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 373 
 
 " Yes, Quinn. I can t seem to get hold of myself. I have 
 been trying to have family prayers. Stephen and I had 
 prayers together the first night we passed in this house. 
 Perhaps if you should come in and sit with me a little while 
 I might come to." 
 
 Dr. Quinn shoved away his books and followed her into the 
 sitting-room. They sat down by the table, and after a little 
 while the old lady said, " What do you think is the secret 
 place of the Most High, Quinn? I ve been saying that 
 over and over to myself, He that dwelleth in the secret place 
 of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the 
 Almighty. " 
 
 The doctor opened the big Bible that lay in its accustomed 
 place on the table, and after some searching found the pas 
 sage he desired and turned the book toward her. 
 
 But Mrs. Sidney made a little motion for him to keep it. 
 " You read," she said, " and then perhaps I can pray." And 
 she leaned back in her chair and let her eyes close. 
 
 Dr. Quinn watched her for a few moments. He felt an 
 involuntary inclination to reach out for her wrist. But as 
 she presently opened her eyes enough to question him with 
 them, he turned back to the book and began to read. He was 
 slow of speech, but one could see in his reading the mind mov 
 ing along with the words, like the finger of a child, from line 
 to line. To-night Mrs. Sidney s mind moved laboriously, 
 too, so that she was glad to sit still with her eyes shut and 
 have time to think what each word meant. 
 
 And the doctor read, choosing his passages: 
 
 " He bowed the heavens, and came down ; and darkness was 
 under his feet. He made darkness his secret place; his pavil 
 ion round about him was dark waters and thick clouds of 
 the sky." 
 
 " I will lift up mine eyes to the hills, from whence cometh 
 my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven 
 and earth. He will not suffer thy foot to be moved : he that 
 keepeth thee shall not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth thee 
 shall neither slumber nor sleep."
 
 374 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth 
 them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame; he remem- 
 bereth that we are dust." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney opened her eyes when he had done, and they 
 both knelt down. Dr. Quinn was still thinking from the 
 look of his friend that she was a little confused in mind and 
 mistook him for her husband, but as soon as she began to 
 speak he knew that her mind was clear. 
 
 She began with the Lord s Prayer, saying the words in a 
 full, clear voice, whose meaning was such that the doctor felt 
 he never had known the words before. 
 
 He knew that she would go on presently, and so he waited 
 until she did. 
 
 "I have come back, O Lord, and I am ready to stay and 
 work in Thy vineyard as long as it is Thy will. I am not 
 afraid any longer. I will dwell in the secret place of the 
 Most High. O God, cover with the shadow of the Almighty 
 my two little girls. They are Thy own children. We gave 
 them to Thee when they were born. I put it to Thee, O Lord, 
 to take care of them. And bless this young man who is to 
 take Stephen s place here. Fix him like a nail in a sure 
 place. And now I lay me down in peace to sleep, for Thou, 
 Lord, makest me to dwell in safety." 
 
 Dr. Quinn helped her to rise, and they stood for a moment 
 facing each other, she with her hands on his shoulders. He 
 saw that it was well with her in her heart, and he did not say 
 what he had wanted to about his own inability to buy the 
 house. 
 
 " I trust you, Quinn," she said, giving him a mother s smile. 
 "You will keep up the doctor s name here. God has been 
 very good to send you here." 
 
 He stooped and kissed her, and she knew that he 
 understood all that she meant, and, if he had been a man who 
 could talk, that he would have answered. 
 
 Then they spoke about some little duties that were left 
 between them, the bandages she had made for him out of the 
 old sheets, the doctor s clothes she had given him, the use
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 375 
 
 of the books. She brought him some milk to drink, and then 
 they said good-night. 
 
 Dr. Quinn went back to his books and finished the task he 
 had set himself, but before he lay down to sleep in the back 
 office he walked softly to the door of Mrs. Sidney s room, 
 which was left ajar. He heard her regular breathing and 
 knew that her soul was satisfied and the weary body at rest.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 AFTER Mrs. Sidney left her home and settled on the 
 "^ Sidney farm some fifteen miles out of Kent, Agnes did 
 not go to see her mother. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney had been there a fortnight when the Mabies 
 arrived to make their permanent home with her. Pleasant 
 had at last exhausted all the devices for losing money his 
 fertile brain could hit upon, and Mrs. Sidney as a creditor 
 was clothed with more authority than she had been able to 
 wield as a mere mother-in-law. Helen broke up housekeep 
 ing simultaneously with her mother, and the bitterness of her 
 grief was incalculably augmented by the thought that Pleas 
 ant had been responsible for the loss of both homes. 
 
 When Ferdinand learned that the Mabies were coming, he 
 experienced the disagreeable sensation of the general who 
 thinks he has captured his opponent s position, only to find 
 he has taken but the outer intrenchments. The opposing 
 general, meantime, has withdrawn into his stronghold, 
 massed his forces, and, being well-provisioned for an indefinite 
 siege, indifferently refuses to consider terms. Ferdinand had 
 expected to arrange Mrs. Sidney s future sensibly for her, 
 and to be able at last to dictate his shiftless brother-in-la^ s 
 method of life. He had upon several occasions tried to obtain 
 possession of the little farm, and, failing that, had watched it 
 run down with philosophic approval. It had seemed to him 
 an impossible refuge for his mother-in-law. He would not 
 acknowledge to himself the irritation he felt when Mrs. Sidney 
 turned her sturdy back upon him and gathered the prodigal 
 Pleasant with his inexcusably large family under her own 
 roof. Ferdinand s chagrin was not at all lessened by a shrewd 
 suspicion that he never again would be able to get a finger 
 into his mother-in-law s affairs. Pleasant was doomed to 
 walk in Mrs. Sidney s ways, and the whole family would con- 
 
 376
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 377 
 
 tinue to live in that self-willed and wasteful manner from 
 which he had been able to rescue only Agnes. 
 
 It was with a grudging but uncontrollable curiosity to 
 see how they got along that he suggested one day to Agnes 
 that they should go down to see her mother and greet the 
 Mabies. To his surprise Agnes quietly declined; and when 
 he expostulated with her upon not being filial and sisterly, 
 her clear look made him awkwardly conscious that she knew 
 all that was in his mind, and thought it beneath him. Never 
 theless he went alone, and apologized with undiscouraged 
 civility to his mother-in-law for Agnes failure to accompany 
 him, on the ground that she was not able to make the j ourney. 
 
 He was caught and made resentful by a satirical twinkle 
 in Aunt Mattie s eyes, which bore a disagreeable resemblance 
 in an aggravated form to the penetration of his wife s expres 
 sion before he left home. Ferdinand was so incensed at the 
 latent sagacity of this crippled old cumberer of the earth 
 that he took occasion later, when all the heterogeneous family 
 were present, to remark casually, " I suppose your sister- 
 in-law expects to make her home during the large proportion 
 of the year with her own relatives? The house seems small 
 for so large a family." 
 
 That remark proved to be the turning-point of Pleasant 
 Mabie s career. 
 
 Pleasant was just ripe for this turning-point, too, because 
 of certain influences which had been working upon him quietly 
 for some weeks past. Upon his arrival at the farm where 
 he had found in Aunt Mattie one more helpless than himself, 
 the instinct which in the past had led him to buy up and take 
 care of all the sick and disabled animals he could get hold of 
 took a new direction. This was fortified by a brow-beaten 
 remorse for his own responsibility in the family disasters 
 which in secret had preyed upon his soul ever since he had 
 received a letter from Ferdinand earlier in the winter. The 
 two emotions combined to rouse him to a humble and pitifully 
 dogged effort to take as much of the burden as he could 
 carry from the women of the household.
 
 378 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 This letter of Ferdinand s had contained a full and de 
 tailed summary of all Pleasant s business career, and had 
 closed with a scathing analysis of the methods which a man 
 of so hopelessly futile a character as Pleasant s ought to 
 pursue at once in order to make as little trouble as possible 
 for the future. Ferdinand had pointed out to Pleasant that 
 he never again must think of doing anything whatever unless 
 some superior mind advised him. In conclusion the writer 
 stated indifferently that in consideration of his wife s rela 
 tionship to Helen Mabie he himself would consent to take 
 the burden of Pleasant s guardianship from now on. 
 
 The humiliation and resentment which this letter had 
 caused Pleasant, along with the letter itself, had been care 
 fully concealed from even his wife. He had destroyed the 
 letter as soon as he had read it, and he had relieved his mind 
 many times since by composing grandiloquent answers which 
 even he could not help realizing would cause only amuse 
 ment, and which he accordingly tore up regularly twenty-four 
 hours after they were written. 
 
 Upon this hopeless and weakly desperate mood Aunt Mat- 
 tie had acted with unexpected stimulus. The spring of pity 
 and incongruous joy which welled up in the able-bodied but 
 shuffling man when he first realized Aunt Mattie s condition 
 created an oasis in the desert of life. He established himself 
 at once as a kind of lady s-maid to the cripple, and Mrs. Sid 
 ney acknowledged before he had been twenty-four hours on 
 the farm that Pleasant saved more steps than an invalid-chair 
 would have done. He carried Aunt Mattie up and down 
 stairs, saw that she had an airing regularly, and had her on 
 his mind from the time that he awoke until he went to sleep. 
 
 At first Aunt Mattie had been harassed and humiliated 
 by these unremitting attentions from a man to whom she 
 always had felt an instinctive antipathy, but her canny mind 
 soon saw that here was an opportunity, not indeed such as she 
 would have chosen, to establish a beneficent despotism over 
 Helen s invertebrate husband. To this end she feigned a 
 dependence she was far from feeling, and it was out of con-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 379 
 
 sideration for this that Pleas ant s quixotic chivalry consid 
 ered itself bound to carry out all her suggestions. Thus 
 already, before Ferdinand s visit, Aunt Mattie had managed 
 to supply Pleasant s willing energies with brains. 
 
 The unexpected turn of affairs had filled Mrs. Sidney and 
 Helen at first with incredulity, then with relief and thank 
 fulness ; while Aunt Mattie, for her part, and to her own 
 surprise, was experiencing the first eagerness and interest in 
 life she had known for years. She was finding a grim 
 pleasure in mortifying her spirit by managing Pleasant, and 
 a gentler pleasure in becoming the boon-companion of the 
 children. Kitty read to her. Dan laid all sorts of objects 
 at her feet and listened enthralled while she discoursed to 
 to him about them. Each of the small children, too, found 
 in the laconic, humorous cripple some phase of intimate 
 companionship. Thus, much to the surprise of everybody 
 concerned, the center of gravity of the household seemed 
 actually shifting and promised in time to adjust the weight 
 somewhat evenly between Helen and Mrs. Sidney and Pleasant 
 and Aunt Mattie. 
 
 It was just as the dawn of this new possibility was becom 
 ing apparent that Ferdinand made his call and very unex 
 pectedly witnessed the full sunrise of the new era for Pleas 
 ant. Nay, he even acted as the Apollo who guided the 
 chariot of the ascending luminary above the horizon. 
 
 When he made his carefully calculated remark about the 
 smallness of the house, with the accompanying supposition 
 that Aunt Mattie probably intended to live elsewhere, a sud 
 den change was visible in Pleasant Mabie. The universally 
 addressed apology which had been apparent in the droop 
 of every dejected muscle of his frame for weeks past dis 
 appeared. His mild and plaintive voice took on a ring which 
 startled Mrs. Sidney so much that she put on her glasses to 
 look at him. 
 
 "If this house is too small, my boys can sleep out in the 
 barn with me, and we will, from now on. We re the ones to 
 get out. I allow I m not a shining success in life, but I ain t
 
 380 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 got down yet to turning women out of doors because they re 
 old and crippled and only related to me by marriage." 
 
 There was a dead silence after this unequivocal speech. 
 
 At last Pleasant had succeeded in giving expression to 
 the meaning of the grandiloquent letters to Ferdinand which 
 an instinct of true literary criticism had forbidden him to 
 send. He was conscious even as he spoke of the difference 
 between the literary style and the vernacular, and he re 
 gretted bitterly the lack of dignity and impressiveness which 
 necessary haste demanded. If he only could have remem 
 bered those few good sentences which in calmer moments he 
 had been able to cull out of the diffuse body of his late liter 
 ary labors ! The consciousness that he was not fully rising 
 to the opportunity Fate had granted him made him much 
 more uncompromising in facial expression and bodily de 
 meanor than he otherwise would have been, and so, all inno 
 cently, he demonstrated the true value of rhetorical compo 
 sition. He was perfectly clear upon what he wanted to say 
 and had gone over all the ways in which it ought not to be 
 said. At last what he had been toiling to draw out suddenly 
 burst forth of its own accord, rampant, unattended by the 
 rosy graces and the flying hours. 
 
 Helen heard and flushed, then turned white. Mrs. Sidney 
 stared as though Pleasant had become a specter. Aunt 
 Mattie was carefully measuring the distance between her 
 chair and the door, deliberating whether she could make it 
 alone or not. Pleasant instantly rose, with a flourish of fury 
 and loathing in Ferdinand s direction, and said with genuine 
 solicitude to the cripple, "Come out into the kitchen, Aunt 
 Mattie. You can stir the samp while I m setting the table." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney made a motion as if to rise, but Helen stopped 
 her with a sign, and Pleasant and Aunt Mattie made their 
 exit in state, closing the door after them. 
 
 Shortly after this untoward interruption Ferdinand 
 brought his call to an end and left the house to return home. 
 
 It was with a feeling of intense dissatisfaction that he 
 turned to give a last look at the dilapidated place as he
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 381 
 
 drove away. Kitty Mabie stood in the doorway looking after 
 him. The only emotion apparent on her face was one of curi 
 osity at his spring coat. She regarded him no more than she 
 would have any other stranger who had made a passing call. 
 Her straight young figure was disagreeably suggestive of a 
 reincarnation of her grandmother, and Ferdinand s last im 
 pression as he went around the curve of the road was one of 
 family defiance which would one day be younger and stronger 
 than he was. As he passed through Kent, Ferdinand told the 
 driver to take him by Agnes old home. This, at least, he had 
 been able to dispose of to the advantage of the unthankful. 
 
 As he neared the place he at first failed to recognize it. 
 The new occupant had painted it, taken away the fence, 
 and built on a wide veranda. The blinds had not been rehung. 
 The evergreen which had banked the house had disappeared. 
 Ferdinand noticed these changes with approval. 
 
 As he was about to continue on his way he was startled 
 by the appearance of the next house. He cast a bewildered 
 look about him to get his bearings, thinking he had made a 
 mistake in locating Agnes old home. He had made no mis 
 take Malthus sign over the door was proof of that and 
 yet right alongside, just across the alley, stood what seemed 
 to be an apparition of Dr. Sidney s old home, with all its 
 familiar features unchanged. It was as though, with the 
 arrival of Malthus veneered personality, the spirit of the 
 Sidney home had gone over to the next house, taking the ex 
 ternal characteristics of its accustomed abiding place with it. 
 There were the Sidney evergreens thriftily stacked in a corner 
 of the yard, there were the old Sidney blinds. Ferdinand noted 
 with chagrin the similarity in shape of the two houses, while, 
 to complete the resemblance, Dr. Sidney s original sign was 
 hung out on the wing corresponding to the office of the 
 old house. Under Dr. Sidney s name, in modest letters, he 
 read the legend: 
 
 MARCUS QUIKK. 
 
 It was several seconds before Ferdinand realized what
 
 382 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 had taken place. An old-fashioned buggy, drawn by a 
 familiar horse and driven by a familiar figure, at this moment 
 drove up before the gate and hastened in him the discovery 
 that Quinn had merely moved into the next house, taking all 
 the doctor s prestige with him along with the evergreens and 
 blinds and horse and buggy. As he looked more sharply at 
 the stolid figure sitting in the buggy an unpleasant sen 
 sation of recognition was aroused by the sight of an 
 appreciative grin upon a face which he now knew to be that 
 of Quinn himself. 
 
 Quinn ducked his head, and then began to climb heavily over 
 the wheels of the buggy. Ferdinand touched his hat, and 
 sharply ordered his driver to start on,, 
 
 As he passed Quinn the possibility of the doctor s pur 
 chasing this new but unmistakable Sidney home flashed upon 
 him. His incorrigible mother-in-law and her insane and pig 
 headed accomplice, Quinn, could not be broken in. After all 
 he had done they still managed to get the better of him. Fer 
 dinand, who calculated not on sentiment, was unaware of the 
 loss and grief weighing down the hearts of those who loved 
 every timber of the old house, and who found the new one 
 but a dreary substitute. 
 
 Ferdinand looked at his watch and hurried up the driver. 
 He had another call to make before going to the station, and 
 his time was short. He was in a bitterly discontented frame 
 of mind. 
 
 As he passed the bank, and, looking in, caught sight of 
 Fred Sidney s bent head, it reminded him of another annoy 
 ing thing. He no longer heard any talk of Fred s getting 
 a divorce from Beatrice. Ferdinand did not acknowledge 
 to himself that there was any malice in his desire to have 
 the separation go through. He would have been incensed 
 at anyone s daring to suggest that he had desired and sought 
 to bring about so unequivocal an acknowledgment from 
 Fred Sidney that his marriage had been a mistake, or that he 
 would have been still more glad to humiliate and socially 
 ostracize Beatrice Sidney. He had not asked himself why
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 383 
 
 he had been so ill-humored at his wife s and Donald s perse 
 vering efforts to break up the relation between Beatrice and 
 Tom, nor why this ill-humor had deepened into settled irrita 
 tion at Tom s interrupted but on the whole growing attempts 
 to get back again into business habits. 
 
 "Is it up this street, sir?" asked the driver, who was un 
 acquainted in Kent. 
 
 Ferdinand roused himself to answer in the affirmative, and, 
 as his eye caught sight of the Bucher residence a little up the 
 side street into which the carriage was turning, his thoughts 
 took a new and pleasanter direction. He spoke amiably to 
 the driver as he left the carriage and turned toward the old- 
 fashioned mansion. " There s a livery three blocks to the 
 left. Go down and wait there for a half hour." Then he 
 opened the wicket-gate and went in. 
 
 Ferdinand s call upon Mr. Bucher was ostensibly a busi 
 ness one, merely one of the periodic conferences which had 
 been taking place for some time between them. 
 
 The long acquaintanceship between the two families had 
 become a personal relation between Ferdinand and the banker 
 ever since the former had begun to lend the bank money. 
 This relation dated from the time when Ferdinand relieved 
 Bucher of Mrs. Sidney s home. Ferdinand s surface amiabil 
 ity, which he not uncommonly employed in financial dealings 
 with outsiders whose prospects for the long run were good, 
 was in Bucher s case colored not only by far-sighted policy, 
 but by .personal motives into which even he himself never in 
 quired too curiously. From the first he had measured his 
 man, and he took with the Kent banker an exactly opposite 
 method from that by which he had hastened Balch s ruin in 
 Winston. He had advanced Bucher small sums of money 
 upon several occasion, taking desirable security, and he had 
 shown such patience and consideration as a creditor that Mr. 
 Bucher never could be convinced that the rumors of Ferdi 
 nand s severity with Mrs. Sidney were true. There must 
 have been something behind it all, he said. 
 
 The crisis of the old gentleman s obligation to Ferdinand
 
 384 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 had occurred recently, and it was one which had descended 
 upon him so suddenly that he hardly realized the danger he 
 had met and passed till it was over and he found himself prac 
 tically in Ferdinand Ballington s control. Ever since the 
 marriage of Beatrice Mott to Fred Sidney the Kent bank 
 had had the use of a share of the Mott wealth. Dealings had 
 commenced with the General himself and had been continued 
 by Beatrice. It struck dismay to the anxious banker when 
 some weeks before, following the sale of Mrs. Sidney s home, 
 Beatrice Sidney, with much talk, direct and indirect, had 
 withdrawn the Mott funds from Bucher s bank. The blow, 
 coming as it did at a time of financial depression, would have 
 put an end not only to Fred s clerkship but to Bucher s busi 
 ness existence, hafl not relief providentially been sent from an 
 unexpected quarter. No less a friend than Mrs. Sidney s 
 much-defamed son-in-law came to Bucher s assistance and 
 saved the bank from going under. " I would not be dis 
 turbed by anything Sidney s wife can say," Ferdinand re 
 marked reassuringly to the worried and conscience-stung old 
 friend of Dr. Sidney s. " She s going the same way her 
 father did." 
 
 Ferdinand would not have allowed himself the indulgence 
 of foiling Beatrice had he not thought himself financially 
 safe in his venture; but of this he was assured. Bucher was 
 getting old and he had his hands on a good deal of very de 
 sirable property, which might just as well pass into Balling- 
 ton control as into a stranger s. Ferdinand consequently 
 had permitted himself to carry over the harassed banker, 
 and during the process he had obtained a marked ascendency 
 over the older man s mind. The good but obtuse German, 
 who through his prime had unconsciously been guided by 
 his friend and neighbor, Dr. Sidney, now as unconsciously 
 fell under the influence of his old friend s son-in-law. How 
 much financial dependence aided in the banker s failure to 
 read Ferdinand he was himself unaware. He was loaded down 
 with anxieties, first among which were his unmarried daugh 
 ter and the, large family of growing children left him by his
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 385 
 
 second wife, and after them the hard-working Kent men and 
 women who had trusted him with their savings. 
 
 As Ferdinand entered, the banker rose, coughing, from a 
 lounge drawn up before the fire and came forward to greet 
 his visitor. 
 
 Mary Bucher, who sat sewing near her father, also rose 
 and quietly left the room. She never remained when Ferdi 
 nand called, and he not infrequently had felt dimly that the 
 mild and motherly girl who managed the banker s home was 
 as instinctively distrustful of him as her father was instinc 
 tively subservient. 
 
 "I have been out to the farm to see Mrs. Sidney," said 
 Ferdinand, accepting the banker s invitation to sit by the 
 grate, " and I had a half hour to put in before returning to 
 Winston." 
 
 The tone of domestic intimacy gratified Mr. Bucher, and 
 he responded by encouraging his guest s confidence. There 
 was some talk of the family on the farm, then of Fred Sidney, 
 and at last, as was usual, of Beatrice. 
 
 At mention of her name the banker s face clouded. He 
 never had approved wholly of Beatrice or of his daughter s 
 friendship with her. He had been surprised at her engage 
 ment to Fred Sidney, and never knew that his repugnance to 
 the marriage was partly because he, like Mrs. Sidney, had 
 drifted into the conclusion that some time his own daughter 
 Mary would marry Dr. Sidney s nephew. He had seen and 
 feared Beatrice s social influence in Kent, and had known 
 better than anyone else what Fred had suffered in his home. 
 His German sense of what was a woman s duty in life had 
 long been violated by the way in which Beatrice Sidney con 
 ducted herself, and lastly there was his perturbed conscious 
 ness of the lawless woman s open defiance and injury of him 
 self. It was with real apprehension for Fred, as well as with 
 a subconscious recognition of righteous retribution coming 
 upon Beatrice, that he listened to some new disclosures which 
 Ferdinand now made. 
 
 When the half hour was up, Ferdinand left the house with
 
 386 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 a feeling of satisfaction. He knew from the banker s face 
 what was in his mind, and he was reasonably certain that any 
 new indiscretion on the part of Beatrice would decide Fred s 
 employer to advise and once more set forward the divorce 
 which Sidney himself so weak-mindedly had let lie. 
 
 He arrived at the station just in time for the train and 
 made his way home without incident.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 HPHE grudgingly told news which her husband brought back 
 from the farm convinced Agnes better than any willing 
 account would have done that Ferdinand s plans for her 
 mother s and sister s families had miscarried. A feeling of 
 hope and returning energy was born in her with the realiza 
 tion that the family fortunes had touched their lowest point 
 and were beginning to rise. Her relief assisted her to make 
 a determined effort herself to fight against the despair of her 
 own situation. She refused to succumb to her growing 
 physical disability, and even made its enforced leisure tribu 
 tary to her mental development. She had been writing for 
 some time and had been undiscouraged in her attempts to 
 gain recognition. It had seemed, too, like a confirmation of 
 the legitimacy of her desires that this winter for the first 
 time bits of verse and one or two prose articles had been pub 
 lished in the magazines and were winning favorable comment. 
 The letters from her mother and sister were regular and hope 
 ful. Miriam, who was in Paris studying, was sending a 
 weekly budget of stimulating comment upon men and events 
 in the French capital. 
 
 This contact with the larger current of life kept Agnes 
 from brooding too much upon her individual eddy. Imper 
 sonal rumors of war, of international jealousy, of diplomatic 
 intrigue, that appeared in the newspapers took on a vivid and 
 dramatic interest at the touch of Miriam s pen. She had met 
 this German prince and that French diplomat at a soiree 
 which came off after the long secret interview where they 
 had decided the fate of an oriental kingdom, and she told 
 in her whimsical way how all the company were agog to read 
 in the inscrutable social masks which the famous men put 
 on with their decorations, which of them had been worsted, 
 or if it were true that a challenge had been offered and ac- 
 
 387
 
 388 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 cepted during the heat of the Interview. On the margin or 
 at the head of a page might be a sketch of the unofficial Papal 
 legate, whose fixed smile and drooping eyes proclaimed more 
 eloquently than words the Papal attitude toward the re 
 public. In close juxtaposition to the diaphanous Italian 
 would stolidly stand the sluggish, fat, fez-topped inertia of 
 the last Turkish envoy-extraordinary sent over to beg off 
 for burning some French consular establishment anywhere 
 between the Red Sea and Macedonia. There were apologetic 
 criticisms of the last opera and the last play, and dogmatic 
 assertions about the salon pictures and statues. All this 
 served to keep so much of the full-resounding roar of the 
 great world constantly in Agnes ears that she was able to 
 submerge the insistent throbbing of her own single string 
 in the great sea of sound. 
 
 But there came hours in the silence of the night when the 
 great world seemed swinging far off in space around its pre 
 scribed orbit while she was but a wandering fragment be 
 longing to no world lost in chaos. Strive as she might to 
 lose the consciousness of herself in the care for others, she 
 could not keep out of her mind her spiritual loneliness and 
 that ever present question: * Am I winning or am I failing? " 
 
 Except in the night, however, Agnes did not have much 
 leisure to search her own soul. In one direction her fore 
 bodings had been fully realized. She was kept constantly 
 occupied making intercourse possible between her husband 
 and their children. Ferdinand s inability to realize the im 
 maturity of mind and disposition in the children made him 
 cruelly harsh in his treatment of them. His rules were so 
 many, and the infringement of them consequently so inevi 
 table, and Estelle and Stephen lived in a kind of peon 
 age, slaves to a constantly renewed penalty. Then, too, 
 much as she loved Aunt Margaret, the latter s furtive and 
 well-meant indulgences often forcibly recalled to Agnes 
 mind Estelle Landseer s solution of her similar dilemma. 
 Ferdinand s mother had taken her child and gone away for 
 a time. Unfortunately no such course was open to Agnes.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 389 
 
 In one respect, however, Agnes personal endeavor seemed 
 slowly tending toward success. In conjunction with Donald, 
 she was encouraging Tom s wavering alienation from Bea 
 trice. She could not work upon Beatrice directly on account 
 of Ferdinand s command that there should be no intercourse 
 between tlje families, and even Tom she could not see as often 
 as she wished because of Ferdinand s and his mutual dislike. 
 Donald she saw often, and the seriousness of their common 
 object sometimes made her ignore and sometimes blinded her 
 to her husband s cynical toleration of his business partner s 
 visits. It had been a great relief to her that Fred had tacitly 
 dropped the subject of divorce, for she realized that time 
 seemed to promise everything now. She began to look back 
 with increasing hope to that early conversation she as a girl 
 had with Beatrice, wherein she had been convinced of the 
 latter s affection for Fred. 
 
 As spring advanced, the willows bordering the lake slowly 
 brightened into yellow flame. A green mist gathered about 
 the gray branches of the trees, and the air grew balmy. 
 Agnes spent much time out of doors with her children. She 
 never had been so poignantly grateful for the spring, and 
 day after day the little group traced the almost impercep 
 tible arrival of the flowers and foliage and birds. These were 
 the friends Agnes was teaching her children to live with. 
 Each day they eagerly brought her new blossoms, and, every 
 night before she put them to bed, they lingered long at the 
 nursery window watching the home-coming of the birds 
 through the lengthening twilight. A pair of robins had 
 made their nest in the poplar tree outside. A shy catbird 
 lived somewhere in the garden shrubbery, but they never had 
 been able to find its nest. Under the eaves of the old barn 
 dwelt a colony of swallows. Stephen knew the robins and 
 swallows, and Estelle could recognize them all on the wing, 
 and while they watched for the dark flitting spots coming 
 swiftly homeward through the sunlit air of evening, their 
 mother told them of the wooing and loyalty of the little 
 ae real families.
 
 390 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 It seemed to Agnes that her emotions were more and more 
 withdrawing themselves from the social world, and that she 
 was drifting, with her children, into a life where the sweet and 
 kindly instincts of nature ruled with wise harmony. But one 
 day, late in May, a shock precipitated her back into the 
 chaos created by human passion. A messenger boy brought 
 her the following letter from Fred Sidney: 
 
 MY DEAR COUSIN: 
 
 At our last meeting I promised to tell you before I committed myself 
 irrevocably to the course of breaking up my home. Accordingly this 
 is to acquaint you with my decision before I put it into execution. It 
 is impossible any longer for me to ignore my plain duty. Bucher 
 advised me some months ago, as I told you, to arrange a divorce, 
 although he believes that divorce should be a last resort. 
 
 It seemed to me during the past weeks as though my wife were trying 
 to put up with me and the bank, but an interview I had with her last 
 night put an end to hope of compromise. 
 
 I had a talk with Bucher yesterday afternoon, which was occasioned 
 by Tom s visit down here last Sunday, and he very reluctantly told me 
 something which confirmed what I had heard before, but had forced 
 myself to disbelieve. Bucher said he had proof that Tom and Beatrice 
 were originally engaged, and he told me what had broken it off. I 
 don t believe the latter, nor do I trust the source from which I believe 
 it came to him, but it was something that may become true any day if 
 I do not give my unhappy and desperate wife the release which she 
 craves. 
 
 Beatrice has told me in the past that she wished she had married 
 Tom. I went home and asked her if she would seriously make that 
 statement, or if she would retract it. She became angry, said that she 
 would not retract it, and, more than that, that the next time she would 
 say it in a way I could not misunderstand. I then told her that I would 
 relieve her from that necessity by getting out of her way in other 
 words, by " deserting her." When I said this, she insulted me by telling 
 me that I might as well speak out plainly and say that I wanted to 
 marry Mary Bucher. Nothing that I could say diverted her from this 
 interpretation of my motive, and I can only conclude that she put it 
 forward as a pretext to further our alienation. 
 
 I left my wife s house yesterday and am now leaving town. 
 
 Do not imagine that my own affairs keep me from thinking often 
 of you. I hope you are well and brave, and that some time in after 
 years when we have fought our struggle to the end and have forgotten 
 somewhat its agony we shall, doubtless, talk life over and find that it 
 means something good after all. 
 
 I haven t worried Aunt Kate with my matters. 
 
 Your affectionate cousin, 
 
 FRED SIDNEY.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 391 
 
 As she dropped the letter in her lap Agnes realized with 
 terror that hours had elapsed since Fred wrote it and that 
 Beatrice s passionate nature would be likely to have ex 
 pressed itself at once in some reckless and irrevocable deed. 
 Her instant thought was to get to Beatrice to make her wait. 
 She realized at once with a woman s instinct the hurt pride 
 and furious disappointment which lay behind Beatrice s 
 taunt. She knew, too, as Fred did not, although Beatrice 
 did, that Mary Bucher had loved him. She was dismayed at 
 this talk of Beatrice s long love for Tom, and wondered at 
 Fred s confirmed blindness. 
 
 Much as she wanted to see Beatrice she was not able to 
 make the hurried trip to Kent, and after a moment s hesita 
 tion she decided to get Beatrice to come to her. She knew 
 that it would be no easy task to overcome Beatrice s objec 
 tion to re-enter Ferdinand s house, and she also knew that 
 Ferdinand would attempt to turn her out if he should find 
 her there. But too much was at stake not to risk embarrass 
 ing consequences. 
 
 Agnes went to the telephone, asked to be connected with 
 Kent, and waited in an agony of suspense after ringing up 
 Beatrice. If she were not in her home, where would she be? 
 Agnes heart went out to her cousin s wife, who, with all her 
 money, was alone in the world. Mrs. Sidney was no longer in 
 Kent, and she well knew that Beatrice s proud spirit would 
 seek counsel or sympathy from nobody else. 
 
 Agnes heart was beating so as almost to suffocate her 
 when she heard at length Beatrice s well-known voice. She 
 was evidently calling to someone in her own hall. Agnes 
 heard her say, " No, no, not that one. My suit-case, the tan 
 suit-case. It s all packed." 
 
 A moment later there was a sharp and stern " Hello " 
 through the receiver. It was followed by an ominous silence 
 when Beatrice learned who was speaking to her. Then came 
 the laconic question, " Well, what can I do for you? " 
 
 Agnes voice trembled, but she answered at once : " You 
 remember the last time you were here you told me to come
 
 392 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 to you if I was in trouble. I am in very great trouble. I can 
 not get to my mother and I want you to come to me at once. 
 You must not refuse me this. It s a life-and-death matter. 
 I m not able to come to you or I would. You can just catch 
 the next train." 
 
 She paused and held her breath for the answer. 
 
 There was a wait; then the same laconic voice inquired, 
 " Are you sure it s me you want ? " 
 
 " Yes. You have just time to get the train." 
 
 There was another pause. 
 
 " All right. I ll get it," came the answer, and there was 
 the clang of the receiver hung up. 
 
 With a revulsion of feeling almost too great to endure, 
 Agnes left the telephone, ordered the carriage to meet the 
 train upon its arrival, sent Miss Margaret out for the after 
 noon, and then dispatched a note to Donald, telling him to 
 detain Ferdinand at the office until six o clock that afternoon. 
 Then she composed herself to wait as best she could. 
 
 An hour later the doorbell rang. Agnes answered it her 
 self, although she knew it was too soon for Beatrice. Strange 
 things of all kinds were ready to happen. This would be one. 
 It was a note from Donald, and a few sentences, simple as 
 they were, made her feel that his anxiety was as active as 
 her own. 
 
 Ferdinand will be detained to-night by a necessary inspection of the 
 shops. Crowell was hurt to-day. Tom quit work before noon. He 
 has been strange all yesterday and to-day. There is a telegram from 
 Kent waiting for him at the office now. D. 
 
 Agnes read the letter twice, then burned it. A new fear 
 leaped into her mind as she put together Beatrice s remark 
 about the packed suit-case and the waiting telegram to Tom. 
 What did it mean? Would Beatrice really come to her at 
 Winston as she had promised? Where was Tom? 
 
 A moment later she rang up the shops and tried to speak 
 to Donald, but learned that both he and her husband were 
 with the mortally injured Crowell.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 393 
 
 Agnes went back to her watching, wondering what would 
 happen next. It seemed as though her preternaturally active 
 mind might have prophesied poor Crowell s disaster before 
 the news had reached her. The minutes at length brought 
 round the hour when Beatrice should arrive. Still Agnes 
 looked through the green-room window minute by minute for 
 an hour .over time. She would have given up hope of Bea 
 trice s coming had it not been for the fact that the carriage 
 had not returned. That meant that the train was late. Oh, 
 why should it be late to-day of all days ! 
 
 Suddenly the telephone rang furiously. Agnes answered 
 it, and Donald s voice, clear and low, spoke to her. "The 
 gentleman has just left for home. It was impossible to keep 
 him longer. I must find Tom." 
 
 Agnes hung up the receiver and leaned against the wall 
 to steady herself. In twenty minutes Ferdinand would be 
 there. 
 
 At the instant of this realization she heard the sound of the 
 returning carriage. She hurried to the door, threw it open, 
 and saw Beatrice coming up the steps. An overpowering 
 relief and gratitude to the loyal friend surged over Agnes. 
 Her fears had been groundless, she thought, but a moment 
 later they came back augmented. Beatrice kissed her fever 
 ishly, and her first words were a strange mingling of tender 
 ness and excitement. 
 
 " I can stay here only twenty-five minutes, Agnes. I have 
 to get the next train. Be quick and tell me what has 
 happened." 
 
 An intuition flashed like lightning upon Agnes with the 
 words. " She has already seen Tom somewhere on her way 
 to the house," she thought.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 AGNES reached around Beatrice and closed the door. 
 " You were good to come," she said twice, not with nerv 
 ousness, but with a kind of solemnity. Then she pushed open 
 the door of the green room and motioned Beatrice in. 
 
 They looked at each other silently, both standing. During 
 the journey Beatrice had run over many possible situations 
 in her mind, but they all pointed to the conclusion that Agnes 
 had determined to leave Ferdinand, and she now scrutinized 
 Agnes with a sharpness which haste rendered unequivocal. 
 Agnes, on her side, returned the searching look, and she 
 found herself even more moved than she had expected to be 
 by Beatrice s appearance. Beatrice s face was pale, haggard, 
 grim, and an uncontrollable anxiety showed in every move 
 ment. Agnes felt distinctly that her cousin s wife was at 
 her wits ends and ready to do any reckless thing which might 
 come into her head. The girl-fondness she had felt for 
 Beatrice, the long and silent gratitude she had given her 
 mother s friend, and the late womanly sympathy which she 
 had repressed with difficulty, came over her now, together. 
 Emphasizing all these was the look she saw growing in 
 Beatrice s eyes. Agnes wished to take this friendless woman 
 to her heart while she pled with her, and now she saw in 
 Beatrice s eyes the same maternal yearning encircling her 
 self a yearning so unwonted there, that Agnes, her faculties 
 on edge by reason of the graveness of the situation, thought 
 the look incongruous, even grotesque. A quick reaction, 
 however, softened her heart with pity for Beatrice, for 
 herself, for all poor failures, made not by crime but by lack 
 of vision. It was some moments before either of them 
 spoke. Then Beatrice wiped her eyes, turned resolutely 
 to the lounge, sat down and reached instinctively for her 
 chatelaine. She thought she knew why she was there, and she 
 
 394
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 395 
 
 was valiantly endeavoring to collect her faculties and bear 
 the brunt of that conversation to which she had been 
 summoned. 
 
 " I knew it would come some time, Agnes," she said, 
 unclasping the net-work of gold that hung from her girdle. 
 " It s better over with. I wish to God it had come before. 
 Things might but perhaps it is just as well. Sit down, 
 dearest. How many you have left who really love you. 
 
 There s your mother and your sister and your aunt " 
 
 She halted, then went on. "There s Fred, too. He thinks 
 the world of you. Now listen. I ve got everything all 
 planned. I want you to go right to my house and stay with 
 Fred. Here are the keys." She pressed the ring of keys 
 into Agnes hand with the unconscious whole-heartedness 
 which characterized her whenever she was giving. 
 
 Agnes saw in her face a kind of fierce comfort which soft 
 ened temporarily its reckless expression. The thought that 
 Beatrice with entire self-forgetfulness was feeling a happi 
 ness because she was able to help Fred, whom she was leav 
 ing, and also Agnes, who had tacitly, at least, cast her off, 
 filled Agnes heart to overflowing. She saw, too, that in 
 undeceiving Beatrice she would take away the only comfort 
 left to her. Yet it must be done. 
 
 While she waited, Beatrice went on. " I stopped down 
 town and cashed a check. The bank was closed, but old 
 Tompkins cashed it for me. I m going to leave half with 
 you. We can settle about the future, later. It s too late 
 for you to go to my house to-night. Go in the morning," 
 she drew a deep breath and finished with disguised bitter 
 ness " and at last I guess Aunt Kate will come there, too." 
 Then she checked her thoughts from dwelling upon her long 
 disappointment over Mrs. Sidney s persistent refusal to live 
 with her, and repeated gently the question she had asked on 
 entering the house, " Tell me what has happened." 
 
 Agnes passed by the question and took up her cousin s 
 words. " I have made up my mind that I shall come to your 
 house, but it shall be to see you as well as Fred," she
 
 396 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 said earnestly. " Beatrice, why do you say to stay with 
 Fred ?" 
 
 " I said we would plan about the future later," returned 
 Beatrice restlessly. " I m going off on a trip. There isn t 
 time to talk about that now. I ll write." 
 
 The packed suit-case, the telegram to Tom, his sudden 
 disappearance, Donald s worry, and this prospective trip of 
 Beatrice s confirmed Agnes fear. If she was to accomplish 
 anything, she must do it at once. 
 
 She clasped her cousin s hands with infinite pleading. " It 
 hasn t been right for us to be separated as we have been. I 
 never shall let it occur again. Oh, Beatrice, things have been 
 going wrong all wrong wrong for everybody. We all 
 have been to blame. But it isn t too late yet. That s why 
 I sent for you. I couldn t come to Kent, or I should have 
 done so, but as soon as I m up from this " 
 
 " What are you talking about ? " interrupted Beatrice 
 brusquely. Then suspicion for the first time entered her 
 mind. " Aren t you going to leave Ferdinand ? " She turned 
 threateningly as she put the question. The tenderness went 
 out of her face, and left it sharp. 
 
 " No," said Agnes slowly, not releasing Beatrice s hands. 
 
 There was a flare of color in Beatrice s face and eyes, and 
 her voice rang ominously. 
 
 " Then why did you send for me?" She was on her feet 
 and stood poised waiting for the answer as for a signal. 
 
 Agnes fingers closed with no uncertain grip over the arm 
 she still held. "You have a right to be angry with me, 
 Beatrice, but you re here and you must listen to me. Fred 
 and you both have been wrong, but you are going to ruin 
 yourselves now and needlessly, needlessly. Fred has loved 
 you always, and he does still." 
 
 " What do you mean by getting me down here to meddle in 
 my business ! " cried Beatrice passionately, trying to free 
 herself from Agnes hold. "Look at your own!" She was 
 as rough as she dared to be, but apprehension for Agnes com 
 pelled her to hold down her fury.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 397 
 
 Agnes drew Fred s letter from her dress and forced it 
 before his wife. Beatrice sprang back from her violently as 
 she felt the hold on her arm loosen, and the paper fell on the 
 floor between them. 
 
 "You must read that letter before you go! It is that 
 which made me send for you ! " 
 
 The agony of insistence in Agnes voice checked Beatrice. 
 She glanced down at the paper, recognized Fred s hand 
 writing, and with a gesture of refusal turned instantly to the 
 door. 
 
 " Fred is not doing chis ! Other people are forcing him ! 
 Mr. Bucher is one ! You don t know what is going on ! " 
 Agnes voice was strained and tuneless as she raised it in a 
 forlorn hope. 
 
 Beatrice s hand was on the door. At the name of Mr. 
 Bucher her face blazed vindictively. " Bucher s always had 
 Fred. He can have him in the bank to all eternity. Besides, 
 do you think I am made to live with a man who is influenced 
 by his employer against his wife ! " 
 
 She turned the knob. Agnes rose. A faintness passed 
 over her and left her face gray. Her lips opened, but she 
 said nothing. 
 
 Beatrice put out her arm to support her. "Who is here 
 to take care of you? Where s the bell? I ll ring." 
 
 "Wait, Beatrice!" said Agnes. She shivered. "Ferdi 
 nand has done this. He is using Bucher to ruin you. Oh, 
 do not let him ! " 
 
 Beatrice stood quite still. Then she turned around and 
 leaned her back against the door, her hand behind her still 
 on the knob. " So! " she said. At last another person had 
 said in plain words the truth about Ferdinand, and this per 
 son his own wife. A new expression was coming into her 
 face. A new current of passion had struck across her wild 
 resentment toward her husband, and momentarily she was 
 adrift between the two. Agnes heart began to beat heavily 
 with hope. There was a glimmer of returning attention in 
 Beatrice s eyes, a suggestion of struggling will-power in her
 
 398 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 voice when a moment later she said quickly, but in a low tone, 
 " Tell me what you know ! " 
 
 " This is what I believe," said Agnes, pale but unflinch 
 ing, " and Fred s letter has confirmed it." 
 
 Beatrice s eyes took on a steadiness and glitter. 
 
 " Since mother s house was sold Mr. Bucher and Ferdinand 
 have been in very close relations. There is nothing in which 
 Ferdinand s opinion does not direct the old man. Hear 
 what Fred writes." She stooped suddenly and picked up the 
 discarded letter. 
 
 Beatrice waited without stirring, and Agnes read aloud: 
 " It is impossible for me any longer to ignore my plain duty. 
 Bucher advised me some months ago 
 
 Beatrice stirred impatiently, and Agnes hurried on, skip 
 ping here and there. " Bucher said he had proof that Tom 
 and Beatrice were originally engaged, and he told me what 
 had broken it off. I don t believe the latter, nor do I trust 
 the source from which I believe it came to him." 
 
 Agnes hand dropped to her side, but her eyes met 
 Beatrice s unwaveringly. 
 
 " There can be no doubt," she went on, " that the source 
 is Ferdinand." 
 
 Rage flamed in Beatrice s face. 
 
 " Of course it s Ferdinand ! " she cried in bitter scorn of 
 her husband. " And I told Fred all about this long before 
 Bucher did, but he believes Bucher s version." 
 
 " No ! no ! " interrupted Agnes. 
 
 " He believes it of me, now ! He has told me so. It s a 
 pity he should be disappointed. When Ferdinand slurred 
 me to Tom, Tom came straight to me and asked me to marry 
 him. He knew what to believe about me. That s the differ 
 ence between him and Fred. I refused Tom because I didn t 
 want him, but since I ve lived with Fred I ve come to appre 
 ciate him better. I could have made something of Tom. 
 I ll do it yet. Fred shall see ! " 
 
 " Beatrice ! " cried Agnes, " don t you see you are going 
 to do yourself what Ferdinand has tried to bring about, and
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 399 
 
 failed? Ferdinand hates Fred almost as much as he hates 
 you. I don t know why. He wants to break up your home." 
 
 Beatrice gave a short laugh, stopped. A thought flashed 
 into her mind. She then looked keenly at Agnes. 
 
 " You want to influence me to go back home. There is one 
 way you can do it. Put on your things, come back with me, 
 tell Fred what you have told me and make him leave Bucher. 
 That will square me off with Ferdinand, I guess." 
 
 As Agnes returned the gaze, she saw dawning in Beatrice s 
 face an expression of triumph. She connected it with 
 Beatrice s threat to Ferdinand the last time she was in his 
 house that his wife should come to her. At last she was 
 seeing her way to accomplish it. 
 
 " Beatrice," Agnes implored, " do you wish to break up 
 my home as the price of preserving yours? You offer to go 
 back for hatred and revenge. What kind of a reunion with 
 Fred will that be?" 
 
 Beatrice clicked her watchcase and turned to the door. 
 
 " Good-by," she said. 
 
 Agnes stepped forward. The determination to say what 
 she was going to say gave a meaning to her gaze which 
 Beatrice respected by delaying. 
 
 " If you take this step, you give the world grounds to say 
 truly what Ferdinand has said falsely. More than all 
 this," Agnes came still nearer as she spoke, " it means 
 life-long suffering to you. You wanted to make Fred happy, 
 and might have made him happy I know you loved 
 him!" 
 
 " Love ! " said Beatrice furiously. " Fiddle-de-dee ! Love 
 hasn t anything to do with our real selves or with the right 
 and wrong of things. You loved Ferdinand, and it made you 
 idiot enough to marry him. You could get on a good deal 
 better with Donald, couldn t you? I dare say you ve thought 
 about that. Well, so can I get on better with Tom than with 
 Fred, and I ve got sense enough to do it ! " 
 
 The reckless words, with their sharp question to herself, 
 shocked Agnes momentarily into silence.
 
 400 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Then she said steadily, "It is true there is something 
 which can overmaster a man and woman when it has little 
 or nothing to do with the real life of the mind or spirit. But 
 that is not love. Love suffereth long and is kind. Oh, 
 Beatrice, the only way to know any happiness in this life is 
 in self-sacrifice. It seems as if we each must give up just the 
 thing we want to keep the most. I know Fred is unyielding. 
 I know how disappointed and how hurt you have been, and 
 how you ve tried " 
 
 The tears rushed to her eyes as she spoke. Beatrice saw 
 them and she put her hand up to her throat, but her eyes 
 were dry. 
 
 Agnes struggled on. " I know that when we re hurt so 
 much when things we long for feel we must have 
 can t be ours it s so hard we give up trying to be good. 
 We sin." 
 
 Her voice was low, no longer strained, but broken rather 
 by suffering, self -revelation, a beseeching so intense that 
 every other feeling was lost in it. 
 
 " So great a sin as this can bring to a woman like you only 
 unending woe. You have tried to do right, but, if you have 
 been unhappy doing that, no words can tell what you will 
 suffer in sinning. There s no other torture so terrible as the 
 consciousness of guilt. You think you are going to live now, 
 but life will be less than nothing to you. I know this, and 
 I would willingly die if I could save you and Fred and Tom 
 from this frightful mistake." 
 
 Agnes voice shook and stopped on the last word. As the 
 two looked at each other, the recklessness of Beatrice was 
 dominated by the endurance of Agnes. The dark face 
 quivered and broke into agony. 
 
 Agnes leaned forward, trembling, to catch the words of 
 self -conquest which she knew were coming. The glory of 
 salvation was almost upon them. 
 
 It was checked by a sound outside. Someone was coming 
 up the front steps. They heard the sound of a key in the 
 lock, the opening and shutting of the front door. They still
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 401 
 
 looked at each other, but their faces changed as they stood 
 listening. 
 
 Ferdinand s step came down the hall, hesitating now and 
 then. Apparently he looked first in the library; then he 
 re-entered the hall and approached the green room. An 
 instant later the knob turned and the door struck against the 
 figure of Beatrice. 
 
 With a faint lifting of the eyebrows at Agnes she moved 
 aside, and Ferdinand entered the room. 
 
 He glanced from Beatrice to his wife, on whom his eyes 
 rested for some moments before he spoke. Then he asked, 
 " Is this visit with your permission ? " 
 
 " It is at my request." 
 
 Ferdinand turned to Beatrice. " In that case, I have only 
 to say to you, Mrs. Sidney, that you may consider your call 
 at an end." 
 
 " Not until I have finished talking to her, Ferdinand," 
 said Agnes, laying a detaining hand upon Beatrice s arm. 
 " She must not go yet. Either leave us here, or I shall take 
 her to my room." 
 
 Beatrice did not speak, but her brows rested over her eyes 
 as she looked at Ferdinand. At the sight of him, the old 
 defiance rose again, gained possession of her and turned the 
 full tide of her new emotions away from the vision of 
 renunciation into a permanent and dangerous enmity. 
 
 There was something terrible even to Ferdinand in the 
 daring, the malignity, and the power of her pose and expres 
 sion. Everything else had sunk into the background as she 
 found herself thus unexpectedly face to face with her foe. 
 He knew that if she could once get an advantage over him 
 she would use it mercilessly. Agnes astounding move in 
 inviting her to his home, coupled with his wife s open opposi 
 tion when discovered, seemed giving Beatrice this dangerous 
 advantage. On the very verge of domestic and social ruin 
 old Mott s daughter had turned into a formidable menace to 
 his own home. Hitherto in his differences with Agnes he had 
 felt assured of his authority and ultimate success. Now, how-
 
 402 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 ever, Agnes seemed uniting with the rebellious nature whom 
 he always had the instinct to crush and thrust out of the 
 way. His anger against Agnes was extreme. 
 
 He made up his mind at once, and he replied instantly, 
 " I forbid you a single word more with this woman. Go up 
 to your room alone." 
 
 There was a moment s dead silence. 
 
 Then Agnes said in a voice equally clear, " Very well, then. 
 Since you compel me to address her only through you, I must 
 ask you if you ever told Mr. Bucher that Beatrice married 
 Fred because you had broken off relations between her and 
 Tom ? If you do not answer, I shall telephone at once to Mr. 
 Bucher and ask him." 
 
 "I shall not allow you to excite yourself, either over a 
 conversation with me, or by telephone with Mr. Bucher," 
 answered Ferdinand. " Mrs. Sidney must leave this house 
 peaceably at once, or I must compel her to leave." The 
 impulse toward brute force was rising within him. 
 
 Beatrice s lip curled. She turned with dignity to Agnes. 
 " Agnes, I m going, but it s not because I m afraid. If you 
 will come with me, I will go home with you. I will give you 
 a suitable income and back you up in whatever you see fit to 
 do. You will be sorry if you don t take my offer." She said 
 the last words slowly and meaningly. A pause followed them. 
 Ferdinand looked at his wife steadily and opened the door. 
 Agnes understood the mute reiteration of his demand upon 
 her. In a flash she saw the intolerable consequences of both 
 alternatives. If she only could know her duty she would do 
 it! Instincts inherited from her ancestry seemed crying out 
 that she must stay. Her passion to save Beatrice wrestled 
 with them, but though Beatrice and Ferdinand both waited 
 for her decision, she did not speak, would not speak, till, word 
 by word, her reason directed what she should say. 
 
 "As soon as I can, I will come to you, Beatrice." 
 
 Ferdinand s voice struck in on the last word. " If you are 
 going, why do you not go now ? " 
 
 Agnes turned toward him. " Because," she replied at
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 403 
 
 once, " I believe you would use it against Beatrice. If I go, 
 I shall go by myself for reasons which are independent of 
 others." 
 
 Beatrice stopped her with a passionate gesture. "Always 
 talk! Nothing but talk! You Sidneys are all alike. You 
 stick by the things that ruin you. You insult and throw 
 away what tries to be good to you. Now, by God ! I ve done 
 with the lot of you ! " 
 
 She rushed out, slamming the door. Agnes called to her 
 and started to follow, but Ferdinand stepped between her and 
 the door, barring the way. Agnes seized his arm and strove 
 with all her strength to fling him aside. He was immovable. 
 They heard the front door torn open, and Beatrice s stum 
 bling steps hurrying down the walk. 
 
 Both knew that she was going to Tom.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 AGNES went to the dining-room and poured herself out a 
 ^ glass of wine. The fear that she might faint and so lose 
 the chances that were left to her to save Beatrice made her 
 move slowly and carefully, but she did not blunder. 
 
 When she returned to the hall she found Ferdinand near 
 the telephone. He anticipated her intention, and spoke to 
 her at once as she came up to it. " Considering your state 
 of mind, I forbid you to use this telephone." 
 
 She turned away from him, rang the bell for her maid, and 
 ordered the horses. 
 
 As the girl was leaving, Ferdinand stopped her. 
 
 " You need not give that order," he said incisively. " You 
 may say instead that my horses are not to leave the barn 
 to-day." 
 
 The girl looked blankly from the mistress to the master of 
 the house. 
 
 Agnes again turned without comment and went upstairs to 
 her room. 
 
 The summons to dinner came while she was gone. Ferdinand 
 disregarded it, and silenced the maid when she came a second 
 time. 
 
 Presently Agnes came down dressed for the street. Ferdi 
 nand was waiting for her in the lower hall. This time she 
 spoke first. " You have gone as far as you can with me, Fer 
 dinand. Do not attempt to stop me from leaving this house. 
 When I come back we will talk things over finally." 
 
 "You shall not leave the house to-day. You are unfit to 
 in every way." The determination of Ferdinand s voice was 
 unmistakable. 
 
 Agnes came up to him and stopped. " I shall leave the 
 
 house at once, Ferdinand. You must let me pass " 
 
 404
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 405 
 
 For answer Ferdinand threw his right arm about her, seized 
 both her hands in his left, and half-carried, half -forced her 
 to the stairs. 
 
 As he put his foot on the first step, Agnes spoke to him. 
 " You hurt me. Let me alone and I will go up quietly." 
 
 He released his hold with a feeling of relief that the turn 
 ing-point had come, supported her up the stairs and to the 
 door of her room. 
 
 As she entered his hand felt for the key ; then he remem 
 bered that one of the children had lost it a few days before 
 and that it had not been replaced. 
 
 Agnes stood in the center of the room watching him. 
 
 As his eyes met hers he spoke deliberately. " I want you to 
 give me your word of honor that you will not leave this room 
 to-night." 
 
 Agnes bowed her head, " I will stay." 
 
 Ferdinand looked at her a moment longer ; then he started 
 to go out. As he was closing the door he turned back, " I will 
 send up your dinner, and if there is anything that you desire 
 I will see that you have it." 
 
 He waited for an answer. There was none. 
 
 As he went down the stairs the excitement which had pos 
 sessed him for the last half hour faded, and an anxious 
 foreboding which he never before had known settled upon 
 him. He went into the library, leaving the door open, picked 
 up the evening paper, glanced it over, then went out to the 
 dining-room. 
 
 The children were already at the table eating, and the maid 
 apologetically explained that it was past their dinner hour 
 and that Miss Margaret would not be home till later. Ferdi 
 nand sent Agnes dinner up to her. Then he and the children 
 ate in silence. 
 
 He observed a puzzled expression on the maid s face when, 
 she came downstairs, but he attributed the girl s manner to 
 her mystification at the events of the afternoon. 
 
 After he had finished dinner, he sent the children up to bed, 
 and returned to the library. He had been reading some time,
 
 406 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 when he heard a carriage drive up to the door. Thinking it 
 was Aunt Margaret returning, he read on for a half hour or 
 so. Then his attention was caught by the sound of a second 
 carriage stopping in front of the house. 
 
 He laid down his paper and went uneasily to the door lead 
 ing into the hall. An unsteady hand was fumbling with the 
 latch-key, the carriage drove off, and presently the door 
 opened and his aunt stood on the threshold. 
 
 " I m sorry to be so late, dear," she began, conscious of sin 
 as usual, " but Agnes told me to stay as late as ever I wished." 
 
 Ferdinand turned without replying and went back to the 
 library. Who had come in the first carriage and entered with 
 out ringing? Agnes had gone out while he was at dinner! 
 
 While he stood collecting his thoughts for a renewal of the 
 struggle between them, the maid came and tapped timidly at 
 the door. 
 
 " Mrs. Ballington wishes to see you at once, sir," she said, 
 and withdrew as soon as she had spoken. 
 
 Ferdinand stood a moment longer, then, with a look of 
 determination, turned and went upstairs. 
 
 As he pushed open the door, he saw Agnes sitting before 
 her desk as though she had been writing. The window back 
 of the desk was still open, although the warm spring air had 
 taken on the chill of night. The faintest odor of apple bloom 
 was in the air. As Agnes turned in her chair and looked 
 across the room at her husband, he was aware, as he met her 
 still gaze, of the same coolness and the same faint sweetness 
 in her that seemed to permeate the room. The beauty of 
 outline of her face was conspicuous now that her color was 
 gone. 
 
 " Ferdinand," she said, after a moment during which she 
 had been silently regarding him, " I have sent for the doctor 
 and the nurse to come. I also have sent to Kent for my mother 
 and Dr. Quinn. Miss Elmore ought to be here soon. I 
 wanted to say what I have to say before she comes." 
 
 " You broke your word and left the house while I was at 
 dinner."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 407 
 
 Ferdinand made the statement like an automaton. 
 
 Agnes considered him curiously. " Yes," she said, as 
 though it were a matter of no moment, " I had to go, and 
 there was no other way." 
 
 Ferdinand s anger rose at her indifference. " Agnes," he 
 said sharply, " your repeated lies, disobedience, and deceit 
 have become insupportable. What such a man as Fred Sid 
 ney cannot tolerate in his wife I certainly will not endure in 
 mine. Your conduct to-day can be condoned only on the 
 theory that you are not responsible now. But I tell you, once 
 for all, that no such excuse will serve you in the future. 
 Where did you go after leaving the house? " 
 
 " I went to the livery-stable and hired a boy to drive me to 
 Donald Ballington." 
 
 Ferdinand s face flushed. 
 
 " The man who has repeatedly given you money without 
 my knowledge." 
 
 " Once only, Ferdinand," she corrected him, without emo 
 tion. " It came to me in such a way that it seemed as though 
 I must take it. I used very little of it for myself. It was a 
 wedding-gift to me in my father s name." 
 
 " This is a surprise," said Ferdinand cynically. " Eliza 
 told me of a sum Donald gave you when she left. How do 
 you reconcile that with your statement that he has given you 
 money but once? " 
 
 " The second sum was not for me. It was borrowed by 
 Aunt Margaret. She has nearly paid it back." 
 
 " How much more have you had from him? " persisted Fer 
 dinand brutally. " And what have you given in return ? A 
 good deal has passed between you. I believe that you asked 
 him to keep your husband away from home long enough for 
 you to entertain his brother s mistress." 
 
 Still Agnes regarded her husband with a grave serenity 
 which galled him inexpressibly. Nothing he could say seemed 
 to reach her. " I said Donald has given me money but once," 
 she replied. " I never have done anything for him. I wish 
 I had."
 
 408 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Ferdinand took a step nearer to her. His voice sank to a 
 menace. " Since we are started, you may as well make a clean 
 breast of it. You have several times dropped covert hints, 
 both in your speech and in writing, of things in your past 
 which you could not tell me. In view of what I have found 
 out myself, I insist upon knowing the rest." 
 
 Agnes waited a moment ; then she said slowly, " I am willing 
 to tell you everything now. Donald s gift was one of the 
 things I could not tell you. The other is this. I have always 
 considered that my neglect and giddiness while my mother 
 was away from home were responsible for my father s death." 
 
 Ferdinand waited for her to go on. When she did not, he 
 continued. " Putting together what you have confessed and 
 what I have discovered, the fatal results of your giddiness as 
 a girl, your intimacy after marriage with an old lover, your 
 falsified accounts of household money, your shameless deceit 
 and open defiance of this afternoon, and your unequivocal lie 
 this evening these things, taken together with a perpetual 
 course of politic equivocation, by which you have attempted 
 to baffle me in my control of my own aunt and children, and 
 a swarm of petty swervings of the truth on every conceivable 
 occasion, have brought me to the point at which I can no 
 longer place any reliance upon what you say. Nothing but 
 lack of money has kept you from being a second Beatrice 
 Mott. If you had had her liberty you would be where 
 she is." 
 
 When he stopped Agnes looked at him as though waiting 
 for him to continue. When he did not, she said, without a 
 tremor in her voice, " I know that for just so much as I have 
 sinned I must answer." 
 
 Then a certain exaltation came into her face her father s 
 look. " I have done at last with all that falsehood and equivo 
 cation. I never have been what you say I have, but it is true 
 I have sometimes lied. I always have wanted to be as sincere 
 as my father and as honest as my mother. My marriage with 
 you entangled my relations with everybody so that in order 
 to be true with myself I would have had to injure my mother,
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 409 
 
 my children, my sister, Aunt Margaret and more than one 
 of my best friends. It seemed to me selfish to prefer my honor 
 before their well-being. No one knows what I have suffered. 
 I thought it was inevitable. I see now that my own blindness 
 caused the situation." 
 
 " You have been blind a good deal of the time since I mar 
 ried you," said Ferdinand when she stopped a moment as 
 though considering. 
 
 " Yes," she answered gravely, and paused again. She was 
 listening to another voice than Ferdinand s, which was saying : 
 * You will live in that world more and more, and, though in a 
 different way than you think, I doubt not with me. Far as 
 she had traveled from her father s creed, how irresistibly had 
 she journeyed home to him in that spiritual progress, which 
 now seemed to be the whole of life. 
 
 After a moment she went on again in the same quiet 
 voice : 
 
 " I cannot live with you and be true to anything. There is 
 just one thing we must live our lives for, and that is truth. 
 It isn t joy, no matter how much the soul longs for it, and it 
 isn t love, no matter how dark the world is without it. Nor 
 is it hope or faith, no matter how desolate the life may be 
 that never has found them. With all these things, but with 
 out truth, life is a failure. But without all those, and with 
 truth, life is triumphant. What is done, is done. I know 
 now how to do better." 
 
 Scorn was in Ferdinand s voice as he interrupted, "What 
 is this theatrical announcement for? " 
 
 Agnes stood up with an effort, shut her desk, and leaned 
 against it for a few minutes, her face away from him. 
 
 He knew that she was suffering intense physical pain, and 
 for the first time under such circumstances he felt no sympa 
 thy with her. When at last she turned toward him again, 
 he noticed with the same absence of emotion the exhaustion 
 in her face. 
 
 " The only possible way I could have helped you was to have 
 left you. I have done the worst thing for you as well as for
 
 410 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 all the rest of us by living here. I have attempted to palliate 
 and neutralize what I ought to have renounced, and you have 
 hardened in the course which I accepted. Loyalty is a 
 duty, but only when harmonious with truth and honor. The 
 time has come when I must make my duty square with my 
 conscience. If you had changed, or if I had helped you in 
 any way, I should know that I ought to stay." 
 
 She hesitated. She was studying his face for the last time, 
 and, as she did so, suddenly another face grew out of it the 
 face of Estelle Landseer. How different might have been the 
 course of her husband s life if had not been cut off in 
 infancy from that strong and conscience-ruled mother-love. 
 What miracle might not a mother s love and wisdom achieve 
 if it were allowed space to work! and a third face, that of 
 her little Stephen rose before her. 
 
 An infinite yearning came into her eyes with the revelation 
 at last that Infinite Love is also infinite justice, that He does 
 not express Himself in paradoxes or issue conflicting 
 demands. Her belief was as strong as ever that neither law 
 of man nor death itself could annul the bond of marriage, 
 but she believed, also, that the faithful fulfillment of the law 
 of love demanded not that she stay with her husband, but 
 that she leave him. 
 
 Her next words fell gently, but finally. " I shall have to 
 stay here, Ferdinand, until after our last child is born. 
 Then, to be true to you as much as to myself, I shall take 
 the children and go away." 
 
 " Where do you intend to go ? " 
 
 "To my mother s farm. Afterwards I shall get work." 
 
 Ferdinand laughed, but it was a mirthless laugh. " Don t 
 you know, Agnes," he said, " that a woman who leaves her 
 husband has no claims whatever upon him? He can divorce 
 her." 
 
 "I know that you will divorce me." 
 
 " I can keep the children, too." 
 
 She did not move or speak for some seconds, and Ferdi 
 nand would have felt that at last he could dictate to her, had
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 411 
 
 it not been for the absent expression of Agnes face. Her 
 eyes were resting on a bunch of early dandelions which filled 
 a little mug that stood on the desk. He knew that the chil 
 dren had placed them there that morning, and he noticed that 
 the flowers were shut up for the night. Presently he saw her 
 reach out and touch the closed blossoms gently, but he did 
 not know that the sight of them had carried her mind out 
 beyond the walls which sheltered the sleeping children to the 
 wide, quiet fields where the flowers considered not, yet were 
 watched and fostered by that deliberate and infinite Power 
 which makes forever for beauty and righteousness. Her fin 
 gers closed over the buds involuntarily, as she lifted her eyes 
 again to her husband s. 
 
 " I am not so sure of that," she said. " I shall be able to 
 support them, and my reputation is good." 
 
 She withdrew her hand abruptly, made a slight gesture, 
 half of pain, half of dismissal, then crossed the room slowly 
 to the bed and sat down near the foot. 
 
 " You forget that my reputation is also good," said Ferdi 
 nand harshly. " How will you support my children ? " 
 
 She did not look up. 
 
 " I asked you," he repeated, " how you intend to support 
 my children? Have you consulted Donald? " 
 
 She lifted her head and they faced each other. Ferdinand 
 felt a start of alarm as he caught sight of a glitter in her 
 eyes. It seemed struggling with a darkness which was slowly 
 blotting out intelligence, to leave in her look only the fright 
 of mortal pain. He understood that she was making a su 
 preme effort to keep her mind clear, and he wondered if she 
 had heard or realized the full insult of his question. 
 
 The cloud wavered, receded, and Agnes spirit gathered 
 itself in a brightness so intolerable that Ferdinand glanced 
 away. 
 
 " I have thought it through to the end ! " she said in a voice 
 that shook with a triumph and freedom as unendurable as was 
 the brilliance in her eyes. 
 
 Ferdinand compelled himself to meet her gaze again, and
 
 412 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 after a moment of torture under the supernal radiance that 
 streamed into his shrinking sight, he was conscious of relief. 
 The light in her eyes went out, she looked at him a moment 
 longer, unrecognizing, unseeing, with the wide eyes of the 
 dying, then her head dropped upon the hands which gripped 
 the brass pillar of the bed.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 l\/f IRIAM finished her work in Paris and started for the 
 French coast with a feeling that her future was assured. 
 During the hard-working term of serious apprenticeship in 
 New York her friends had seen that her progress was sure 
 and swift, but she herself had not indulged in many hopes as 
 to her professional career. She had paid quite as much atten 
 tion while she worked to her father s blunt criticisms as she 
 did to those of her masters. During the period in Paris 
 there seemed to come suddenly an ability to make the clay 
 take the shapes she had been possessed to create ever since 
 childhood. Only time and strength were needed now the 
 power of creation in marble and metal was the,re. She chafed 
 at delays necessary to give her body rest. But it was with a 
 different feeling that she turned her face homeward in the 
 spring. The holiday was well earned, and all that she most 
 wished was waiting for her, a sailing trip across the Atlantic 
 with her father, a class reunion at Winston during the sum 
 mer-school session, and then a quiet month with Agnes. 
 
 There were three days before Captain Cass schooner was 
 to reach Brest, and Miriam took the occasion to accept an 
 invitation from some Russian friends to stop in Finistere 
 and visit the governmental laboratories. Professor Kolensky, 
 who had been busy all winter at the Pasteur Institute, was to 
 have charge of the summer-school at Roscoff, and the chance 
 of seeing once more at first hand something of the scientific 
 investigation which always had held her interest, decided 
 Miriam upon the roundabout trip to Brest. 
 
 The Kolenskys met her at the station, and they drove to 
 gether in the diligence down the long road to the little Breton 
 town crowded on a point of land jutting out into the English 
 channel. 
 
 * 413
 
 414 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " This is about the last place in the world to which I ever 
 expected to come," Miriam said as she looked out at the few 
 rows of little stone houses, and then up at the big whitewashed 
 building called " La Maison Blanche," at which they were 
 alighting. 
 
 " We are very Parisian here, though," one of the Profes 
 sor s daughters returned in her mellow French, " and we are 
 to have a table d hote in your honor to-night which will be 
 something magnificent. Here comes Madame Julie now." 
 
 They went up into the large dining-room whose wooden 
 walls were decorated with old china, seaweed, and shells, and 
 Miriam looked with delight at the peasants in their dark suits 
 and blue sashes. 
 
 As they sat down at the table reserved for their party, a 
 man who had been eating alone at a distant table rose and left 
 the room. He did not look toward them, but Miriam caught 
 sight of his back just as he was passing through the door 
 way, and started. " Who is that ? " she asked involuntarily. 
 
 The Kolenskys smiled. Professor Kolensky explained that 
 the man was an American who had gained such an eccentric 
 name for himself in the few days he had been there that 
 Madame Julie had been jesting with them about bringing 
 another American into the house. 
 
 Miriam heard their courteous after-remarks about Ameri 
 cans, abstractedly. When she left the table and walked across 
 the road to the terrace where coffee was being served, she 
 began to look nervously among the guests seated at little 
 stands under the pavilion which stretched across one side of 
 the garden. 
 
 At the very last table at the other end of the terrace her 
 eyes found the American. He was sitting with his back 
 toward the others, his coffee and brandy apparently un 
 touched on the little table before him. He seemed to be only 
 half conscious of his surroundings as he looked at the sea. 
 
 Miriam watched him as she sipped her coffee and heard the 
 Kolenskys eagerly discuss an octopus hunt that was to take 
 place the next morning. After a time she turned to the Pro-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 415 
 
 fessor and said, " I believe that man is someone I know. I 
 am going down to speak to him." 
 
 " Ask him to go octopus hunting with us to-morrow," said 
 the naturalist kindly, in his monotonous treble. 
 
 Miriam walked swiftly down the terrq.ce. Before she 
 reached the end of it she had lost the sense of strangeness 
 and anxiety that she had been feeling as she had watched him 
 a few minutes before. That excitement had changed to one 
 of eagerness. She was going to see him, was going to hear 
 of Agnes and now, instead of waiting six weeks. All the 
 longings she had been holding off ever since she left Paris 
 began to rush in upon her, as she stopped just before his 
 chair. 
 
 " Tom ! " she said. 
 
 The man made a spasmodic shove back from the table and 
 turned around. 
 
 If Miriam had the advantage of Tom in not being taken 
 off her guard, it was more than made up for when she saw 
 his face. She had remembered Tom Ballington s look with 
 pleasure. Whatever shortcomings he had, they had not 
 been registered in his face. That was frank, responsive, 
 and lovable. But she wondered, as she looked at it now, 
 whether it contained more ugliness or more woe. All the 
 ruddy look which she had liked so much seemed to have 
 blackened, and now as the blood rose from his neck, it blotched 
 the skin with purple. 
 
 Tom put up his hand and loosened his collar. 
 
 " Where did you come from? " he blurted out, shaking the 
 glasses as he backed against the table. 
 
 " I came from Paris this evening." 
 
 " How did you know I was here ? " he continued. 
 
 " I did not know it. I saw you just as you were leaving 
 the dining-room." She added after a moment, " Can we not 
 go somewhere and talk? " 
 
 Tom looked out at the ocean again. " I walk along the 
 shore every night," he said. 
 
 " Let me go with you. I will explain to the Kolenskys."
 
 416 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Tom took a step forward to stop her. She noticed it and 
 looked at him inquiringly. " They are the Russian family I 
 am visiting," she said as he did not speak. 
 
 " Don t mention my name to them," Tom said huskily. 
 
 Miriam looked at him earnestly. 
 
 " I am registered here by the name of Pond," he added, 
 and an agonized expression came into his sullen eyes, which he 
 forced to meet hers. 
 
 Miriam bowed gravely. 
 
 When she returned to him he had collected himself some 
 what, but his embarrassment was still so great that it affected 
 her also. 
 
 " You might not like to be seen walking with me," he said, 
 hesitating to make the move toward the gate. 
 
 Miriam made it herself, and he followed a step or two 
 behind her. They went down to the shore without exchanging 
 a word. 
 
 Then Miriam inquired, " Which way do you walk? " 
 
 " Out to the right," Tom answered. " Nobody else goes 
 that way. That is Santa Barbara Church way off on the 
 bluff there." 
 
 Miriam turned to the right. When they had gone some 
 little distance she asked, " How long ago did you leave 
 Winston?" 
 
 " Two or three weeks." 
 
 " What brought you here? M 
 
 He made no reply. 
 
 Miriam stopped and looked at her companion with mingled 
 anxiety and sympathy. "What is it that has happened?" 
 she said earnestly. 
 
 Tom looked down and kicked the stones at his feet. How 
 could he tell this woman, of all the world, what had happened ? 
 
 She saw his extremity and began to walk again, instinc 
 tively climbing the bluff. He kept by her side, 
 
 Presently she stopped. " Let us sit down here." Her eyes 
 went out over the twilight sea as she spoke. The slow sweep 
 of the revolving light on the Island of Batz drew her atten-
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 417 
 
 tion to the left. How many ages that stubborn cliff had 
 defied the hurricanes of the Atlantic, to be touched with infinite 
 melancholy by its association with the fugitive wandering of 
 Mary Stuart! As her companion seated himself beside her, 
 her eyes traveled from the island to the rugged promontory 
 on which the town was built. The after-glow lingered on the 
 fine bell-tower of the fifteenth-century church, tinged the little 
 white houses with pink. Miriam followed the zigzag of the 
 main street which rose out of the breakers, and pursued the 
 ridge until it faded out above the town. The promontory 
 lifted itself higher into lonely desolation, swept around behind 
 them like the wall of an amphitheater, jutting out into the 
 sea again on their right. Crowning the summit of the second 
 cliff was the little chapel, Santa Barbara, as white and still 
 as a brooding seagull. 
 
 Tom watched Miriam like some dumb animal, and when she 
 turned again she saw the old look of wistfulness emerging 
 through the blind despair of his face. 
 
 " I wish you would tell me what is troubling you," she said. 
 " Perhaps I could help you," she said again. 
 
 He began to tremble and drawing away put both his 
 hands up to his face and sobbed. Miriam never had seen a 
 man give way like this. She waited, alarmed at the violence 
 of his grief. But the physical spasm spent itself at last, and 
 when he took down his hands and left the swollen features 
 exposed, he seemed to have wept out some of the brutality 
 that had stained his face. 
 
 Miriam continued as soon as she saw that he could listen. 
 
 " I am going to America on my father s schooner. I wish 
 you d let him take you back, too. Whatever it is, it would be 
 better to go back than to run away. You have only begun 
 life. If it s begun wrong, there is time for you to begin 
 over again. Will you go back? " 
 
 " I can t." The answer came instantly, but after a con 
 siderable pause he said again, as though the reply were the 
 result of thinking, " I can t go back." 
 
 Miriam reflected.
 
 418 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Does your brother know where you are ? " she asked at 
 last. 
 
 " No." 
 
 She was still watching him earnestly, and a dim memory 
 impelled her to put a question to which she dreaded to hear 
 the answer. "Are you alone?" 
 
 Tom did not change his position. He raised his head and 
 looking at Miriam full in the eyes said, "I came here with 
 Mrs. Fred Sidney." 
 
 For several seconds they looked at each other, then simul 
 taneously turned their eyes away. 
 
 " Where is she now ? " asked Miriam. 
 
 " Out there ! " He pointed to the island in the ocean. 
 " She was through with me before we left the steamer. I ve 
 followed her here town by town, not to be with her, but so she 
 
 won t be alone. She can t go any farther unless " He 
 
 gave a short gesture toward the water. " I d follow her 
 there, all right. Most women snatch a little happiness out 
 of being ruined. She didn t get even that." 
 
 After a silence, Miriam spoke again : " Has she no one who 
 can come to her? " 
 
 "Nobody." 
 
 She waited again, then said simply, " I will go to her." 
 
 Tom turned a look upon her which Miriam instinctively, 
 shunned. It was too piteous an unveiling of his soul. 
 
 " I will make some suitable arrangement with her," she 
 added hastily, steadying him with the commonplace words. 
 
 Tom sat rigidly upright. " Miriam," he said, " you once 
 offered me your friendship. I tried to deserve it for a while. 
 Under other circumstances, God knows I would have tried for 
 more. I gave up all trying that night in New York. The 
 only thing that makes your kindness bearable to me, now, is 
 the fact that you re not doing this for me. I know now that 
 your friendship does not demand greatness. You d do it for 
 anybody. Oh, God! if I only had stayed even what I was 
 then ! " 
 
 The last words burst from him in a choked scream. He
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 419 
 
 leaped to his feet, stumbled a few steps away from her, and 
 turned his back. 
 
 Miriam s eyes were fixed upon him. Then she said shortly, 
 " Look out there in front of you. Those fishermen down 
 there fight the ocean all their lives. What! will you give 
 up at your first shipwreck? " 
 
 The bitter kindness of the words lashed Tom to a last 
 struggle for self-control. He forced himself to face his 
 companion again. 
 
 "All right," he said between his teeth. He looked at her 
 with shamed and beaten but unflinching eyes. Miriam s face 
 changed slowly. " Miserable sinners all of us," she said at 
 last, scarcely realizing that she had put her thought into 
 words. At first Tom did not take in their meaning. Miriam s 
 look was a revelation to him. His mind was irresistibly 
 drawn away from himself. He repeated her words half- 
 comprehendingly, and his thoughts turned to the myriads of 
 blind and suffering beings who were hating and loving and 
 ruining each other, and through it all were groping toward 
 the light all but the woman before him. She was above it, 
 clear-eyed, untouched, yet she pitied and comprehended. The 
 first faint impulse toward regeneration, tragic and hardly 
 to be won though it was, stirred within him that inevitable 
 instinct which drives the spirit of man upward, not for hope, 
 nor for reward, but for existence. 
 
 Miriam withdrew her eyes from him and, leaning over 
 abstractedly, arranged the pebbles at her feet. As Tom 
 watched her, a memory out of his childhood came back to him, 
 and he quoted, as in a dream, " He that is without sin 
 amongst you, let him first cast a stone. And again He stooped 
 down and wrote with His finger in the sand." 
 
 Miriam s hand paused. She raised herself. Tom s eyes 
 rested upon her head, but she looked off to sea. The stars 
 were beginning to come out. The distant monotone of the 
 ocean was a background for the silence. The memory of 
 that Figure writing in the sand filled their souls. 
 
 " Miriam," said Tom, " can I ever become good? "
 
 420 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I want nothing more." 
 
 A strange peace fell about them while the stars came out 
 thicker in the sky and the low thunder of the ocean rose with 
 infinite power and victory. 
 
 When they stood up to go, Tom held out his hands. 
 
 " Good-by till we meet again," he said, " if we ever do." 
 
 They clasped hands and then he turned abruptly. She 
 saw him run with his head down, along the lonely shore to the 
 right, straight into the on-coming dark and the in-coming 
 ocean. There was a narrow rim of shore-line between the 
 bluff and the sea. But she saw that though he would be wet 
 before he reached the point, yet he would reach the edge of 
 land from which the little chapel, Santa Barbara, sent its 
 ever-constant beam of light out over the rocky shore. 
 
 A line from Dante about a runner came into her mind: 
 
 "And he seemed as those who conquer, not those who are defeated."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 weeks after Miriam s meeting with Tom at Roscoff 
 a group of girls were waiting nervously in the reception 
 room of the Kappa Phi Society House of Winston College. 
 There was a college reunion, and they were expecting the 
 arrival of their guest of honor. 
 
 " Is that the carrige, Lou ? " 
 
 A tall girl standing by the window, who looked composed 
 enough in the back, turned over her shoulder a scared face 
 to answer the question. " I didn t hear anything," she 
 replied, then leaned over the sill and stared down the curving 
 driveway. 
 
 " I wonder if she looks at all as I remember her," queried 
 the first speaker. " I never shall forget those stories she used 
 to tell us through the college fence. We were all afraid of 
 her, but we couldn t resist her stories." 
 
 " I have still a little clay head she modeled for me one day 
 out of one of my mud-pies, and to think now that she carves 
 statues for the crowned heads of Europe! I read in the 
 College Art Journal that the whole French Academy went 
 down on their knees before she would design caryatides for 
 the new gallery." 
 
 "You ought to have seen them!" a full ringing voice 
 interrupted from the doorway. 
 
 The girls gave a start and gazed with a frightened 
 fascination at the newcomer who announced herself so 
 unceremoniously. 
 
 She entered the room, drawing off her long, gray gloves, 
 and tossing her plumed hat on the lounge, as she continued, 
 " There was Monsieur O., with all his honors thick upon him, 
 and an imperial that made him an animated souvenir of the 
 Second Empire as he knelt; there was M. le Professeur G. 
 
 421
 
 422 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 on his right, and on his left the absinthe drunkard cartoonist, 
 L. Behind him the rest of the Academy filed in and knelt, 
 and last came the famous but somewhat aging Hermes, who 
 didn t want to kneel, but I pointed to the floor and he sank. 
 Then they all began in concert, We, the unworthy painters 
 of France, beseech the glory of America to vouchsafe to carve 
 two of her immortal figures of fame for the entrance to our 
 Art Gallery. If she will not, we perish ! " 
 
 Miriam s eyes shone with a mixture of mirth and pleasure 
 as she sank into an easy chair and surveyed her disconcerted 
 hostesses. 
 
 The tall girl, Lou Allen, was the first to recover herself 
 and to come forward with heightened color. " We have been 
 wondering ever since we received your telegram, Miss Cass, 
 how we can show you that we appreciate the honor you do us 
 in accepting our invitation. You mustn t be surprised if 
 your fame has been somewhat twisted in coming so far to get 
 here. May I introduce some of the girls? Frances Mar 
 shall she is our Nestor, always dropping wisdom. Ruth 
 Grant plays the banjo. Sally Tracy basketball. Roddy 
 Random valedictorian and whistler, Alison Drew my 
 chum aims to sing in opera. Polly Hedges paints. Go 
 bring your portfolio, Polly. Miss Cass will like to see 
 them." 
 
 Polly turned crimson as the others broke into sudden 
 laughter. " Never painted anything but chairs in my life, 
 Miss Cass. They re just trying to guy me." 
 
 " Yes, she has, Miss Cass. Here s the portfolio." 
 
 Polly flung out desperate hands. " You devilish girls ! " 
 she exclaimed. "Don t, Miss Cass!" 
 
 Miriam caught the note of agony and laid the portfolio 
 unopened on the table. " Let us talk over all that has been 
 going on since I left college. Come ! who will begin ? " 
 
 There was an intimacy and freedom in Miriam s manner 
 that set the girls tongues in motion. They perched around 
 her and began one of those anthems of youth where many 
 voices take up the theme, " You are great and we are proud
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 423 
 
 to be near you." Miriam leaned back while her burnished 
 head turned slightly to this one and that one as they checked 
 and chaffed and interrupted one another under the excitement 
 of the older woman s smiling and luminous eyes. There was a 
 sense of restlessness in the air. With them it was the exhil 
 aration of talking with a famous woman. With her it was 
 the re-living of youth. She was waiting through all their 
 chatter for the sound of a well-known, eager footfall which 
 would bring back the one enduring charm of her girlhood, 
 the one friendship that had been unsullied by time. Her 
 cheeks began to burn with unwonted color, and the mood of 
 the girls rose to a bacchanalian hilarity. 
 
 Presently, under cover of the mirth awakened by an anec 
 dote of her bohemian life, one of the girls leaned over to 
 whisper to another: 
 
 " She can t have been such friends with Mrs. Ferdi 
 nand Ballington. That was like the rest of the alumnae 
 gossip." 
 
 The whisper seemed to have conveyed a subtle suggestion 
 to Miriam s mind, for she sat up and drew a long breath. 
 " Well, girls, this has made me years younger, so that I am 
 beginning to feel the uncontrollable hunger of infancy. Let 
 us eat, drink, and be merry. Then I must leave you and go 
 to spend the evening with a friend I have looked forward to 
 seeing, as you will look forward to seeing one another when 
 you have had Academies and Salons littering up your floors 
 with their renowned knees." 
 
 " Happy woman ! who is she, Miss Cass ? is she coming 
 up here? may we meet her? " 
 
 Miriam s eyes laughed at them kindly. " Certainly you 
 may see her, but you must not keep her long. It has been 
 three years since I saw her, and much as I love you on three 
 quarters of an hour s acquaintance, you must make way for 
 your elders. I telegraphed her to meet me here. It is 
 Agnes Sidney you know her, of course, as Mrs. Ferdinand 
 Ballington." 
 
 The girls looked at her, dropped their eyes, sat quite still.
 
 424 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Miriam s manner suddenly changed. Her brows settled 
 over her eyes. "Has anything happened there?" she asked, 
 as though they were strangers. 
 
 They looked at each other with furtive glances, but there 
 was no escape from those imperious eyes. 
 
 Frances Marshall finally found voice to say painfully, 
 " It can t be possible, Miss Cass, that you didn t know that 
 you can t have heard how Mrs. Ballington about the unfor 
 tunate " She stopped in a panic. 
 
 The color had faded out of Miriam s cheeks. " I have 
 heard nothing," she said, so rapidly as to be scarcely intel 
 ligible. She drew a quick breath, as though to ease her 
 heart. " Tell me what has happened. Be quick about it ! " 
 
 "Mrs. Ballington died over two months ago." 
 
 Miriam s hand left the arm of the chair, hung poised in 
 the air a moment, and then dropped back. The girl who was 
 " aiming at opera " knew that the hand had tried to ward the 
 dagger from her heart, but had been too late. The girls 
 turned away and busied themselves in aimless ways about the 
 room. Three of them stole out through the door behind her. 
 Miriam did not move. One of the girls who remained sat 
 down on the lounge in a dark corner of the room, buried her 
 face in the pillows, and began to sob noiselessly. Still 
 Miriam did not stir. What was passing in her mind only 
 those who have felt that mortal thrust know. 
 
 When she spoke again her words sounded like the burial 
 service. There was no passion, no personality in the tones. 
 " Be kind enough to tell me the particulars." 
 
 Two of the girls came forward. The third left the lounge 
 and fled from the room. 
 
 " Mrs. Ballington had been apparently in perfect health, 
 Miss Cass. She was down street the day before she was taken 
 sick. I saw her and she bowed to me, although I remember I 
 wondered if she recognized me, she seemed so preoccupied. 
 She was not looking well then, but I had seen her frequently 
 about the city before that, and she had been looking particu 
 larly well."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 425 
 
 Miriam s gray eyes were looking through and beyond the 
 speaker and she seemed hardly conscious of her own words 
 as she asked, " Were you ever close enough to her to see if 
 if her hair " 
 
 She broke off as her mind went back and divined the cares 
 and griefs and struggles in her friend s life that must have 
 undermined her strength. 
 
 Frances Marshall waited for her to finish. 
 
 "Go on, please," said the voice. 
 
 " I often noticed Mrs. Ballington s hair, Miss Cass. It 
 was not gray at all. She did not seem to age like other 
 women, only to grow richer and sweeter in mind and body." 
 
 Frances voice stopped huskily, but after a moment she 
 went on. 
 
 " The occasion of her illness was a premature birth. There 
 were several physicians. Dr. Quinn came down from Kent, 
 but only in time to see her die." 
 
 Miriam looked at her as though she were still speaking. 
 Presently she glanced away to the window. After a long 
 silence she drew another quick breath and rose. " If you will 
 find my hat and gloves, I think I will go. It was a very 
 pleasant visit until and I thank you all but I see they have 
 gone. I have given you a very bad half -hour, my dear. The 
 reason I heard nothing was because I came over from France 
 in a schooner. Whatever letters I have were written me 
 there, and have been forwarded to her home, where they are 
 waiting for me. I will go down and get them before I leave 
 the city." 
 
 She put on her hat and stood idly fingering her gloves. 
 Frances Marshall s eyes began to sting and presently two 
 tears burned their way down her cheeks. Miriam looked 
 up, glanced around the room, and started for the wrong 
 door. 
 
 " This is the way out, Miss Cass," said the girl brokenly. 
 " If you care to come back, you can be alone here." 
 
 Miriam turned. She touched Frances tear-wet cheek with 
 a gentle finger. " Good-by."
 
 426 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 She followed the old lilac-bordered path curving round 
 to the gate. Overhead the locusts hung heavy with honey 
 and bees. Beside her walked a phantom girl in white with a 
 Roman sash and vine-leaf hat. They reached the gate, the 
 girl stayed behind, smiling her old brilliant, eager smile, 
 kissing her hand in farewell. With eyes of agony Miriam 
 saw her fade into the pine trees, and turned to go down the 
 street. 
 
 Then she was conscious of another presence, older and 
 sadder, still more beautiful, and thrilling with love and long 
 ing. She felt the gentle hand steal into hers, and with a face 
 that made the few passers-by give her the whole walk she went 
 down into the city, listening to words that would never be 
 spoken to her again. 
 
 There was a jar, a break-off of the familiar voice. Miriam 
 looked up with blind fury at the interruption, to see a man 
 standing in front of her hat in hand. It was Donald 
 Ballington. 
 
 " I was just coming to find you, Miss Cass," he said 
 eagerly. 
 
 Miriam put out her hand mechanically. 
 
 Donald waited a moment, and went on. "My mother is 
 away, and I am living down at the hotel on the lake during 
 the summer, but the house is open and I wondered if 
 
 you would not like to go there rather than to " He 
 
 did not finish. " You can be quite alone or not, as you 
 like." 
 
 The last sentence was a refuge to Miriam. If she could 
 be alone for a while, she could pull herself together. She was 
 still holding Donald s hand as though they were girls 
 together, when she replied, " Thank you, Mr. Ballington. I 
 should like to spend the night there. In the morning I shall 
 go back to New York. When I am a little used to it, I will 
 come back to Kent to see Mrs. Sidney." 
 
 Donald turned and walked beside her in silence. He 
 divined that she was not thinking of him. 
 
 " I suppose you came on to see the children," he ventured
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 427 
 
 at last. " Aunt Margaret telephoned me you were to be 
 here." 
 
 " I came on to see Agnes." 
 
 Donald started. 
 
 Miriam added, " I heard she was dead only half an hour 
 ago." 
 
 Donald s heart swelled within him. They reached the 
 gate of his house. He opened it and stood aside for her to 
 enter. 
 
 "Mr. Ballington, I wish you would come in a few 
 moments," said Miriam ; " I want to ask some questions, and 
 I have something to tell you." 
 
 Donald followed her up the walk with a foreboding heart. 
 As they went into the hall the twilight struck cold to his 
 fancy; their foot-falls echoed through the empty house. 
 They sat down in the drawing room, and Miriam placed her 
 hat on the table beside her. 
 
 " I wish you would tell me very particularly about the last 
 weeks of Agnes life. Her letters told me much, but we do 
 not write the things that affect us most. In this case death 
 anticipated what might have been said." 
 
 Donald told all that he remembered. He said little about 
 Ferdinand, much about Agnes and her cheerfulness in the 
 face of physical weakness. He recounted a conversation he 
 had had with her, in which she had sent upstairs for a packet 
 of Miriam s letters, neatly docketed and tied with a purple 
 ribbon, and read him passages here and there. 
 
 Miriam s head sank upon the table in a spasm of grief. 
 Donald hesitated and stopped. She thought it was because 
 she troubled him, and, after a little, she raised her face and 
 wiped her eyes, "Don t mind me, Mr. Ballington. This is 
 just what I want to hear." 
 
 Then he began on the story of Tom and Beatrice. Miriam 
 looked at him searchingly and, once, when he halted, urged 
 him gently, " Tell me everything just as it was." 
 
 The slow anger of the righteous was in Donald s soul as 
 he continued. " Ferdinand was aware of the situation, Miss
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Cass, and he was glad of it. He always hated Tom and 
 Beatrice both. He hates me because I did some things for 
 his wife that he wouldn t do ; and more than that, because I 
 told him that I thought he couldn t and wouldn t make her 
 happy. He stopped her by force from getting any message 
 to me or Fred of what Tom and Beatrice were doing, and 
 she had to lie to him and creep out of her own house like a 
 thief finally to get to me. She drove around to find me in a 
 hired carriage, with her heart breaking because she had been 
 detained so long. She was dying when I talked with her. 
 She left the carriage, walked out of hearing of the coach 
 man, but she could scarcely stand. He killed her, and that 
 is all there is to say." 
 
 Miriam sat outwardly controlled as Donald went through 
 the rest of his recital his last interview with Agnes, his 
 fruitless pursuit of the fugitive pair as far as New York, his 
 return to find Agnes dead, the dissolution of partnership 
 between him and his cousin. 
 
 When he was through there was a silence; then she said, 
 with a self-restraint which Donald felt to be more terrible 
 than any outburst of passion, " I saw your brother before 
 I left France and had a talk with him. I also saw Mrs. 
 Fred Sidney." 
 
 Donald s face flushed crimson. 
 
 " They had separated," Miriam went on, " and both were 
 wretched." 
 
 Donald listened with strained attention to Miriam s words 
 of Tom. When she had finished he waited a moment to get 
 control of himself, and then said in a husky voice, " I once 
 hoped Tom and you might marry. Perhaps you have helped 
 him more than if you had." He waited, then said still 
 huskily, "Tell me about Beatrice." 
 
 Miriam considered. " I cannot repeat the conversation. 
 She was reticent and told me nothing of what I have learned 
 from you. We spoke of her future, however, and she is now 
 with friends of mine in Paris. I am in communication with 
 her. I have with me a letter from her for Agnes."
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 429 
 
 Another pause followed, then Donald fulfilled his last com 
 mission from his cousin s wife. 
 
 "I have a letter for you, Miss Cass. It is from Agnes 
 and it is postmarked the day before she died. As you see, 
 she directed it to be returned to me in case it did not reach 
 you." 
 
 Donald rose as he spoke. Miriam held out her hand 
 unsteadily for the letter, and then went with him to the door. 
 
 After he was gone, she asked to be shown to her room. 
 Later on when the maid took up a tray upon which a delicate 
 luncheon had been arranged, Miriam answered her rap at the 
 door at once, and the letter was in her hand still unopened. 
 It was late that night before she broke the seal.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 Miriam came down to breakfast in the morning 
 she stopped at the foot of the stairs and looked down 
 the wide hall she had entered for the first time eight years be 
 fore with Agnes. Through the open doorway she could see 
 the pillared veranda and below it the well-kept walk and 
 driveway. Presently she turned and went into the music 
 room. The piano was open and a book of songs still rested 
 on the rack. She crossed the room wondering if it were the 
 Rubinstein song Agnes had sung that first night, but the 
 music was open at Lassen s "Es war ein Traum." As she 
 read the words she seemed to hear Tom s voice singing as they 
 drifted on the lake, while Agnes sat in the stern of the boat 
 trailing her fingers in the water. Miriam turned away to the 
 dining-room with the memory of that last day and night with 
 Agnes around her, and as she walked the letter which she 
 carried next her heart lay with insupportable weight 
 upon her. 
 
 She found a note from Donald on the breakfast table, say 
 ing that Mrs. Sidney was coming in from Kent on the morn 
 ing train and that if she wished she would be able to see her 
 a few minutes at the station before her own train left. There 
 was also a time-table with her train marked on it. " Mr. Bal- 
 lington left word that the carriage is at your disposal," 
 supplemented the maid who served her. 
 
 As she ate her breakfast Miriam remembered Donald s 
 saying that Ferdinand had been out of town several weeks 
 and that Miss Margaret and the children were out at the 
 lake where Mrs. Sidney was to meet them. She decided to 
 go for any letters which might be held at the farm for her, 
 and after breakfast ordered the carriage. Having packed 
 
 430
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 431 
 
 her few things, she left a note for Donald thanking him for 
 his kindness, and started off for the deserted house which she 
 had come to visit with such hope and eagerness. 
 
 As the double row of clipped cedars came in sight, Ferdi 
 nand s spirit seemed to challenge her, and two sullen spots of 
 red began to glow high up on her cheeks. She left the car 
 riage at the gate, and as she went swiftly up the walk to 
 the house she noticed that the great front door stood open. 
 She was scarcely conscious of what she did as she went up 
 the steps and entered without ringing. 
 
 There was the green parlor with the door shut. "They 
 carried her out from there," she thought. After a moment 
 she turned to the library. " No more flowers here now." 
 Down the hall the door into the dining-room was open, and 
 Miriam caught sight of the tall iron lamp and the old-rose 
 shade. 
 
 With a sense of desolation she turned to the stairway. As 
 she went up the letter in her bosom seemed to burn into her 
 the sentence in which Agnes had stated without emotion the 
 way in which she for the last time had struggled up those 
 stairs " When I reached home I could no longer stand ; 
 I think I must have come up to my room on my hands and 
 knees." 
 
 Miriam paused a moment at the top of the stairs, and then 
 turned toward Agnes room. Her heart beat heavily as she 
 put out her hand to the door. After a moment s hesitation, 
 however, she turned the knob noiselessly, and the door swung 
 open. 
 
 The white curtains at the windows blew gently toward her 
 with the current of air that drew through the room with her 
 entrance, and they subsided again as she closed the door 
 behind her. There was a flicker of sun and shadow on the 
 shades as the trees outside swayed in the breeze. 
 
 Miriam stood still until her eyes accustomed themselves to 
 the twilight. She noticed that the door into Ferdinand s 
 room was ajar and that a rim of light outlined the opening. 
 Upon the wall opposite the door was hung the portrait of
 
 432 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Estelle Landseer, and Miriam wondered why it had been 
 brought from the green parlor. Agnes desk had been moved 
 from its old position over to one of the front windows where 
 it stood open with a chair in front of it as though someone 
 had been writing there recently. Miriam turned away with 
 a feeling of strangeness to the bed. That, too, was differ 
 ently placed. Then her eyes passed quickly over the other 
 objects in the room, and she discovered that the pictures on 
 the wall alone remained as she remembered them. 
 
 A passion of homesickness, an uncontrollable desire to 
 have things as they were, came over her. It was intolerable 
 that this one place of all others, which should be the shrine 
 of her friend s memory, should be desecrated by change. 
 Scarcely thinking what she was doing, she went swiftly over 
 to the desk and shoved it across the room. 
 
 As she did so she saw that a late picture of herself hung 
 framed in one of the compartments. A mist of tears, the 
 first she had shed, blurred her eyes as she turned away. 
 
 A moment later she had replaced the chairs as they used 
 to be, and then there was the soft rumble of the bed rolling 
 around on its castors. 
 
 When it was in its old position Miriam stood looking down 
 at it. " Agnes ! " she said under her breath. Then, as if in 
 a dream, she put out her hand to touch the pillow, but it 
 stopped an inch or two in the air above it. Then her hand 
 began to pass slowly downward toward the foot of the bed, 
 always a few inches above it, now higher, now lower, as 
 though it were following the curves of a recumbent form. 
 Then Miriam straightened herself and stood motionless, her 
 eyes fixed upon the little space of air an inch or two above 
 the pillow. 
 
 There was a sound of steps in the adjoining room, the 
 door was pushed open, and a man s figure paused in aston 
 ishment on the threshold. 
 
 Miriam neither heard nor saw. 
 
 Ferdinand s eyes glanced quickly around the room and 
 took in at once what the sound of the moving furniture
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 433 
 
 had meant. "What are you doing in here?" he exclaimed 
 angrily, taking Miriam for the servant. 
 
 There was an instantaneous change in the motionless figure 
 by the bed and Miriam wheeled toward him. 
 
 Still Ferdinand did not recognize her across the room in 
 the dim light. He was conscious only of a dark and hostile 
 presence that filled him with something he would not confess 
 to be dread. He waited a moment for a reply, then crossed 
 the room, and sent one of the window shades with a snap to 
 the top of the sash. Then he turned and recognized her. 
 
 "I did not hear you come in, Miss Cass. Have you been 
 here long? No one told me you had come." 
 
 Miriam stood looking at him. All the night before she 
 had struggled with passions that had taken a form which 
 only the strongest can feel without mental and moral ship 
 wreck. Love, grief, hatred, and vengeance had scarred 
 her soul. Now as she stood face to face with the man she 
 considered her friend s murderer a stillness of mood suc 
 ceeded the tumult. It seemed to her as though she were 
 standing in the presence of the dead, and when she spoke she 
 felt herself to be pronouncing the epilogue of a tale that 
 is told. 
 
 " No one heard me come in, Mr. Ballington. The door 
 was open and I did not ring." 
 
 He did not know how to break the silence that followed, 
 and waited for her next words. 
 
 " What are you going to do with the children ? " 
 
 There was a well-modulated surprise in Ferdinand s voice 
 as he replied, "I shall keep them here in charge of Aunt 
 Margaret." 
 
 There was a pause that lasted until it became embarrassing 
 to Ferdinand. He moved uneasily and opened his lips as 
 though to speak, when Miriam anticipated him. 
 
 " It may be that I never shall have another chance to talk 
 with you. Mr. Ballington, when I was here before, we did 
 not talk seriously. Perhaps no one but Agnes ever talked 
 so to you."
 
 434 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 As Ferdinand met the gray eyes that were steadfastly 
 upon him, something in him flinched. They searched him 
 as the eyes of his mother s portrait searched him, and he 
 could neither baffle them nor meet them unconcerned. 
 
 "Let us go downstairs," he said with studied courtesy, 
 turning toward the door. He felt an overwhelming reluc 
 tance to talk with her in this room. 
 
 Miriam stayed where she was. When he reached the door 
 and turned back to her, she said : 
 
 " If you will stay I would rather talk here. It will be only 
 a few moments." 
 
 Ferdinand hesitated, then came back to her. 
 
 "Mr. Ballington," asked Miriam directly, "what killed 
 Agnes ? " 
 
 The unexpected question confused Ferdinand. He replied 
 after a moment, " I believe the immediate cause of death was 
 heart-failure." 
 
 An intuition of what was coming brought with it a dread 
 which was inexplicable to him. He could not shake it off, 
 and he could not rise above it. Her next words roused him 
 to strained attention. 
 
 " You and I know the real reason." 
 
 As they continued to look at each other Ferdinand s 
 memory began to stir. He found himself seeing as Miriam 
 would have seen long-vanished expressions of his wife s face. 
 When they occurred he had scarcely noted them, or worse, 
 had commented on them impatiently expressions of weari 
 ness, of quickly-disguised pain, of disappointment, of bewil 
 derment, of fear, of anguish, of hope fading into endurance. 
 As they passed before him there thronged into his mind the 
 words that had accompanied them. When they were spoken 
 he had heard them with indifference, with indulgence, with 
 anger. Now he heard them as they would have sounded 
 to Miriam, and the recollection troubled him more than he 
 ever had been troubled before. He was at a loss, too, how 
 to reply to her last curious remark, whose meaning was by 
 no means clear to him.
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 435 
 
 " I don t understand you," he replied stiffly, without with 
 drawing his eyes from hers. 
 
 " If you did not and could not understand me, it would take 
 away my only excuse for talking to you. It is on the chance 
 that you do and can that I venture it. Surely you must have 
 suffered, or at least been shocked, in losing your wife and 
 baby. You must have thought then, and since, things that 
 you never had thought before." Miriam spoke quietly but 
 without hesitation. 
 
 " It is not necessary for us to talk over my thoughts," 
 interposed Ferdinand. 
 
 Again he turned to go, but her statement once more held 
 him. " Agnes wrote me a letter the night before she died." 
 
 Ferdinand waited half-warily, half-contemptuously. As 
 she did not continue he returned shortly, "Well? " 
 
 He was watching her intently now, but her face might have 
 been made of stone, he told himself bitterly, so free was it 
 from the self-revelation to which he had been accustomed in 
 Agnes. There was not a tremor either of friendliness or of 
 hostility in the fine, strong mask against which his fixed 
 gaze struck and glanced idly off. 
 
 " The facts I know are inconsequent, except in so far as 
 they enable me to talk to you understandingly. Mr. Balling- 
 ton, you had given to you the daily companionship of a soul 
 that tried to live the spiritual life. You could not see what 
 was your most precious possession. You looked at Agnes 
 mistakes, her weaknesses and her failures, and blamed them, 
 not knowing that it was only these that made and kept her 
 your wife. That finer and truer Agnes, the steadfast soul 
 that learned through weakness and failure to lay hold of 
 courage and power, you more than blamed, you hated and 
 tried to crush but all you could do was to kill her." 
 
 Miriam s voice broke. Ferdinand noticed it instantly. 
 After all she was but an over-wrought woman, he considered, 
 her loss of control atoning for what she had said. But the 
 break was momentary. Almost immediately she resumed. 
 
 "Mr. Ballington, the world is going another way from
 
 436 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 yours, no matter who or how many will to stop it. You have 
 pinned your faith to what you call hard facts, but there are 
 spiritual facts that you never have seen. Sooner or later, 
 however, spiritual facts enter into your world of hard facts 
 and they never demonstrate themselves so irrefutably as they 
 do when a man like you, refusing to believe in them, himself 
 unwillingly proves the opposite of what he set out to prove." 
 
 Ferdinand now had himself well enough in hand to indulge 
 an ironical smile. Agnes school-friend had one feminine gift 
 at least, that of oratory. 
 
 " What did I set out to prove? " he asked. 
 
 There was a short silence broken by the twittering of a 
 nest of young swallows under the eaves over the window. 
 Then Miriam replied : " That selfish interest is the determin 
 ing force of life. It has not been with the strongest people 
 you have known; not with Dr. Quinn, who preferred Mrs. 
 Sidney s friendship to yours ; not with Mrs. Sidney herself, 
 who sold her home to rescue her daughter s family, although 
 legally another man was responsible for Mr. Mabie s debts. 
 You would have let the other man pay them. Mrs. Sidney 
 burdened herself with a crippled relation who had nearer 
 claims on other people. You advised turning her over to 
 them. Agnes followed your guiding principle, although she 
 did not do it legally, when she falsified her house accounts. 
 She took what she considered was hers, although it happened 
 to be in your possession. She repudiated your theory when 
 she confessed to you. She continued to repudiate it from 
 that time till she died. Now look at results ! " 
 
 "I trust that you are satisfied with results," commented 
 Ferdinand. 
 
 " Relatively speaking, yes. Dr. Quinn never will be a 
 rich man, but he will live the life he wants to live. Mrs. Sid 
 ney, in spite of loss and bereavement, has an old age rich in 
 love and gratitude. The cripple has been something better 
 than an encumbrance, she has been an encouragement and a 
 comforter. Agnes death proved that she was right and you 
 were wrong, for it proved that it is impossible to reconcile
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 437 
 
 the life of the soul and that is the life of the race with 
 your hideous creed that would stifle the soul and hence the 
 race. When you killed her you proved that. There is no com 
 ing to terms with you or your kind. You must be abandoned. 
 You tried to ruin Beatrice Sidney through her weaknesses 
 and those of her husband and Tom Ballington. Selfishness 
 and recklessness blinded them so far. Then the higher nature 
 awoke and, instead of ruining, you have truly saved all three. 
 They see, at last, and they forgive. Since it has been 
 demonstrated, you should acknowledge that you have been 
 wrong. Until you feel uncertain of yourself and what you 
 have lived for, you are a lost soul." 
 
 Ferdinand stood without moving through all she said. He 
 looked at her unwaveringly, but there was a curious veil over 
 his eyes. Whether he heard her or not, Miriam could not tell. 
 
 She paused a moment, then, when he did not move, she 
 turned and went to the door. 
 
 Glancing back at him a moment before she left him, she 
 saw him looking after her with the same inscrutable quiet. 
 With a sigh of farewell to the room she never might enter 
 again, Miriam went out and closed the door after her. 
 
 Ferdinand stood where she left him. Anger and bitter 
 ness darkened his face. He heard her leave the house, heard 
 the carriage roll away. Then he went over to his wife s desk, 
 sat down impatiently, drew some sheets of paper to him and 
 picked up a pen. In order to free his mind from the unwel 
 come thoughts Miriam had called up he was about to write 
 a business letter. He raised his eyes a moment preparatory 
 to starting the letter and found himself looking at his 
 mother s portrait on the wall opposite. Agnes had asked a 
 short time before her death that it be brought to her room 
 in order that her children might have its constant compan 
 ionship. He turned his eyes away from it instantly, rose and 
 touched the bell. A few moments later the maid tapped at 
 the door. He told her to order the horse to be saddled, and 
 dismissed her curtly. As he heard her receding footsteps 
 the silence and emptiness of the house grew upon him. He
 
 438 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 went back to the desk, and, as he was shutting it, saw Mir 
 iam s picture looking at him. With a exclamation he picked 
 it up, pulled open the little drawer, threw it in, and shut the 
 drawer violently. Then he closed the desk and stood frown 
 ing at it abstractedly. How oppressively still the house 
 was ! The children were coming home from the lake that 
 night, but the thought gave him no pleasure. They shrank 
 away from him, and it seemed to him that even his aunt was 
 beginning to do the same. Donald had left the office. Tom 
 never again would be conveniently present to point his 
 morals. Whispers against himself that had started when he 
 sold his mother-in-law s home had touched his reputation in 
 Winston. He fancied that people treated him differently 
 since his wife s death, and he wondered uncomfortably how 
 much they knew. Miriam Cass had insulted him, and he 
 could not reply. How still the house was since she left ! 
 Would anything ever fill the emptiness again? All his suc 
 cesses began to seem dreary, the world to seem mechanical. 
 A sentence he had heard somewhere came back to him. " Have 
 you never wished to get away from this world of buying and 
 selling to live " he started into full recollection as the 
 sentence completed itself " with me and the children ? " 
 The passionate appeal he had denied assailed him once more, 
 no longer beseeching but eondemning, terrifying. The sound 
 of horse s hoofs on the gravel outside roused him. He passed 
 his hand over his eyes trying to shake off a question which 
 began to prey upon his self-assurance. Dropping his hand 
 he turned determinedly to leave the room. Once more his 
 eyes rested upon his mother s portrait. Ferdinand was con 
 scious of a thrill of fear, for the still gray eyes met his own 
 with the same silent question he felt henceforth would chal 
 lenge his soul. 
 
 Had Agnes been right?
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 AS the horses stopped at the station Miriam stood up in 
 the carriage and looked back down the slope to the city 
 resting on the shore of the lake. It seemed a mass of green, 
 with roofs showing here and there among the trees. Several 
 spires rose above the green, one of them lifting the outlines 
 of a cross against the sky. The waters of the lake in the 
 distance looked still and blue, but the noise in the great trees 
 near at hand brought the sound of waters to Miriam s ears 
 and she closed her eyes for an instant as in memory she 
 walked with Agnes along that curving shore. 
 
 Then she heard Donald s voice speaking to her, saying that 
 Mrs. Sidney had come, and she turned and let him help her 
 from the carriage and take her where Mrs. Sidney was wait 
 ing. Donald left them together, saying that he would return 
 in a few minutes to put Miriam on her train. 
 
 The two women looked at each other in silence with inex 
 pressible thoughts speaking from their eyes. 
 
 Miriam was recalling, as she looked at the steadfast old 
 face, the time when as a college girl she had watched Mrs. 
 Sidney and the doctor in church and had made a sketch of 
 them, calling it " Fate and Aspiration." Now she was seeing 
 the faith and the humbleness which illumined and softened 
 the strong features. Her heart ached with the unconscious 
 pathos of the sturdy figure. It asked so little and gave so 
 much ; it had lost so uncomplainingly and suffered so daunt- 
 lessly; it had struggled so faithfully to subject its head 
 strong instincts to the law of gentleness and renunciation ; 
 it so persistently transformed defeat into victory. 
 
 When at last Miriam spoke, it was half the artist in her 
 that said the words. " The most wonderful thing of all, Mrs. 
 Sidney, is your face." 
 
 439
 
 440 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 Miriam s own face had been indescribably changing as she 
 looked at the older woman. The sternness went out of it, 
 leaving exposed for the time being the Miriam whom Agnes 
 had known. It was a self-unconscious, spiritual face that 
 looked up at Mrs. Sidney. All that Miriam had meant to 
 say was leaving her. Mrs. Sidney s face meant victory. It 
 did not ask consolation. 
 
 Agnes mother put her hardened hand over Miriam s beau 
 tiful one. " Miriam, you look good. Be good," she said 
 earnestly. 
 
 Miriam felt a pain in her throat. 
 
 "If he smite thee on one c-heek, turn the other. If he 
 take thy coat, give him thy cloak also!" continued the un 
 compromising voice. Miriam saw that Mrs. Sidney meant 
 the words she had quoted. She had been driven step by step 
 to the logical conclusion of the Christian philosophy, and like 
 her Master she had accepted it. 
 
 " Take up thy cross and follow me," the voice went on. 
 "Did you ever think what was the end of that journey, 
 Miriam?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Mrs. Sidney sigHecf as if to ease the tenseness of her body, 
 letting it relapse as she did so. A smile whose radiance was 
 not of this earth transfigured her face, as she continued, 
 " But after the agony of Gethsemane and the cross, we shall 
 see the great white throne, and there shall be no more death, 
 neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more 
 pain, for the former things have passed away." 
 
 Her eyes fell to the lifted face of her daughter s friend, 
 and her smile changed and became one of human warmth and 
 encouragement. "It s a journey of love, Miriam," she said 
 tremulously. 
 
 " To the strong like you, who make it so," Miriam replied. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney thought a moment before she spoke again. 
 
 Then she began to speak of something which she never had 
 expected to mention. " Something happened to Agnes be 
 fore she died, Miriam. I saw that as soon as I went into the
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 441 
 
 room. I d seen that same look on Stephen s face. When I 
 asked her about it, she told me that if she got well she d tell 
 me, but that there was no need for me to know if she should 
 die." 
 
 Miriam did not say anything. 
 
 She was thinking that it was a mercy that Mrs. Sidney 
 had been spared the truth, when the old lady added quietly, 
 " But of course I knew what it was." She looked keenly at 
 Miriam and asked, " Perhaps you know, too ? " 
 
 Miriam did not trust herself to speak. She saw by her 
 friend s face that Mrs. Sidney was re-living the last scenes 
 in her daughter s life, and Miriam felt a hunger to live them 
 with her. " What was the look you mean ? " she asked, 
 forcing herself to call up Agnes face with mortal struggle 
 upon it. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney seemed to have been waiting for the question. 
 "It was a look of mighty deliverance" she answered in a full, 
 triumphant voice. 
 
 Miriam was startled. She felt herself sustained above her 
 grief, as she had been lifted when she first saw Mrs. Sidney s 
 face. Then she remembered that Agnes must have been dying 
 when her mother arrived and that the look her mother had 
 seen was that with which Agnes met death. 
 
 " I knew she would die so," she said presently. 
 
 "I do not mean death, Miriam. I mean incorruption and 
 power. She would have lived on so, just as her father did, 
 if she hadn t had heart failure. The death doesn t matter 
 one way or the other. That was only an episode. She wasn t 
 thinking about dying. She was thinking about living." 
 
 "Didn t she know she was going to die?" asked Miriam 
 in surprise. 
 
 " She wouldn t give up hope till she had to. Quinn says 
 he never saw anybody make such a fight for life. The nurse 
 asked her once if she didn t want to make some preparation 
 for the next world, and she said, no, she was ready for that 
 any time, but that we must concentrate all our energies on 
 keeping her in this."
 
 442 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 " Right ! She was like you ! " broke in Miriam poignantly. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney still held to the purpose she had had in bring 
 ing up this conversation. She went on, undiverted by Mir 
 iam s cry: 
 
 " She said to me once, I have just learned how to live, 
 mother. That seemed to be why she most wanted to get well. 
 But when Quinn told her there was no hope, she acqui 
 esced." 
 
 " Death meant little to her," said Miriam gravely. " She 
 had fought her fight and kept the faith. She had won her 
 point, that was the main thing. She refused to compromise." 
 
 " That is so," assented Mrs. Sidney thoughtfully. " She 
 had learned to accept a good many sorrows and at last she 
 learned not to fret herself because of evil-doers. When I saw 
 her she was not troubled any more about Ferdinand. He 
 that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he that is right 
 eous, let him be righteous still. She had no more to do with 
 his way of life, Miriam, than I have or you have." Mrs. 
 Sidney looked at Miriam as she said the last words, and then 
 added, " The way to live is to be holy. Those who are not, 
 we must forgive, for they know not what they do." 
 
 The whistle of the train was heard from the distance, and 
 a plume of smoke could be seen nearing them from round the 
 bend of the road. Both women rose. 
 
 "Agnes is safe now and happy," said Mrs. Sidney 
 bravely, " and when one has accepted all in this life, it doesn t 
 come so hard to accept death. She did the very best she 
 could and she has gone to her reward. She had some troubles, 
 but a good many good things, and her children are going to 
 grow up and call her blessed. They will have their troubles, 
 but what is their mother in them will come through it all 
 the way she did. When I think of Stephen, I don t think of 
 the hard times he had, but of what he was, and his daughter 
 was like him." 
 
 Miriam placed her hands on Mrs. Sidney s shoulders. 
 " When Agnes children grow up," she said earnestly, " they 
 will not be left alone to struggle with their father s will. You
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 443 
 
 and I will tell them their mother s story, and her death will 
 drive the story home. They never will forget what I shall 
 tell them. They shall not suffer if they are disinherited of 
 his money, which is all he has to give them and which he will 
 hamper with conditions. I can give them enough, as their 
 mother would give it, freely. They will come to me for it, 
 too for that and the chance to live. It is only a little while 
 to wait." 
 
 The train drew into the station, and Mrs. Sidney saw Don 
 ald coming toward them. 
 
 " The last words Agnes spoke were to the children," she 
 said. " She seemed very well just then. I heard her ask 
 them to say a verse after her and to remember it always be 
 cause it was true. She said it twice, and Estelle and Stephen 
 said it after her. Blessed are the pure in heart for they 
 shall see God. " 
 
 Miriam stifled a sob. 
 
 Mrs. Sidney had one more thing to say, and she said it 
 briefly. " You are a good friend, Miriam. God bless you for 
 it. But friendship isn t all God meant women to have. Re 
 member that Agnes married life is the exception. The 
 doctor s and my life is the rule. I have heard that you have, 
 said you will not marry. Do not set yourself up against the 
 laws of nature. Nothing but trouble can come from it." 
 
 Miriam smiled affectionately at her companion. It pleased 
 her that the old lady s mind continued to cope with other peo 
 ple s difficulties as well as with her own. Grief had not broken 
 her down, and fortune had done her worst. 
 
 "You are quite right," she said. "Far be it from me to 
 set myself up against a law of nature. But that is not the 
 only law of nature." 
 
 A gleam of her old humor came into her eyes for a moment. 
 Then she changed the subject. 
 
 She put two envelopes into Mrs. Sidney s hand. " Donald 
 will explain," she said. " One of them is for your nephew 
 from me. The other is from Beatrice to Agnes. She sent it 
 by me and I know Agnes would have given it to Fred. I be-
 
 444 THE BALLINGTONS 
 
 lieve that after reading these, he will wish to see his wife 
 again. Then I shall come to Kent." 
 
 As Mrs. Sidney glanced down at the letters, bewilderment, 
 then relief and thanksgiving unspeakable, quivered in her 
 face. 
 
 "To think this, too, is about to come out right!" she 
 said brokenly. " Goodness and mercy have followed me." 
 She could say no more. 
 
 Miriam leaned over and kissed her friend, then went 
 aboard the train with Donald. Mrs. Sidney waited outside 
 under the train window. 
 
 Donald arranged Miriam s packages for her, and then 
 handed her a book. " Aunt Margaret found this book lying 
 open in Agnes room and gave it to me for you. It must 
 have been the last one she read." 
 
 Miriam recognized the volume as one of her own gifts to 
 Agnes, and accepted it silently. 
 
 They clasped hands, and then he turned and left her, his 
 eyes wet. 
 
 The tears were in Miriam s eyes, too, as she leaned from 
 the window for a last look at Mrs. Sidney. 
 
 " God bless you, Miriam good-by," said the doctor s 
 wife. The train began to move. " I shall see you again soon. 
 Trust the Lord and put your faith in Him," she continued, 
 walking along by the window, " and remember this about all 
 the things we have talked of and things we haven t talked of, 
 that now we see as through a glass darkly, but then " 
 
 She stopped. A mist of tears clouded her eyes and rolled 
 down her cheeks. Miriam saw her expression change into 
 that look which tells that the well-beloved has gone. There 
 was a moment of wavering, then the unconquerable spirit rose 
 once again, resumed control, and just as Miriam was losing 
 sight of her, she called after, completing her sentence 
 " but then we shall see face to face ! " 
 
 The trees, the roofs and spires of Winston, the still blue 
 lake, passed out of Miriam s view. For some time she did 
 not change her position, but continued to look through the
 
 THE BALLINGTONS 445 
 
 window at the green world below and the blue dome over 
 head. 
 
 " But then we shall see face to face ? " she repeated 
 thoughtfully to herself. 
 
 Her eyes dropped to the book Donald had given her, which 
 had fallen open in her lap. Agnes pencil marks drew her 
 attention to the page, and she read the underlined words: 
 " Here, however, I touch a theme too great for me to handle, 
 but which will assuredly be handled by the loftiest minds, 
 when you and I, like streaks of morning cloud, shall have 
 melted into the infinite azure of the past."
 
 The work of a genius. A story that will live 
 
 THE BREATH OF 
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 By SIDNEY McCALL 
 Author of "Truth Dexter" 
 
 12rao. Cloth, 431 pages. $1.50 
 
 A great American novel, if not the American novel. 
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 An absorbing love story that throws unusual light upon 
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 A powerful story with vivid descriptions and a thrilling 
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 Strikes an unusual note and will live beyond the 
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 A masterly delineation of men and women caught in 
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 Yuki is a charming characterization, dainty, exquisite, 
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 Far outside the common run of ^fiction. Dial, Chicago 
 
 THE WOOD-CARVER 
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 Mr. Oppenheim s Most Romantic Novel 
 
 By E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM 
 
 Author of " A Prince of Sinners," " Anna the Adventuress," 
 " Mysterious Mr. Sabin," etc. 
 
 Illustrated. 309 pages. 12mo. $1.50 
 
 Of absorbing interest to those who love a story of action 
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 Shows him at his best. New York World. 
 
 This brilliant imaginative story, with its buoyant 
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 Philadelphia North American. 
 
 Strongly drawn and thoroughly interesting. Forceful, 
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 quirer. 
 
 The girl is a fascinating creation. The hero is vigor 
 ously manly. Pittsburg Times. 
 
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 At all Booksellers
 
 A Romance of South Africa 
 
 ON THE FIRING LINE 
 
 By ANNA CHAPIN RAY and 
 HAMILTON BROCK FULLER 
 
 With Frontispiece \^mo. $1.50 
 
 In this fine romance of love and war Miss Ray has a wider 
 field than she has compassed before and strikes a deeper note of 
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 Boer War, and in local details Mr. Fuller has given valuable 
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 interest because they are so human. 
 
 By the Author of "A Rose of Normandy" 
 
 A KNOT OF BLUE 
 
 By WILLIAM R. A. WILSON 
 
 Illustrated by Ch. Griinwald. izmo. $1.50 
 
 In a new tale of absorbing interest the author of the success 
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