That Ketr on Streak 
 
 FELICIA 
 BUTTS 
 CLARK
 
 UNIV. OF GALIF. UBHARY. LOS ANGELES
 
 That Ketron Streak 
 
 BY 
 FELICIA BUTTS CLARK 
 
 COL , O. 
 L. B. C.
 
 CHAPTER ONE 
 Introducing David and His Friends 
 
 HELLO, Davie !" called a deep voice from an 
 upper window of an Elizabethan building in 
 Davis Quadrangle. "Come on up !" 
 
 "Davie" came on up, parrying a grip of the hand- 
 somest modern type, gray felt hat from New York's 
 best purveyor of headgear, stuck on the back of a mass 
 of reddish brown, wavy hair, gray suit of stylish cut, 
 tan shoes made to order at a high price -r- that was 
 David Ketron, as Hugh Hinson saw him from the 
 mullioned window overjiung with the greenest of ivy. 
 
 The Quadrangle was the pride of the University. 
 Altogether, Davis the soap-man, had invested a million 
 dollars in it, and his portrait was the most prominent 
 object in the octagonal lobby which David now en- 
 tered. There were four buildings facing the square 
 court. The architect had gone to Oxford purposely 
 to study its fine old Colleges, and had improved on the 
 original design of the mediaeval founders of this 
 famous institution. 
 
 Modern and up-to-date was the Davis Quad- 
 rangle, latest heating, each suite of rooms provided 
 with bath, excellently lighted, splendidly equipped. As 
 Hugh Hinson put it, "only the elect could live in Davis 
 Quadrangle," meaning thereby, that only the students 
 who could afford expensive quarters were eligible for 
 admittance into this glorious building where Art 
 
 (3) 
 
 21 28927
 
 4 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 screamed loudly of her presence and of Davis the 
 soap-man's money, to everyone who entered. 
 
 Davis had died soon after it was finished and had 
 never during his life nor after his death contributed 
 one cent to relieve the real needs of humanity, to make 
 sufferers more comfortable, to minister to the aged, 
 to care for little helpless children in deep distress, to 
 lift up the fallen, or lead the footsteps of the sinful 
 and wanderers into the way of God's peace. 
 
 The soap business had been profitable, its profits 
 were exhibited in the Davis Quadrangle, to provide 
 suitable quarters for -the "gilt-edged gentlemen" as 
 Hugh Hinson said in his gentle, sarcastic way. 
 
 Hugh Hinson did not live in one of the spacious 
 apartments with white tiled bathroom and all the latest 
 improvements. He was not waited on by an ob- 
 sequious negro, such as Andrew, who came forward 
 now to take David's grip, his hat and overcoat, passed 
 over to him with that air which belongs to one who 
 was born to be served that was Davie. 
 
 Oh, no, Hugh lived in a tiny room down in the 
 village that he got cheap, and in the mornings, arose 
 betimes to boil an egg on a kerosene stove and eat 
 some dry cereal, to drink a pint of milk and come forth 
 happy and healthy when the distinguished occupants 
 of Davis Quadrangle were still tossing on their ex- 
 pensive mattresses, in restless slumber after a "lark" 
 that had kept them out until the wee hours of the 
 day. That was Hugh. 
 
 "Glad to see you back, old chap," was Hugh's
 
 s 
 
 salutation. "Got your card and been waiting for you 
 a whole hour." 
 
 "The train was late, that's why." 
 
 David yawned. 
 
 "Hurry up with some coffee, Andie, and plenty 
 of cream, do you hear? Bring a lot of good things. 
 Hugh, you'll have some breakfast, won't you?" 
 
 "Oh, no, had mine long ago. It is a great thing 
 for a fellow to get up in time to see the sun rise, and 
 a pretty sight it is, too." 
 
 "You ought to have been a poet," said a voice 
 close by. "Then your name would be written in the 
 Hall of Fame." 
 
 The hidden sneer, in the languid, slow drawl cut 
 Hugh and a flush came into his cheeks, making him 
 handsomer than ever. No one could deny that Hugh 
 Hinson was the best-looking man in the class ; but 
 that wasn't what the boys liked him for. It was the 
 good-will that shone from his brown eyes, the hearty 
 clasp of a good-sized hand, the helpful word that made 
 a shy fellow feel better and gave a weak brother 
 strength to fight his besetting sin. 
 
 Hugh Hinson was a good friend to have, every- 
 body acknowledged that, even David Ketron. Two 
 fellows more unlike you never saw. 
 
 "Have some breakfast, Algie," was David's greet- 
 ing to the newcomer. 
 
 "Thank you, I will. Just got up. Made a night 
 of it and I've got a splitting headache." 
 
 Algie, otherwise Algernon Van der Voort, was of 
 distinguished Knickerbocker extraction, whose an-
 
 6 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 cestor, a stolid gentleman from Amsterdam, had 
 smoked a long pipe and sat around in his shirt sleeves 
 on the narrow veranda of a log cabin on Manhattan 
 island about two hundred years ago. The original 
 Van der Voort had sold cheese and butter and eggs 
 in one room of his residence and, owning a neat chunk 
 of the Island, which descended to his heirs and was 
 wisely retained by them, founded the family fortunes. 
 
 To the fortune, Algie often referred. In fact, it 
 was written in large type all over him, so that even the 
 way-faring man could see that he owned several blocks 
 in New York City. But of the cheese and butter and 
 eggs business, Algie never spoke. This was dropped 
 into the abyss of the past, like many another family 
 ancestor. 
 
 Algernon lounged sleepily in one easy chair, and 
 David yawned in another, while Hugh, grown silent, 
 kept his place on the wide oak window seat, elaborately 
 carved and sumptuously cushioned, thanks to Mr. 
 Davis. He looked out at the fine elms in the campus, 
 watching the young men hurrying back and forth, 
 some with suit-cases, some with hammer and nails or 
 tennis rackets. 
 
 The air was sweet with Autumn odors, dried 
 herbs and the pungent fragrance of Golden Rod. The 
 University was just opening and David had returned 
 after a summer spent in motoring in Colorado, in per- 
 fect physical health. 
 
 Let me present David Ketron, because he is a fine 
 fellow, though he has the faults that come to an only 
 son of doting parents, to a lad who has had everything
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 7 
 
 fall into his hands which he could possibly desire, 
 who never knew what it was to have his will crossed, 
 who never knew hunger or cold, or even sadness in 
 all his twenty years. 
 
 David Ketron had a father who ruled financial 
 affairs in a certain large town of Ohio. He was the 
 "boss" of about everything that went on in Pursell, 
 had a lot of mills, employed many hands, lived in the 
 handsomest home, surrounded by acres of park and 
 woodland, had been to Europe many times and was 
 growling now because the present conflict would pre- 
 vent him for a time from enjoying himself in his cus- 
 tomary play ground. 
 
 Jared Ketron boasted no ancestors, he did not 
 know much about his grandfather except that he did 
 horseshoeing and died poor. A self-made man, he 
 wanted his son to be quite the contrary and began 
 the spoiling process when the boy's mother died, on 
 David's tenth birthday. 
 
 The process had developed rapidly and com- 
 pletely in the past ten years. David had been into 
 all the mischief possible to pampered youth ; he had 
 spent his very liberal allowance and more, too. 
 
 He had come to the University because his father 
 wanted him to enjoy advantages which he had been 
 too busy to get. And he was enjoying these in his 
 own way and to his own satisfaction. 
 
 Once, during his career, David had come very 
 close to being expelled, and that was the time that 
 Hugh Hinson appeared on the scene and pulled him
 
 & THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 up physically and morally. There isn't any need to 
 state just what the trouble was, but the result was a 
 close and almost tender friendship between Hugh and 
 David, an incongruous friendship in- some regards, 
 for David was born with a golden spoon and Hugh 
 with a tin one. 
 
 It showed that David had not been utterly spoiled 
 by a foolish, but loving father; that he had at once 
 seen the gold that was in Hugh's soul, even though 
 the fellow who was working his way through the 
 University had very little yellow gold to spend. 
 
 Andrew appeared, balancing deftly on one hand 
 a heavily-laden tray. In the other, he carried a pack- 
 age of letters. Both of these he placed on a table 
 beside David's chair. 
 
 "Draw up, AJgie. Hugh, come and have a slice 
 of melon and a glass of iced coffee, if you don't want 
 anything else." 
 
 "Don't be a grouch, Hinson," drawled Algie, help- 
 ing himself to melon. 
 
 Decidedly, Hugh was not a grouch ; the word did 
 not fit him. With a pleasant smile he left his win- 
 dow-seat and joined the others. 
 
 "This is a good melon," he remarked. 
 
 "How's the garden?" asked David. 
 
 "Have you a garden?" Algie inserted. "That's 
 why your hands are so black, isn't it?" 
 
 For an instant, the strong hand that held the fork 
 trembled. It wasn't what Algie said that hurt so; 
 it was the insolent, overbearing manner of superiority.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 9 
 
 "Why my garden is fine," Hugh replied. "I 
 wish you could see it, Davie. We raised all that we 
 could possibly eat and mother has canned a lot." 
 
 "Suppose we motor out there some day, Hugh. 
 How far is it?" 
 
 "Easy to do it in a day. Could your mother keep 
 us over night?" 
 
 For a moment, Hugh hesitated. How could 
 David be made comfortable in the plain little home 
 where he and his mother and Agnes had lived since 
 father died, five years before? 
 
 He could almost hear his mother's quiet voice 
 saying, "Of course, dear, bring your friend. We'll 
 give him the best we have." 
 
 "Certainly," he answered, "we'll go any day you 
 like." 
 
 "October would be fine out there, wouldn't it?" 
 
 Before Hugh could answer, Algie asked : "Got 
 a new car, Dave?" 
 
 "Sure. Best I could find. Cost four thousand 
 and ought to be good." David scowled at his chicken. 
 "Andrie, this is not fit to eat. I can't be served this 
 way. Tell the cook that if he doesn't send me better 
 food than this, I'll see that he's out of a job quick." 
 
 "Yes, sir," replied Andrew. "The cook has just 
 lost his child, sir. I don't believe he is to blame if the 
 chicken isn't right. His mind ain't on it, sir." 
 
 David had the grace to utter some regrets, but 
 Algie said, as he pushed his chair back from the table: 
 "That's the way to talk to them, Dave. Keep 'em up 
 to the mark. It's what those fellows are for, to wait
 
 io THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 on us, we pay them well. I believe in class distinc- 
 tions. Well, good-bye. I'm off for a ride." 
 
 Algie lit his cigarette, waved his hand to David 
 and sauntered out of the door in that exasperating 
 way he had that got on Hugh's nerves. 
 
 "Don't go, Hugh. Sit down and tell me about 
 everything." 
 
 "There isn't much to tell. I've had a pleasant 
 summer. Worked hard and slept well." 
 
 "That's more than I've done. Had a bum time. 
 Used up my nerves. Doctor gave me some powders 
 to make me sleep." 
 
 Hugh leaned his elbows on the table, rested his 
 bonny face in his hands and looked David over. 
 
 "Well, 1 must say you look it. Your eyes are 
 heavy and you have dark rings around them. Your 
 cheeks are sallow ; liver's out of order from too high 
 living. You're down in the mouth and you're getting 
 lines between your eyes. Too much fun, David, that's 
 my diagnosis. Why don't you cut out all this non- 
 sense? A fellow only twenty with not a care, 
 oughtn't to look as you do." 
 
 "I suppose you're right, Hugh, but how am I 
 to 'cut it out' when the fellows are after me all the 
 time? There's a banquet tonight of the Jolly Good 
 Fellows and I won't be home till morning. And 
 there'll be something else tomorrow. And so it goes 
 all through the year." 
 
 "Couldn't you do some studying for a while? 
 'Sport your oak' as the English students do. There's 
 a good, solid oak door to this room, provided by kind
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK li 
 
 Mr. Davis. Shut it up, put a card on the door to say 
 you're busy. Your father would like it. He wants 
 you to do well. That's what he sent you here for. 
 Oh, I hate to preach^I'm none too good myself, but 
 I can't bear to see you going the pace, Davie, and be- 
 ing no good to yourself or anybody else." 
 
 "I guess you're right, Hugh, but I don't see where 
 to stop. Suppose I say that this banquet tonight shall 
 be my last, that I'll swear off from fun after this and 
 settle down to business; that I'll study hard and 
 graduate decently next June. What would you say 
 to that?" 
 
 ''You wouldn't honestly, Davie, would you?" 
 
 Hugh's voice was vibrant with excitement. If 
 Davie only would ! He had plenty of brains if he 
 would use them, and a strong will which had, up to 
 the present been employed chiefly in urging him to- 
 ward paths where he ought not to tread. 
 
 David laughed. 
 
 "Oh what an earnest fellow you are! If I were 
 like you, I'd Hello, I forgot my mail. Wait till I 
 read these letters it won't take long, half of them 
 are bills and I'll walk down with you. Some exer- 
 cise will do me good." 
 
 "All right, I'll wait if you won't be too long. 
 I've got to be at the laboratory at twelve." 
 
 Hugh picked up the paper and was soon absorbed 
 in the news. 
 
 Andrew came in, removed the tray, put David's 
 freshly brushed hat and coat away, went into the 
 adjoining bed-room and unpacked the heavy leather
 
 12 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 grip, and laid out clean linen, and another suit. Hav- 
 ing done everything he could find to do, Andrew de- 
 parted. 
 
 David rapidly opened his letters, placing the bills 
 on one side, bills left unpaid when he went away on 
 his vacation. He smiled as he read two or three of 
 the epistles and tore them up. Taking a check with 
 an amount in four figures from another, he put it 
 carefully away in his pocket. 
 
 "Must stop at the bank and deposit it," he mur- 
 mured. "Dear old Dad!" 
 
 David opened the last envelope, cheap paper, ad- 
 dressed in a wavering script. He read it through 
 slowly and this time no amusement was on his face. 
 His expression grew pleasant and tender, a soft look 
 came into his eyes that were frank and kind, when 
 they were not dimmed by worldly thoughts and too 
 much pleasure. 
 
 "This will suit you, Hugh, it's about your kind. 
 Didn't know I owned a grandmother did you?" 
 
 "I knew that you owned a four-thousand dollar 
 car and some stylish waistcoats and a dozen or so 
 suits, but I never was aware that you possessed any- 
 thing so precious as a grandmother." 
 
 "She's like a piece of Dresden china, delicate 
 and refined and sweet as a wild rose. I'm enthusi- 
 astic over grandmother." 
 
 "So I see." 
 
 "Want to hear her letter? I wouldn't dare read 
 it to any of the other fellows. They'd think I was 
 daffy."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 13 
 
 Hugh looked at a battered silver watch that had 
 belonged to his father and was wound with a key. 
 Hopelessly behind the times Hugh Hinson was in 
 some ways. He had some queer sentiments, accord- 
 ing to the boys. 
 
 "It's quarter to twelve. L can wait five minutes. 
 Go ahead." 
 
 Hugh settled himself comfortably in the chair 
 where Algie had lounged, but no indolence was ap- 
 parent in his attitude. There was something about 
 Hugh Hinson that impressed people as latent vitality. 
 He could rest, but was capable of action. 
 
 At first he listened to the reading with indiffer- 
 ence, but presently his face brightened and he sat up 
 straight. 
 
 " 'Hillside, Vermont, September 25th. My dear 
 Grandson," it began. 
 
 ' 'For some reason I have been thinking of you 
 all day. This is your mother's birthday, dear, and she 
 would have been so happy to know what a fine boy 
 her David has become. She was such a beautiful 
 girl, so good and obedient. I am so glad that the 
 good Father in Heaven has made you such a blessing 
 to us all, such a student for, of course, you stand 
 high in your classes and such a credit to us. 
 
 "Listen to that, will you? 'Such a student and 
 such a credit to us all !' By jove, Hugh, it makes a 
 fellow have some desire to live up to what the dear 
 old soul expects." 
 
 "Why don't you?" Hugh said quietly. Grand- 
 mother was becoming a person to him.
 
 14 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 ' 'Couldn't you come up and see me some time, 
 Davie? It is beautiful here among the hills. The 
 maple-trees are gorgeous and the sumach and golden- 
 rod are abundant. 
 
 " 'Ive made a batch of elder-berry pies, the kind 
 your father used to like when he came courting my 
 Leila. I haven't seen you since you were a lad of 
 twelve and you could eat more pie than any other boy 
 I ever saw. Now you are almost a man and I know 
 just what you're like, you couldn't be anything else, 
 being Leila's son. 
 
 ' 'You are handsome and strong, but best of all 
 you are a Christian, aren't you, Davie? And you are 
 going to give your whole life to God's service. 
 There's nothing better to do than just that, to give 
 ourselves to Him who gave Himself for us. That's 
 my experience, and I'm seventy now and see before 
 me very few years. You are going to have a long life 
 of usefulness. 
 
 " 'Don't study too hard. Davie. and injure your 
 health. I've heard that boys in college sometimes 
 study all night, so that they can stand high in their 
 classes. Please do not do this. 
 
 " 'I think of you often and every night I pray 
 God to keep Leila's Davie. Give my best regards to 
 your father. 
 
 " 'Affectionately, your grandmother, 
 
 " TAMKLA PRKNTK !:!' ' 
 
 "I wouldn't have read this to anyone but you. 
 Hugh. I guess Grandmother's something your kind.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 15 
 
 Once a year, on my mother's birthday, she writes me 
 just such a letter." 
 
 "What's a fellow to do with a saintly relative 
 like that? I'm not making fun of her or her religion, 
 not one bit. I respect it, but 1 simply can't live up to 
 it. These are modern times and a man has got to 
 enjoy himself in modern ways. And people don't 
 believe in things like they used to.'' 
 
 "1 must go. Da vie, come along." 
 
 The two presentable youths went out into the 
 glow of sunshine, bare-headed, hands in pockets, giv- 
 ing a friendly greeting to other boys. 
 
 "I had a letter from Eleanor this morning," 
 David remarked, casually. 
 
 There was an instant's pause. 
 
 Then Hugh said : "Is she going back to col- 
 lege ?" 
 
 "She's coming next week. Uncle Aleck is better 
 and I guess she will fimsh her course in order to 
 teach. Hello, there's Parsons." 
 
 David hurried away and that was the last that 
 Hugh saw of him for twenty-four hours.
 
 CHAPTER TWO 
 The Jolly Good Fellows 
 
 DAVIE forgot all about grandmother's letter in 
 the excitement of preparing for the banquet 
 that evening. He tossed it into a drawer and 
 there it lay, redolent of lavender and sweet thoughts 
 and unselfish love. 
 
 "The truth is, 1 can't live up to you/' Uavie said, 
 not knowing that he spoke aloud. 
 
 "Can't live up to what?" inquired Tom Parsons. 
 "You live fast enough to keep up with anything." 
 
 "You wouldn't understand, Tom. What about 
 tonight? Dress suits and pearl studs?" 
 
 "Oh, no. Sweaters and duck trousers. It's to 
 be a real picnic down at Sander's Beach. Great larks, 
 swimming, rowing, eating and drinking; coming home 
 by moonlight. The old lady is going to look her best 
 tonight, there's not a cloud in the sky. 'Oh what is 
 so rare as a day in' September." he chanted in a 
 rich tenor voice that made him the pride of the Glee 
 Club. 
 
 "It will be fun. What about the eats? Who's 
 got 'em in charge?" 
 
 "We left that to Algie ; he's up on all such things, 
 a regular Delmonico himself. And Simons is to sec 
 to the champagne. We won't spare expense." 
 
 "Not much we won't. I'm ready to chip in with 
 a big check. Got my allowance from dad this morn- 
 
 (16)
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 17 
 
 ing. He says as long as I'm now a senior, I'll need 
 to spend more. My bank accounts are flush now." 
 
 "You're a lucky dog!'' sighed Tom, sitting on 
 the arm of a chair and smoking one of David's ex- 
 pensive cigarettes, bought with proud papa's money. 
 "I wish I had a tenth of what you have." 
 
 "Don't I share with you, Tom?" 
 
 "You just do. By the way, you couldn't let me 
 have a ten-spot could you ? I'll pay it back as soon 
 as 1 get my October money, if there's any left," he 
 added, under his breath. 
 
 "Oh, that's all right, Tom, pay me wlien you can, 
 old chap. I'll write a check. We ought to help one 
 another," David said with his grand air, feeling ex- 
 ceedingly virtuous. The irony of it was that he never 
 realized that he was being generous with his father's 
 money. 
 
 Tom Parson's eyes were deep-set and too close 
 together for beauty. He had a way of half-closing his 
 eyelids, so that one scarcely saw his eyes at all, nor 
 could one get any clue to his thoughts. His mouth 
 was thin, with a sarcastic curve, exaggerated now, as 
 he watched David signing his name with a flourish 
 to the check. It was hard to tell whether Tom Par- 
 sons was pleased or not. 
 
 "I've made it twenty-five, Tom, you might need 
 more, expenses tonight, you know." 
 
 "Thank you." 
 
 Tom's tone might have expressed either gratitude 
 or resentment, as one chose to interpret it. David 
 accepted the first interpretation. His was not a sus-
 
 i8 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 picious nature and he really liked Tom and believed 
 that he was a faithful friend. 
 
 "Oh, don't mention it. And, by the way, don't 
 think of returning it, old boy. I've got plenty and 
 you haven't." 
 
 David did not observe the deep flush on Tom's 
 face, nor the trembling hand that reached out for the 
 check. It is too bad to have to tell it, for David Ket- 
 ron had many good qualities; the truth was that at this 
 moment, he was completely absorbed in contemplat- 
 ing his own importance as the only son of a million- 
 aire. 
 
 Tom pocketed the check, lit his third cigarette 
 and became pale again. Ordinarily he had not a 
 trace of color. 1 1 is cheeks were thin, his nose and 
 face were long, his hair very straight and black, his 
 eyes as I have said, were narrow, were black and 
 snaky there is no other word to express their ap- 
 pearance. 
 
 It is intresting to study how people form friend- 
 ships and for what diverse reasons. Next to Hugh 
 Hinson, Tom Parsons was David's closest friend. 
 He chose Hugh because he believed in him and trusted 
 him and partly because at times, even the millionaire's 
 son needed some one stronger than himself to lean 
 upon. 
 
 Tom I 'arsons was his friend for a totally differ- 
 ent reason. In his heart of hearts, David was in- 
 ordinately proud of his father's wealth and the posi- 
 tion which he himself possessed because of it. He 
 was one of the richest students in the university of
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 19 
 
 old standing, where there were many sons of wealthy 
 men. 
 
 The sycophancy of Parsons was pleasing to him. 
 Did he trust him? Not at all. But he was willing to 
 pay high for honeyed words and respectful homage 
 such as Tom knew so well how to give ; they were his 
 stock in trade and were profitable. 
 
 Decidedly, David had his weaknesses, but he was, 
 at bottom, a fine fellow, when you rubbed off all the 
 dross gathered from the gold that had encrusted him 
 all his life. How could he fail to be a fine fellow, 
 with the mother and grandmother whom he had pos- 
 sessed ? Yet, many of his good qualities were buried 
 deep beneath an accumulation of conceit and selfish- 
 ness and desire for the luxuries of this world and the 
 pleasure of life. 
 
 "There goes Ines!" cried Tom, excitedly, rush- 
 ing to the window. 
 
 David followed. 
 
 A girl wearing a white gown, with a deep red 
 rose fastened in the belt, and a broad white hat, the 
 drooping brim of which half hid her piquant, laugh- 
 ing face, dashed by. As the bright yellow car passed, 
 she waved her hand to the two fellows at the window, 
 showing a row of regular teeth, very small and ex- 
 ceedingly white. 
 
 It was strange that the first thing one noticed 
 about Ines Guille was her teeth. Hugh Hinson said 
 they made him think of the sharp teeth of a wild 
 animal, ready to seize its prey; which was not at all 
 nice in Hugh, for Ines was a very beautiful girl, who '
 
 2o THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 dazzled the eyes and caused violent palpitations in 
 the hearts of many youths in the university. Most 
 people admired her teeth and some thought they must 
 be false because they were so absolutely perfect. 
 
 "Stunner, isn't she? What's the mystery there, 
 Dave?" 
 
 "Didn't know there was any mystery." 
 
 "You never heard of the man who has been seen 
 hanging around the house where Ines and her aunt 
 live? Looks like a tramp." 
 
 "No, who is he?" 
 
 "Letter fo' you, sah," Andrew said, handing 
 David a small cream-tinted envelope. 
 
 Tom tried hard to see whose writing it was 
 some girl's, sure ! but could not, for David opened 
 it and read it, putting it carefully into his pocket, 
 without giving Tom a chance to gratify his curiosity. 
 
 Some things about his friend, David Ketron was 
 shrewd enough to understand, especially since that 
 day when he came into his room unexpectedly and 
 found Tom busy examining the papers in his desk. 
 There had been a scene, and a break for two months. 
 
 
 
 But Tom was useful and amusing and David made it 
 up. His desk was kept locked, however, after this 
 little episode. 
 
 "Who is he?" David repeated. 
 
 "Nobody knows. Some think it's her father, and 
 she's ashamed of him. It is a bit queer. Well, chow ! 
 Fm off for a. nap.. We'll get little sleep tonight I 
 imagine."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 21 
 
 "So long!" answered David, in the vernacular of 
 the college youth. 
 
 When Tom was surely gone, he locked the heavy 
 oak door, as Hugh had suggested, but did not go at 
 any work. He took from his pocket the small cream- 
 tinted envelope and re-read the note. The paper bore 
 a coat-of-arms, a lion rampant, three stars and a 
 pine-tree, and beneath it was an inscription in French : 
 L'honneur ct justice. This was in gold. 
 
 It was a very distinguished, stylish epistle, writ- 
 ten in fine script of foreign style, acquired with vari- 
 ous other accomplishments when Ines was a pupil in 
 the Convent of the Annunciation in Paris. 
 
 Ines had been heard to remark that she learned 
 a good deal of languages, how to make wax flowers, 
 to embroider and do cross-stitch, but mighty little 
 religion. Judging from her actions, she spoke the 
 exact truth. In the circle of society in which Ines 
 Guille moved, it was not considered genteel to prac- 
 tice any religion. Tom Parsons and Algie Van der 
 Voort did not see any need of it and even David 
 Ketron was indifferent. 
 
 David re-read the note several times. 
 
 "DEAR DAVID: 
 
 "Aren't you coming to see me soon? I'll be in 
 at tea-time tomorrow and shall expect you. .1 want 
 to know what you have been doing all the vacation 
 and lots of other things. Be sure to come. 
 
 "Yours sincerely, INES GUILLE.""
 
 22 I' HAT l\l. IKd.N SlKKAK 
 
 David did not throw this scented note with its 
 embossed heraldic heading into the drawer, as he had 
 done with grandmother's letter, and forget all about 
 it. By no means. He put it into' a separate part of 
 his pocket-wallet, and placed it on the left side of his 
 vest, in the place where sentiment locates a certain 
 organ. 
 
 He thought very often about it, as he donned, 
 not sweaters and trousers, as Tom Parsons had said 
 - for that was merely figure of speech, not to be 
 taken literally by one of the Jolly Good Fellows 
 but a suit of heavy Japanese silk, made by an expen- 
 sive tailor. To the uninitiated it looked as unpre- 
 tending as Ines Guille's simple white gown ; the expert 
 knew that both of them cost a lot, enough to keep 
 Hugh Hinson in comfort for six weeks. 
 
 "Good-bye, Andie. You needn't wait up for 
 me," David announced, sallying forth at five forty- 
 five, sharp. 
 
 "Thank you, sah," Andrew answered, watching 
 David go blithly away. 
 
 In the negro's black face there was an expression 
 of mingled pride and pity. He had cared for David's 
 comfort for eight years, had prepared his bath and 
 laid out his clothes with praiseworthy devotion. He 
 knew what David liked and gave it to him; but he had 
 a mind of his own, even if he was genuinely black; 
 he knew that David was going the pace and would 
 pay for it some day, just as surely as the moon would 
 shine upon the earth that night and the sun would 
 rise next morning.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 23 
 
 Andrew was deeply religious by nature. He loved 
 his young employer and he loved his soul. Humble 
 though he was, he would have given his life to save 
 David Ketron's soul. Pray for him, he did daily; 
 speak plainly to him, he did frequently, even at the 
 risk of getting fired. 
 
 Three times had David dismissed him and three 
 times taken him back. The truth was that David, 
 sound at heart, as I have said, was perfectly aware 
 of the value of faith in God and in the salvation 
 offered by our Lord Jesus Christ, which was possessed 
 by his friend Hugh H in son, by his grandmother, up 
 in Vermont, and by his serving man, Andrew Jones. 
 
 Not ready to accept their faith, because he knew 
 that if he did so, it meant self-denial and self-abnega- 
 tion and even more than these to be a real Christian, 
 he nevertheless, prized these persons who possessed 
 the spirit of Christ much more highly than he prized 
 Algie Van der Voort, who could blow beautiful rings 
 of smoke in the air, or Al Simons, the champagne ex- 
 pert, or Tom Parsons, who would have made a good 
 Mephistopheles. He did not want to give any of 
 them up. 
 
 Andrew went back into the bed-room and picked 
 up articles strewn around the floor and table by reck- 
 less David. He put the handsome cravat into its 
 leather and gold case, with kindred cravats, equally 
 costly. 
 
 "I wish he hadn't gone tonight," muttered An- 
 drew. "Deah Lo'd when you' gwine to save 'im?
 
 24 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 Hurry, Lo'd, for he's goin' to de debbil fas' ez he 
 kin." 
 
 In this opinion, Andrew Jones, formerly of Vir- 
 ginia, whose grandfather had borne the woes of slav- 
 ery, was exactly right. 
 
 David was unaware of Andrew's opinion of his 
 mad rush toward destruction, or the sincere prayer of 
 his which followed him as he entered the car standing 
 at the entrance to the quadrangle. He was just one 
 of hundreds of thoughtless, joyous, reckless, affec- 
 tionate youths who swarmed all over the gray build- 
 ing, whistling, shouting, singing, talking slang 
 sometimes using much worse language, lovable 
 youngsters who had the making of men in them. 
 
 What kind of men? That was the question. 
 Men to make the world better, to help sufferers, to lift 
 up the discouraged, to spread Christ's spirit wherever 
 they went; or men whose influence would bring evil 
 wherever it went, would leave a trail as slimy as that 
 of the loathsome black snail that one finds in tropical 
 countries. Who can say what material there is in one 
 of these lads to whom our hearts go out in real love, 
 these men in embroyo? 
 
 "Pile in, boys!" shouted David, pushing the 
 starter. "Hurry up there, Algie. Put in the bottles, 
 Al. There's plenty of room. Got plenty ? Oh, we're 
 Jolly Good Fellows," sang David. 
 
 The others joined in. 
 
 "Aye, we're Jolly Good Fellows, an' don't you 
 forget it. Hurrah !"
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 25 
 
 "Climb in here by me, Tom. There's plenty of 
 room," said David, when the echoes of the chorus 
 had died away. "All ready, boys?" 
 
 "All ready," they answered. 
 
 ( )ff they went, the splendid car purring its way 
 through the long street, where historic elms waved 
 generous branches, casting shade upon this young gen- 
 eration of students as they had sheltered students a 
 century before. 
 
 A. girl waved her hand as the car flew by. She 
 stood on the white veranda of a white house with 
 white pillars, in the midst of a velvety lawn, dotted 
 with oaks and elms and maple-trees just beginning 
 to turn scarlet and gold. 
 
 "It's Ines," Tom said, with a queer catch in his 
 voice. 
 
 "Yes, it's Ines," answered David, saluting with 
 three honks of his big horn.
 
 CHAPTER THREE 
 A Kettle of Clam Chowder 
 
 OUT with the hampers, boys ! Give me one. 
 My ! it's jolly heavy ! What's in it?" 
 "Everything that's good, you chump. Do 
 you think I don't know how to order grub ?" inquired 
 Algie superintending the unloading of several wicker 
 hampers from a second car by no means as fine as 
 David's but fully as useful. 
 
 Beside the hampers, four youths had been 
 screwed into the auto, one hanging his feet outside, 
 one sitting on the hampers, one driving and the fourth 
 serenely riding on the foot-board. 
 
 "Can't we eat right away?" inquired Stout Jim 
 Smith. "I'm hungry." 
 
 "You're always hungry," grunted Algie. "Get 
 busy, now." 
 
 Algie never did a stroke himself, but he ordered 
 and watched other fellows work. It was a way he 
 had I suppose, when you think of it, that we all 
 have our little "ways," good or bad. The fellows had 
 been inclined to resent this superior attitude of his, 
 doubtless derived from some mistaken idea about the 
 ancestor who sold cheese and butter and eggs in New 
 Amsterdam. 
 
 This was before they found out that Algie did 
 know how to boss, that with all his languid air and 
 affected drawl, he had inherited from the sturdy 
 
 (26)
 
 THAT KKTKON STREAK 27 
 
 Dutchman a good deal of executive ability and carried 
 everything through that he undertook. He was par- 
 ticularly endowed with the gift of ordering the "eats" 
 which endeared him to his comrades, much more than 
 if he received the Greek Prize. 
 
 Besides this, Algie Van der Voort had a long 
 purse and didn't mind spending money any more than 
 David Ketron did. The boys clave to Davie and Algie, 
 for are not "eats" and "cash" two most essential fac- 
 tors in college life? 
 
 "This is fine!" said David, standing on a rock 
 (ivrrlooking the bay and breathing in the fresh, spicy 
 air of pines and sea. 
 
 "I picked it out," Tom answered. "Down yonder 
 is a flat stone by the water, where we can spread the 
 grub and there's a good pool for swimming just around 
 the corner, you can't see it from here." 
 
 "Your head's level, Tom." 
 
 Tom smiled one of his quiet, cynical smiles and 
 felt in his pocket for the check that David had so 
 generously given him that morning. Yes, Tom had a 
 long head and he knew how to use it. 
 
 "Let's go swimming first," announced Stout Jim. 
 "We can't have supper yet, I s'pose, an' we must do 
 something." 
 
 "We might read," suggested Al Simons, who was 
 Algie's shadow and had helped prepare the feast. 
 
 There was a howl of derision. With a grand 
 rush, the eight lads who had come in the cars, joined, 
 by two more who had arrived via trolley and a half 
 mile tramp through the woods, made for the pool,
 
 28 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 flung aside their garments and were soon enjoying a 
 swim and frightening the trout. 
 
 David went a little further than the others, and 
 soon saw an opening in the overshadowing cliff. 
 
 "Looks like a cave," he muttered. 
 
 A cave offers many attractions. 
 
 "Come on, Tom," he called. "I've found some- 
 thing." 
 
 There were low bushes on the border of the pool, 
 hiding David and Tom from the rest of the swimmers. 
 
 "Great, isn't it?" Tom said, as the two crept into 
 the dark, cool opening in the rocks. "Bear in here, 
 maybe." 
 
 "Hear him growl !" exclaimed David keeping up 
 the fiction. 
 
 Sure enough, there was a sort of growl, but it 
 wasn't a bear, it was the deep voice of a man, a re- 
 fined, pleasant voice. 
 
 "To what am I indebted for this visit, young 
 gentlemen?" he inquired. 
 
 "Well, I never!" said Tom. "We didn't know 
 that anybody had taken this cave for a private house." 
 
 "Won't you sit down?" 
 
 "I guess we'd better go back and dress before we 
 make a call," suggested David, laughing. 
 
 "You'll find it chilly in here, perhaps. I like it 
 and it's better than no roof at all, isn't it?" 
 
 "It's great," Dave replied, "but sort of primitive, 
 don't you think ?" 
 
 They could see quite easily, now, what was in the 
 cave, for there was a cleft in the rock through which
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 29 
 
 the light likewise the rain could come in. There 
 was a rude fireplace, such as gypsies use, made of flat 
 stones and on it was a tin kettle, from which steam 
 came, and delightful odors. 
 
 "Clam chowder," explained their host, seeing 
 David's glance. "Found clams on the shore, picked 
 some tomatoes from a vine that had escaped through 
 somebody's fence; thought maybe they belonged to 
 the wayfarer, like such things used to in Bible times, 
 you know. All that grew by the wayside belonged to 
 the poor. Mixed clams and tomatoes and a few 
 potatoes and there you are. Best chowder you ever 
 ate, I'll guarantee." 
 
 "Smells so," said Tom. 
 
 "I suppose you're camping out." David ventured. 
 
 The man smiled. His face was very agreeable 
 when he smiled ; in repose, it was rather severe. He 
 had the healthy complexion that goes with out-of-door 
 life, his eyes were singularly bright and his heavy 
 brown hair waved around a well-tanned forehead. 
 
 When he lifted the cover of the chowder-pot, 
 David observed that his hands were slender, with the 
 long fingers of an artist that was it. He was an 
 artist. They were always rather queer. 
 
 Evidently, he lived here, for in the corner was a 
 sort of couch, covered with an old gray steamer-shawl. 
 
 "Well, not exactly camping out. I'm living here 
 for the present. It's a good place to think in and I'm 
 thankful for a place to lay my head while I'm planning 
 how. best to do my Master's work. Do I need any- 
 thing better than He had when He was on earth?
 
 30 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 'The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have 
 nests/ our Lord said. Why should I enjoy more com- 
 forts than He had ?" 
 
 Tom nudged David. 
 
 "Let's go," he whispered. "It's time for supper." 
 
 A man who quoted Scripture and lived in a cave 
 must be a little off his head. 
 
 "You're camping near here?" inquired the 
 st ranger. 
 
 David noticed again the peculiarly rich and 
 melodious timbre of his voice. It had so much depth 
 to it. 
 
 "We're the Jolly Good Fellows and we're out here 
 just for the night, for a picnic," he explained. "We'd 
 better go now and we thank you for letting us see 
 your nice home." 
 
 "It is nice, isn't it? Do you know, I feel as if I 
 never wanted to sleep under a roof again after being 
 in this glorious air all day and night. Maybe we were 
 all meant to be gypsies. But soon I must go back to 
 my work." 
 
 "Do you work?" 
 
 "Did you think I tramped all my life, young 
 man?" asked the stranger, laughing. "Of course, I 
 work, in the big city, down among the people who 
 don't know what fresh air is, who rarely see a flower 
 or anything beautiful, who live in droves like cattle, 
 yet God the Father made them and loves them, and 
 Christ the Son died for them, and the Holy Spirit 
 hovers over them." 
 
 His face shone as if the sunset had illuminated
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 31 
 
 it, and he seemed to have forgotten the boys who went 
 away without trying to say good-bye. 
 
 "Kind of cracked," was Tom's characterization 
 of the stranger. 
 
 "I don't know about that," David said slowly. 
 
 David \vas thinking. He did not often exercise 
 his brain that way; it was easier not to think, just to 
 bump along through life any old way. His thoughts 
 had suddenly flown to grandmother, the little Dresden 
 china lady up in the hills of Vermont. 
 
 Grandmother would understand this stranger 
 who talked about his Master as if he walked by his 
 side; grandmother spoke the same language, one that 
 David and Tom and Algie and Al Simons could not 
 comprehend. Along with French and tennis and man- 
 dolin playing, would it be better for them if they took 
 a course of this kind of thing? 
 
 David's thoughts were short ones, for when they 
 had re-attired themselves, rinding their clothes in the 
 right spot but their comrades gone, the supper spread 
 on the flat rock drove everything else from their 
 minds. 
 
 "Thought you might be drowned," Stout Jim re- 
 marked, casually. He held a sandwich in one hand 
 and a chicken leg in the other. Fat sandwiches, the 
 Jolly Good Fellows believed in, not the nice, dainty 
 kind that girls serve at afternoon teas, and that a 
 man can swallow at one mouthful. This had been one 
 of the first decisions made by the ten who were linked 
 together in the bond of fellowship and picnics and 
 larks.
 
 32 
 
 "Much you cared," retorted Tom, helping him- 
 self liberally. ''Didn't seem to worry you much. 
 Haven't lost your appetites any over it, have you?" 
 
 The eight grinned cheerfully. 
 
 "Hadn't a doubt but that you'd turn up," Al said. 
 
 "Where'd you go anyway?" asked Algie in his 
 most languid tone, keeping a sharp eye on the amount 
 of food consumed by each Jolly Good Fellow. 
 
 It wasn't fair that one should get more than an- 
 other and there were some who grabbed. Yes, liter- 
 ally grabbed. Algie was strong on justice. 
 
 David kicked Tom as he opened his mouth to ;m 
 swer. For some reason, he did not want to hear Tom 
 analyze the strange man as he was equal to doing, in 
 his cold, sarcastic way, holding him up to ridicule be- 
 fore a lot of boys who would laugh and scoff only too 
 easily, perhaps pretending to be much more irreligious 
 than they were actually, at heart. There were con- 
 tradictions in David Ketron's character. 
 
 "Oh, I say!" exclaimed Tom, rubbing his ankle, 
 "What're you tryin' to do? Fall over me?" 
 
 David gave him a sharp look, quickly understood 
 by Tom. "He don't want me to tell about the man," 
 Tom thought. The check burned in his pocket. What 
 Dave wanted, went with Tom Parsons. 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 "All right. I'll forgive you. Where's the drinks, 
 Algie?" 
 
 In a row stood the champagne bottles without 
 which any feast held by the Jolly Good Fellows would 
 have been a failure, deadly dull.
 
 THAT KETKON STREAK 33 
 
 Algie opened one bottle. It popped loudly. 
 Glasses were held up and filled with amber liquid 
 that held excitement and false mirth, dullness of mind 
 and failure of judgment in its depth. 
 
 They- all drank, clicking the glasses together as 
 David had taught them to do in foreign fashion. 
 
 The man from the cave watched them do this, as 
 he came around the corner with the big tin kettle in 
 his hand, steaming with fragrant odor of clam chowder. 
 
 I saw a picture once in a famous art gallery, by 
 an artist whose name is known all over the world. 
 On the mountain side stood a lonely figure, clad in 
 loosely-flowing white garments. His face was tender 
 in expression, but upon it was written such a sadness 
 as one rarely sees. 
 
 Below him lay a city of gray houses clustered 
 close together and in its midst was a great temple. 
 There were people on the flat roofs of the houses and 
 a haze like a golden veil hung over them and the city 
 and the flowers and gardens and palms. 
 
 Underneath the painting in its soft tints of green 
 and violet and rose, were these words : "O Jerusalem, 
 Jerusalem. . .how often would I have gathered thy 
 children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens 
 under her wings and ye would not ! Behold your 
 house is left unto you desolate." 
 
 A similar expression was on the strange man's 
 face, as he looked down upon the ten strong youths 
 raising to their lips and draining the liquor which 
 could bring with it naught but destruction and pain. 
 
 He stepped forward briskly.
 
 34 THAT KETKUN STREAK 
 
 "Hello, boys! Like clam chowder? I made a 
 big pot full today. Guess there's enough to go around 
 and I'd like to share it with you." 
 
 "Like chowder? Well, I guess," called out one lad. 
 
 Algie sized up the stranger and in spite of his 
 rough trousers, his crumpled shirt and shock of wavy 
 hair, was able to see the man underneath. 
 
 "We haven't any plates, sir." 
 
 "Well, I have. They're under my arm. If some- 
 body will show me the best place to put my kettle, 
 we'll have these tin plates filled in a jiffy. I always 
 have a lot of them on hand, because one never knows 
 when one may have a guest like tonight." 
 
 "Where'd he come from?" whispered Stout Jim 
 to Tom. 
 
 "Straight down from heaven," Tom spoke more 
 truly than he knew. "Accept your blessings, eat your 
 chowder and ask questions afterward." 
 
 Ten spoons were dipped into ten plates of smok- 
 ing chowder and there was silence for a few minutes. 
 
 "Mighty good," was Stout Jim's commendation. 
 
 "I'd like the recipe," Algie remarked. "Our cook 
 can't make anything like this." 
 
 The man glanced at Algie's immaculate white suit, 
 at his ladylike, manicured hands, at his general get-up 
 and his eyes danced with fun. 
 
 "It's a very simple recipe. Dig the clams just as 
 the sun is rising and the clouds are all pink and gossa- 
 mer. Raise the tomatoes in your own garden, see 
 them grow from tiny plants until they bear ripe red 
 beauties. Go out into the woods and make your own
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 35 
 
 oven and cook your own chowder. I'll guarantee that 
 nothing ever has or ever will taste so good as that." 
 
 Algie joined in the hearty laughter that went 
 around ; he could bear a joke at his own expense. 
 
 Al Simons' heart warmed to the stranger. 
 
 "You haven't had one bit of your own chowder. 
 There isn't a drop left." 
 
 "Oh, I say," began David. 
 
 "I'll take a sandwich instead, if you will allow me. 
 Good old-fashioned kind, these." 
 
 Algie beamed. 
 
 "Pass him the chicken, boys, and do have some 
 jelly. Totty, hand out the champagne." 
 
 "Have to open another bottle." 
 
 "I don't want any, thank you ; never learned to 
 like it." 
 
 "Missed a lot," remarked Tom. 
 
 "I don't know. There as so many good things 
 in this world that one more or less don't matter. I 
 know the best spring, water's cold as ice." 
 
 "Where is it?" said one. "I would like a glass 
 of good water." 
 
 "Shall we find it?" 
 
 "Let's !" 
 
 The whole ten were on their feet, Stout Jim tak- 
 ing the opportunity to supply himself with two slices 
 of jelly-cake and some olives. 
 
 Off they tramped, following the man, who walked 
 with the easy, springy tread of an athlete. 
 
 "It has to be drank out of a tin cup to be really 
 delicious. I'm sorry that I don't own more than one
 
 36 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 cup, but we might wash the chowder kettle and fill 
 that to carry back." 
 
 "I'll wash it," said Tom, grown enthusiastic. Had 
 he ever thought of ridiculing this most delightful man ? 
 Never mind if he did believe some old-fashioned stuff, 
 he deserved to be one of the Jolly Good Fellows. 
 
 The spring was in a rock overhung with ferns. 
 The stranger was right. It was ice-cold, delicious. 
 
 Out of the battered tin cup with no handle, each 
 one took a long drink. Algie asked for a second one. 
 Then they all traveled back to the sandy shore, two 
 of Algie's henchmen bearing the kettle. 
 
 "We wont open any more bottles just now," com- 
 manded the chief. "I'm going just full up with 
 water." 
 
 "So am I," said Tom. "Let's build a fire and sit 
 around it and tell stories. It's a bit cool now that the 
 sun is gone." 
 
 "Totty and Jim, you go and gather wood. It's a 
 fine scheme. You'll stay won't you, sir?" Algie asked. 
 
 "Surely, if you're sure I won't spoil the fun." 
 
 "Not a bit of it," shouted the chorus. "Oh. 
 you're a Jolly Good Fellow an' don't you forget it," 
 they sang. 
 
 "Much obliged. I know how to lay that wood. 
 You ought to have seen the fires we made on cool 
 nights when I was tramping in the Alps." 
 
 "Tell us about it," said David. 
 
 They made a circle around the fire and kept piling 
 on sticks until the flames went high into the air and 
 were reflected in the smooth waters of the indentation
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 37 
 
 made by the sea between two encircling walls of rock. 
 The moon rose, a ball of gold on the horizon. The 
 old man in the moon grinned when he saw the boys 
 and sailed on up into the heavens shedding all over 
 the beach and rocks and pines a silvery light. 
 
 "Of course, I'll tell you about it. .Ever been 
 there?" 
 
 "I have," answered David, "went two years ago 
 with my father." 
 
 David was sitting next to the stranger. He felt 
 that he had something in common with this man who 
 understood so well the soul of a youth and could meet 
 him on his own ground. 
 
 "Well, some day I'm going over there myself 
 pretty soon. I want to be in the midst of the recon- 
 struction. You know that is what our Master wants 
 us to do. 'Ge ye into all the world and preach the 
 Gospel' doesn't mean by any means that a fellow has 
 to be a preacher and stand in. a pulpit in a gown and 
 talk to a congregation, though of course, that's a big 
 thing to do. It means to go out among people and 
 just live Jesus before them, to go among the poor and 
 give them food." 
 
 Even Tom the cynic listened and Algie forgot 
 to lounge. The tones of the man's voice held them, 
 the truth of what he said touched them. They were 
 not bad; they were only hearty, happy boys who 
 were groping their way through the mysteries of 
 youth into the mysteries of manhood without a guide. 
 
 There is something very fascinating about a per- 
 son who is in dead earnest. Every one of these ten
 
 38 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 Jolly Good Fellows appreciated sincerity they were 
 keen in their estimates and knew a fraud when they 
 saw him. Every one of them believed in this stranger, 
 though they had not the slightest idea where he came 
 from, and liked him because he was genuine and be- 
 cause he was not one bit ashamed of his religion. 
 After all, as Tom had said, he has a right to believe 
 what he pleases. 
 
 "Dear me one would think that I was a preacher 
 myself," the man said, with sudden change of air. 
 "I was going to tell of camping in the Alps. It was 
 fifteen years ago, when I was about as old as you. I 
 was just out of college and my father sent me to 
 Europe to get a shine on me, he said. Sort of polish- 
 ing process, you know. Well, I got polished up in 
 some pretty undesirable ways that my father didn't 
 expect, but I had a specially good time in the moun- 
 tains." 
 
 The lads sat around the fire, entranced by the 
 stories they heard. No ignorant tramp was this, but 
 a cultivated gentleman, who had been all over the 
 world, who had seen the sun rise on the mountains of 
 Korea, the Hermit Kingdom, had climbed the Hima- 
 layas in India and spent days in the lonely desert, 
 knew how to ride a camel or an elephant, and could 
 tell tales of kangaroos. 
 
 The hours passed and the man in the moon con- 
 tinued to laugh high above them, for he saw the bot- 
 tles of champagne with their gilt labels remain corked, 
 he saw the kettle of spring water emptied. 
 
 He almost heard Tom say to Algie, as Totty
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 39. 
 
 packed the dishes away in the empty hampers : "Why, 
 we've got all this stuff left!" 
 
 "Oh, well, we've had a great time and we'll leave 
 them till our next picnic." 
 
 Tom went with David to leave the car at the 
 garage. As they walked back to the quadrangle where 
 they w r ould separate, for Tom Parsons could not af- 
 ford to live in such luxurious quarters, he said : 
 "That fellow seems to be a crank only on one subject 
 and that's religion." 
 
 "Maybe it would be better for us all if there were 
 more cranks like him," was David's unexpected reply. 
 
 "Ain't gettin' religious, are you?" sneered Tom. 
 
 Faithful Andrew had not gone to bed. He was 
 waiting, rather dreading to see his young employer 
 as he would return. To his surprise, the colored man 
 heard no shouting on the stairs. David came in 
 quietly, and perfectly sober. 
 
 "Now Andrie, why didn't you do what I told you 
 to? I didn't need you." 
 
 "There's a cup o' chocolate fer yo', Master David, 
 an' some cake." 
 
 "That tastes good, Andrie." 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "I saw a man of your kind tonight." 
 
 "My kind?" 
 
 "Well, not exactly, but he believes that the Lord 
 Jesus Christ sticks to us poor fellows, even when we're 
 in trouble." 
 
 Andrew went away to his small room in town. 
 
 "Oh, Lo'd," he whispered, "I'm jest a goin' to 
 keep prayin' and you'll do the rest, sure."
 
 CHAPTER FOUR 
 Davie Drinks a Cup of Tea 
 
 TOM PARSONS came to David's room just 
 after ethics class. He yawned vigorously, 
 stretching his arms. 
 
 "What fools we all were last night, Davie, to be 
 hoodwinked by that crank. Lost half our fun too. 
 Simons says 
 
 David looked up from the book he was reading, 
 "perfecting French" he called his occupation. The 
 book was bound in brilliant yellow. Its title was 
 Le crime de Roland highly educative in the things 
 of sense and beauty, highly defective in moral tone 
 and teaching. David could read French easily, he had 
 had a charming good "bonnie" in his childhood and 
 had spent much time in beautiful France, after bis 
 father "struck it rich." 
 
 This was one of the bonds between him and Ines 
 Guille, this common love for France. 
 
 "I thought him a very interesting man," David 
 interrupted with an air of hauteur that he assumed at 
 times, an air that Tom Parsons detested. 
 
 "Religious crank. Just fancy the Jolly Good 
 Fellows sitting there quietly, listening to Scripture !" 
 Tom gave way to mirth. "And not one of us has been 
 to church for a year. Oh, it's a good one. on us." 
 
 "I went at Christmas time," remarked David, 
 joining in the laugh. It was too ridiculous to think
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 41 
 
 that ten such advanced and modern fellows as the 
 Jolly Good Fellows should have been hypnotized by a 
 man who lived in a cave and talked about Jesus as if 
 he knew him well and considered him really an elder 
 brother. 
 
 "You ought to hear Algie talk this morning. He's 
 waked up, has Algie." 
 
 "Without a headache. So did I.'' 
 
 "He has a queer notion about this crank, thinks 
 that in spite of his strange ways, he's one of us, a 
 man of intellect." 
 
 David stared. 
 
 "Was Algie referring to you?" he asked pointedly. 
 
 "You needn't rub it in if I did flunk on math," 
 blurted out Tom, his face scarlet with annoyance. "I 
 passed up anyway and you didn't do much better." 
 
 "No, I didn't," David confessed, "and dad didn't 
 like it any too well, either. Now, if I studied like my 
 cousin Eleanor does, I could make my family glad 
 that I belong to it. I wonder how it would feel to 
 take honors." 
 
 "I guess Hugh Hinson is in for some. They say 
 he'll take the Snowden prize. But not for all the 
 honors would I live as he does in a stuffy hole down 
 by the factories ; gets part of his meals and has his 
 dinners at a cheap boarding house." 
 
 David was not in good humor this morning as 
 he ought to be, having come home in a normal con- 
 dition and having the knowledge of a big surplus in 
 the bank.
 
 42 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 The truth was that some things said by the 
 stranger as they sat around the brushfire in the moon- 
 light and the waves lapped softly on the sandy beach, 
 had struck very close home. He could not forget 
 them. 
 
 "Hugh pays his bills and doesn't sponge on any- 
 body," he remarked so sharply that Tom, the 
 sycophant, winced. 
 
 For the moment, he had forgotten his business, 
 he had even forgotten the check given him by David 
 the day before. He intended to apply it as part pay- 
 ment to a very unaccommodating tailor who insisted 
 on seeing some money before he would consent to cut 
 the handsome cloth selected by Tom for his winter's 
 suit. 
 
 "Oh, Hugh's all right," Tom answered, disregard- 
 ing the implication in David's words. "I expect he'll 
 be a great man when we are just plodding along. 
 That's the way it comes out in story books. Honest, 
 poor, industrious, successful." 
 
 "Funny we never asked him his name," said 
 David. 
 
 "Nor did he ask ours." 
 
 "I guess he thought we were just human beings 
 and he didn't care who our fathers were nor ho\v 
 much money we had. Maybe he was the right kind." 
 
 "You're daffy yourself, Dave, this morning. 
 Come out and have a game of tennis." 
 
 "Don't care if I do. Andrie, bring me my racket 
 and balls, please, or maybe you'd better carry them
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 43 
 
 over to the court. It's sultry this morning and I can't 
 do more than carry myself." 
 
 The millionaire's son sallied forth, clad in flannels, 
 and in a lordly manner led the way with Tom, while 
 Andrew, black and shining, brought up the rear, bear- 
 ing the implement of pleasure. 
 
 "And now for Ines," breathed David. He was 
 fresh from a bath into which Andrew had put some 
 perfume, not knowing that in so doing he was merely 
 following the example of the Romans two thousand 
 years ago, the people who loved luxury and sensuality. 
 He was arrayed in his best and his face was flushed 
 with excitement. 
 
 There were many in the university who would 
 have envied David Ketron if they had known that he 
 was on the way to the white house with the white 
 pillars, where dwelt Ines Guille, the most beautiful 
 and to many people the most inaccessible girl in the 
 whole town. 
 
 "Whither away?" called out Algie as the immacu- 
 late David passed beneath his window. 
 
 "Going out to tea," David answered. 
 
 Algie leaned out further and whispered hoarsely. 
 
 "To see fair Ines?" 
 
 David frowned, nodded and went on his way 
 across the campus, in front of buildings hung with 
 ivy, the growth of many years, and down the long 
 street till he came to the house where Ines had stood 
 yesterday, waving her hand. 
 
 Decidedly, if Ines was cold to most people, she 
 was not so to David. She came forward to meet him,
 
 44 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 speaking some pleasant words in her formal foreign 
 fashion. 
 
 "Aunt Lennie, Mr. Ketron has come. Will you 
 make the tea?" 
 
 "How do you do, Mr. Ketron," said Mrs. Stewart. 
 "You'll find that bamboo chair comfortable, I think. 
 Isn't it hot today? There's a storm coming up. Al- 
 ready I hear thunder rumbling," the lady rambled on. 
 
 Ines Guille was different in many ways from the 
 other girls whom David knew. She was lithe and 
 graceful. Today, she wore a soft gown of lemon yel- 
 low, singularly becoming to one who had the dark 
 complexion of a Spaniard and the dark eyes of an 
 Italian, large and languorous. When Ines smiled, she 
 was like a child, her cheeks dimpling, her regular teeth 
 gleaming between well-formed lips, red as the 
 coral from the South Seas. 
 
 When Ines frowned, the ancestors of long ago, 
 the Spanish Senoras who lived in Granada and wore 
 lace mantillas over their sleek heads, would have seen 
 themselves, reproduced in her face, with all its mystery 
 of the Orient and the Moors. 
 
 Today she did not frown, but every time that the 
 thunder rolled over the sky, as the clouds became 
 heavier, she shuddered and looked anxiously at the 
 window. 
 
 "Let's have some light, Aunt Lennie," she said, 
 at last. "The sky is like ink." 
 
 "It's going to be a big blow, I fancy," said David, 
 helping her turn on the burners until the room was 
 lighted brilliantly.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 45 
 
 "I don't like it," Ines said under her breath. 
 
 The maid brought a large silver tray, laden with 
 cups and saucers, with an artistic tea-service, heavily 
 chased, and set it down upon a small tabouret inlaid 
 with mother of pearl, in front of Mrs. Stewart. 
 
 "Don't be foolish, Ines," reproved Mrs. Stewart, 
 as her neice grew more silent. "Drink your tea. Mr. 
 Ketron, you'll have some of the .cakes, won't you? 
 What will Mr. Ketron think of you if you act like a 
 silly child, Ines?" 
 
 Mr. Ketron was thinking various things at this 
 moment and one was that he liked Ines Guille far bet- 
 ter in this mood, when she was quiet and subdued, 
 than he did when, in all her regal beauty, she con- 
 ducted herself like an imperious queen. He was won- 
 dering whether, after all, there might not be in the 
 girl who had fascinated him and many others by her 
 grace and foreign manners, the qualities that go to 
 make up the real woman. Aunt Lennie, who hadn't 
 a nerve in her whole body, could not realize that Ines 
 was actually suffering, not from imaginary fears, but 
 from the excitement which many a high-strung person 
 feels in the approach of a terrific tempest. 
 
 A terrible tempest this one threatened to be. The 
 lightning was plainly visible, for the lights had gone 
 out, probably the powerhouse was struck. The crash- 
 ing thunder was ceaseless and the house shook with 
 blasts of wind. 
 
 The tea was untouched, even cool Aunt Lennie 
 confessing that she would leave hers till later, it was 
 too hot to drink anyway. Ines sat curled up in a big
 
 46 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 easy-chair, her face hidden in a pillow and David, not 
 knowing just what to do in this unexpected emergency, 
 went to the window and looked out. 
 
 Electric storms had no effect upon him ; he en- 
 joyed seeing the blue and copper flashes darting down 
 in jagged fire, he liked to see the thick branches of 
 the oaks bending like the limbs of giants writhing in 
 a power greater than their own. On the paths, rivers 
 of water were running and the rain fell in torrents. 
 It was one of those autumn storms that washes away 
 the accumulated dust of summer and makes every 
 leaf and blade of grass fresh and clean. 
 
 To his astonishment, he saw a man coming to- 
 ward the house, battling against the wind and rain. 
 He wore a long rubber coat and was bareheaded. An 
 umbrella would have been utterly useless. Besides 
 this one, solitary figure, there was no human being to 
 be seen abroad. The storm had driven all to shelter. 
 
 The man reached the porch, shook himself like a 
 wet dog, and disappeared, presumably into the house. 
 A few moments later, David heard a door open and 
 turning, saw the man coming into the adjoining 
 library, then between the columns into the parlor 
 where he and Mrs. Stewart and Ines were, not ex- 
 changing a word. 
 
 The maid, white and trembling, had lighted the 
 candles at the piano, on either side of the fireplace, 
 in the Venetian candelabra, five branched and wrought 
 in glass, designs of roses and festoons of blue ribbon. 
 In their soft radiance, the room took on a festive ap- 
 pearance and became more cheerful.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 47 
 
 With the man's entrance came an atmosphere of 
 strength. 
 
 "Hello," he said, "what's the matter here? It 
 isn't a funeral, is it? It's just one of the grandest 
 demonstrations of nature anybody ever saw. Out 
 where I live, the trees are doing their best to stand, 
 fighting bravely, too." 
 
 Ines sprang up at the sound of his voice and 
 rushed toward him, her face transfigured with joy. 
 
 "Oh, Guy, Guy! how good of you to come." 
 
 She hung on his arm and he patted her cheek as 
 if she had been a little child. 
 
 "I thought you'd be nervous, dear, so I came." 
 
 "You think of everything, Guy." 
 
 "Of those whom I love, dear, constantly." 
 
 A terrific crash and flash silenced Ines. She clung 
 to the new-comer, who had come out into the storm 
 because he knew that she would need him and soothed 
 her. 
 
 "Don't be afraid. God is in the storm, dear. He 
 wants us to realize His power and majesty, as well as 
 His love and pity," he whispered. 
 
 All storms pass and so did this one. The clouds 
 rolled away toward the south, the patches of blue sky 
 became larger, the sun peeped through, jolly as ever, 
 to show that he was still there. 
 
 "I've heard that voice before," thought David, 
 coming back from the window. "Where was it, I 
 wonder?" 
 
 The man went to the candelabra and blew out
 
 48 THAT KKTUOX STKKAK 
 
 the candles as if he were at home. Ines left the room 
 and Mrs. Stewart rang the bell for the maid. 
 
 "Please bring some hot tea, Jennie. I guess we 
 can drink it in peace now." 
 
 "The old elm has fallen, sir." Jennie addressed 
 herself to the tall man who was disposing of the 
 candles on the piano. 
 
 "I'm sorry for that, Jennie," he answered. 
 
 "Do you know my nephew, Mr. Ketron? Mr. 
 Guy Guille, Ines's brother." 
 
 "Oh, Iknow Mr. Ketron, by face if not by name. 
 Met him last evening." 
 
 David returned the hearty clasp of a strong hand. 
 
 "You're you're different," Davie stammered. 
 
 "No more the wild man of the woods, eh? 
 Clothed and in my right mind," Mr. Guille replied, 
 with a pleasant laugh. "The truth is that Aunt Lennie 
 and Ines wanted me to stay here and live in a civilized 
 way, but I much prefer my own cave and my spring of 
 fresh water, though I turn up occasionally to show 
 that I'm a part of the family." 
 
 "And let his sister know that he is caring for her 
 and protecting her," Ines added, squeezing her 
 brother's hand. 
 
 "As big brothers should, dear. Mr. Ketron, I'm 
 glad to know you. We had a good time last night, 
 didn't we?" 
 
 "We sure did." 
 
 "Why couldn't girls be there too?" inquired Ines, 
 putting three lumps of sugar into David's cup of tea. 
 
 Mr. Guille answered, winking boyishly at Davie.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 49 
 
 "You can't be a Jolly Good Fellow, can you?" 
 
 "I just can and you know it." 
 
 ''That's so, Ines, you can, when you want to. You 
 ought to see her fry eggs Indian fashion on a stone 
 spider in my cave, Mr. Ketron. Didn't know she 
 could cook, did you, or fish in a pool or wade 
 
 "No, I didn't," replied David, "but I'd like to see 
 her do it." 
 
 "Well, you never will," was the saucy reply. 
 
 David went back to his room with his brain in a 
 whirl. The wild man of the cave, the crank who 
 talked Scripture and told fascinating stories, who 
 could make the best clam chowder ever, and wore old 
 trousers and a torn shirt, was Guy Guille, brother of 
 Ines. Ines, herself, was a mystery, too. At one mo- 
 ment, the cold, proud girl dressed in costly garments; 
 turning the heads of susceptible youth, driving her 
 expensive yellow car so fast that the police wanted to 
 catch her and make her pay a fine ; at the other, a tear- 
 ful child, clinging to her brother, or a girl who liked to 
 fish and could fry eggs, Indian fashion, on a stone 
 spider. 
 
 "Girls are surely strange creatures," he said. 
 
 "Hey, there! Look where you're going, Dave. 
 You just stepped into a puddle." 
 
 "Algie," said David, solemnly, "we were all fools 
 last night, worse than we thought." 
 
 "I rather think we were, to leave all that good 
 champagne because somebody a tramp told us 
 stories. Like a lot of kids, we were." 
 
 "It wasn't that. Do you know who the tramp is ?''
 
 5O THAT KKTRON STREAK 
 
 "No. Do you?" 
 
 "He is Guy Guille, the artist." 
 
 "Not the one who painted A Stormy Morning?" 
 
 David nodded. 
 
 "He's Ines Guille's half brother, and when he 
 isn't doing splendid pictures he works among the poor, 
 does lots and lots of good, so Mrs. Stewart told me. 
 Now, who's the fool, eh?" 
 
 "We called him a crank," groaned Algie. "Say, 
 Dave, it's funny isn't it? that a fellow who has lived 
 in Paris and Rome and London whose name is in 
 everybody's mouth should prefer cold spring water 
 to iced champagne." 
 
 ''Maybe he's right." 
 
 "Maybe he is, seeing he's Guy Guille, the famous 
 artist. If he was James Potts the tramp, or Salvation 
 Smith the preacher, we'd say he was wrong and didn't 
 know beans," Algie stated with conviction. 
 
 One thing I'll tell you just here, though it doesn't 
 belong in this part of the story. Algie Van der Voort 
 and Al Simons took those bottles of champagne that 
 were left from the feast back to the dealer and ex- 
 changed them for various edibles. And, at the next 
 banquet of the Jolly Good Fellows, everybody drank 
 lemonade and was perfectly contented. 
 
 As Algie had said, we're all human and it made 
 a big difference whether an example was set by a 
 man in old' trousers and torn shirt, who acted like a 
 gentleman and tried to live like Jesus Christ, or this 
 same man with the same ideals, known to be Guy 
 Guille, the famous artist !
 
 CHAPTER FIVE 
 Eleanor 
 
 ELEANOR blew into David's sitting-room on a 
 blustery day in November. She literally blew 
 in, feathers flying, skirts wet, bringing with 
 her a breeze that tossed David's letters and papers 
 from his desk and sent a stray neck-tie out of the 
 window. 
 
 "Run and pick it up, Andie/' commanded David. 
 "Hello, Eleanor, glad to see you, but you needn't have 
 come in quite such a lively manner. When'd you get 
 to town?" 
 
 "Last week. I couldn't leave father before." 
 
 "How is Uncle Aleck? Sit down, Eleanor, and 
 tell me about everything. Take this chair, it's more 
 comfortable." 
 
 "Everything is comfortable here, Davie." 
 
 David bustled about, on hospitable thoughts in- 
 tent, pulling down a shade, beating up the cushions 
 on the couch and finally settling himself opposite to 
 his guest and beaming upon her. 
 
 "It's good to look at you, Eleanor. In this life 
 of rush and bustle, you always seem to be resting and 
 yet you are ever busy. How do you manage it ?" 
 
 David leaned his elbows on the big desk, littered 
 with scented notes and bills and a few, a very few 
 papers that implied studious work and stared at his 
 cousin. 
 
 (51)
 
 52 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 Eleanor certainly was good to look at. She was 
 dressed in a leafy shade of brown, her hat was small 
 and bore one white wing, the soft fur around her neck 
 was a deep brown ; a handsome stole it was, a Christ- 
 mas gift from Uncle Jared. Eleanor's face "shone 
 from within" David had always said, and he was 
 right. It was the soul light lit by divine illumination, 
 by sincere love for God and faith in the Savior which 
 made Eleanor Ray different from many other girls. 
 
 Her life was not easy. An invalid father re- 
 quired much care. Because of his poor health, he had 
 lost his position as cashier in a bank and the family 
 finances were falling behind. It was not easy to be 
 cheerful and courageous under these circumstances, 
 except the soul-light be kept burning brightly, by 
 prayer and communion with divine power. 
 
 "I'm glad you like my new dress. I made it my- 
 self, Mr. Ketron, I'd have you know, every stitch. It's 
 my beautiful furs that make me look nice." 
 
 "No, I think it's something different from that," 
 David said slowly. "As to the furs, you know very 
 well that you could have lots more pretty things, 
 father and I would gladly give them to you, if you 
 weren't so 
 
 "I can't take much from Uncle Jared, Davie, un- 
 less he forgets the past and makes friends with 
 father again. I must stick to father." 
 
 "Well, you could accept presents and even money 
 from me, I'm not in that old fuss about a miserable 
 piece of property that wasn't worth anything. It alj
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 53 
 
 happened so long ago and if father didn't hang on to 
 things like Sam Hill, he'd have forgotten it long ago. 
 Grandfather intended Uncle Aleck to have the 
 meadow lot all the time, only he didn't mention it 
 in his will." 
 
 "And now the meadow lot is gone with all the 
 rest." Eleanor sighed, just one little sigh. 
 
 "I have a check book, dear. You'll let me help 
 you through this year and then you will have more 
 time for your study. I hate to think of you acting as 
 housekeeper for that batch of girls at Salem House 
 when you ought to be having a good time. You're 
 young yet, Eleanor, and now is your time to be gay 
 and happy. Let me help." 
 
 David reached out his hand for his check book 
 and opened it. 
 
 "It's a temptation, I don't deny it, Davie, and if 
 it was your own money that you'd earned, I might be 
 inclined to borrow it. Not that I dislike the work I 
 am doing, but that it would give me more time for 
 other things that I'll never get except at college. It 
 isn't happiness I want, because I'm happy, and it 
 isn't going to last just these few years of youth, but 
 all through /life. But, Davie, the money is Uncle 
 Jared's and it isn't loyal to father to take it. A gift 
 once in a while, there is no harm in accepting, but 
 not money." 
 
 "Perhaps you're right, Eleanor. It sounds funny 
 when you speak of money I earn. It would be a joke, 
 wouldn't it for me to have my own bank account. 
 I suppose it sounds strange to you, but it never oc-
 
 54 THAT KKTRON STREAK 
 
 curred to me that I ought to be depending on myself 
 and not on father, for bread and butter." 
 
 "Any fancy waiscoats and cigarettes and An- 
 drew's wages," commented Eleanor. 
 
 Her mouth was smiling for she liked this cousin 
 of hers and was sure that he had the makings of a 
 man in him, if one could only blow away the froth of 
 artificiality and self-pampering. 
 
 "Oh, I say, Eleanor, you're hard on a fellow. 
 Andrie! bring Miss Ketron some hot chocolate, will 
 you, please?" 
 
 Eleanor laid aside hat and furs and prepared to 
 make herself at home. 
 
 "I see that you want me to pay you a real visit. 
 For one hour, I can stay." 
 
 "Wrist watch would make a good birthday pres- 
 ent," David noted in his mind. He had always had 
 difficulty in finding handsome, appropriate presents 
 for this proud little cousin. 
 
 Jared and Alexander Ketron belonged to a hot- 
 headed, stubborn race. Years before, when Jared 
 was poor and Aleck was the more prosperous, a 
 meadow lot of small value had caused a break between 
 the brothers. Jared thought that he was misused. 
 Aleck wanted to make up but refused to say the first 
 word; both were sorry, but neither would yield. 
 Neither had opposed the friendship of David and 
 Eleanor, who were very congenial. 
 
 Andrew brought hot chocolate and some vanilla 
 wafers and Eleanor ate them daintily, enjoying the
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 55 
 
 luxury of a blazing wood fire and a deep, cushioned 
 chair. 
 
 "I'd get to be a regular sybarite if I lived as you 
 do, Davie. What do you do to counteract all this 
 elegance and keep yourself fit?" 
 
 "I take a cold shower every morning and play 
 tennis in the afternoon." 
 
 "Bosh ! I don't call that anything." 
 
 "What do you want me to do, young lady ? Chop 
 wood or break stones by the roadside?" 
 
 "Anything to keep yourself from getting mushy." 
 
 David's eyes danced. 
 
 "For the leader of her class, I consider the word 
 'mushy' decidedly inelegant." 
 
 "You needn't fence. You know very well what 
 I mean. Algernon Van der Voort, lazy and languid, 
 is your dear friend." 
 
 "Not so awfully dear. What do you know about 
 Algie?" 
 
 "Met him this summer; he came to Afton on a 
 sketching tour." 
 
 "Ah! He didn't tell me." 
 
 "Probably I did not make enough impression on 
 his receptive mind." 
 
 "He isn't my only friend. How about Hugh Hin- 
 son? Don't consider him a dangerous character, do 
 you ?" 
 
 The color deepened on Eleanor's smooth cheek, 
 but her voice was steady as she answered : "Hugh's 
 a- good friend, but I don't believe you see much of 
 him."
 
 56 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "I just do, Miss. What next?" 
 
 "I detest Tom Parsons." 
 
 "Pretty strong language. He's inoffensive and 
 down on his luck." 
 
 "Living on his friends, I should say." David 
 laughed. 
 
 Seems to me that you are not very kind to poor 
 Tom, but I'll accept part of your judgment." 
 
 "I guess your check book will verify it," Eleanor 
 glanced at the open check book on the desk in front 
 of David. 
 
 David followed her glance, a quick look of sus- 
 picion came into his eyes. He took the book and 
 examined it hurriedly, then laid it back, still open. 
 
 "Anything more, cousin mine?" 
 
 "You think I'm scolding, David. Honestly, I'm 
 not, but I do wish you'd wake up and see where you 
 are going, and who is leading you along the path 
 where youth sees roses and doesn't notice the thorns 
 that sting and poison." 
 
 "I don't think you are scolding, Eleanor. Give 
 me credit for a few meditations in my solitary hours." 
 
 "And then there's Ine's. I wish you wouldn't 
 go to see her so much." 
 
 For the first time, David looked annoyed. . 
 
 "Let's not discuss Ines," he answered curtly. "I 
 wish you'd get to know her, Eleanor, really I do. 
 She is not the thoughtless girl you consider her." 
 
 "Maybe not," Eleanor responded, doubtfully, 
 picking up her handsome furs and preparing to de- 
 part. "If I've made myself disagreeable, forgive me,
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 57 
 
 Davie. It's only because you are like a brother to me, 
 and I'm so proud of you and want you to do a lot of 
 good in the world." 
 
 David took both her hands and beamed upon her 
 good naturedly. Eleanor was a little thing and her 
 head came only to his shoulder. 
 
 "It's all right, kid, say anything to me you like. 
 I'll know that it's meant for the good of this mis- 
 guided youth. But honestly, you're mistaken about 
 Ines. In the first place, I don't go there very often, 
 chiefly, I confess, because she doesn't invite me. Sec- 
 ondly, she's more of a genuine, hearty girl than you'd 
 think to look at her." 
 
 "Looks are certainly deceiving," inserted Eleanor, 
 coldly. 
 
 Like many a fine, upright girl, Eleanor had her 
 own views and hated to change them. There was con- 
 siderable of Jared and Alexander Ketron's stubborn- 
 ness in her make-up. 
 
 "Promise me that you'll be nice to her when you 
 meet her and will try to see her good points." 
 
 "For your sake. Davie, I will." 
 
 "You'd like her brother." 
 
 "Who is her brother?" Eleanor turned to look 
 at him. "I never heard of him." 
 
 "Oh, yes you did, many times. He's Guy Guille, 
 the artist." 
 
 "Who painted that wonderful picture, A Stormy 
 Morning? Can he be Ines Guille's brother?" 
 
 "He sure is. Now, I've got you, Miss. But more
 
 58 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 than an artist, he's a man who actually believes in 
 God and walks with Jesus Christ at his side." 
 
 "Oh, Davie!" Eleanor breathed, in her astonish- 
 ment. Never before had she heard David mention 
 the name of the Lord Jesus Christ except in a critical 
 manner, as he would have spoken of an ordinary man. 
 There was feeling and reverence in his manner now. 
 
 "He'll be here a week longer. I'll manage it to 
 have you both for tea some afternoon. Will you 
 come ?" 
 
 "Will I come ? You dear boy ! Of course I will." 
 
 "And I'll invite Ines too," David smiled mis- 
 chievously. 
 
 "All right. I'll be nice to her. Good-bye, Davie." 
 
 Eleanor vanished and was blown out into a windy 
 world. 
 
 David sat down again and stared at his open 
 check book. He was not thinking, of his cousin, nor 
 of Ines, nor even of his new friend, Guy Guille, but 
 of that innocent little book. 
 
 "It's queer," he muttered, "mighty queer." 
 
 "Two days later, David phoned to Eleanor at 
 Salem House, over which she had authority as house- 
 keeper and thereby paid all her expenses of living and 
 had enough over for her tuition fee. 
 
 "They'll come today, at four-thirty. Put on your 
 prettiest gown and come over." 
 
 "Will the green crepe do?" 
 
 "Fine." 
 
 "I'll be there." 
 
 "Oh. Eleanor."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 59 
 
 "Yes, Davie." 
 
 "You'll pour tea, won't you ?" 
 
 "Gladly." 
 
 David knew how to entertain. More than this, 
 he was proud of his little cousin, who held such a 
 good position in her class. He did not want to be a 
 grind, thank goodness, but he was happy that someone 
 in the family did have some ambitions in this line. 
 
 Besides being a good student, Eleanor was es- 
 sentially feminine. 
 
 "You're a peach," he complimented, when she ar- 
 rived, the first guest. 
 
 She dropped him a courtesy. 
 
 "Here comes Algie. First on the scene. Told 
 him you'd be here. He didn't know that you were 
 my cousin." 
 
 Algie hovered around Eleanor as she made tea 
 in the handsome Samovar that David had brought 
 from Russia. It was of deep-tinted copper, of curi- 
 ous shape, had been purchased in a bazaar where 
 strange languages were spoken and quaint costumes 
 were worn by men with mystical faces and liquid 
 voices, full of the sorrows of centuries of oppression. 
 
 "Hugh, you know Eleanor." 
 
 Eleanor held out her hand and Hugh took it 
 and was tongue-tied. How could Algie talk to this 
 fair maid in the green gown as if she were made of 
 common clay. 
 
 But when Algie melted away, to give place to 
 Guy Guille, Hugh found his tongue. Guy knew ex-
 
 60 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 actly how to put every one at his ease, to bring out 
 the best that was in them. 
 
 Soon the three around the tea-tray were laughing 
 and talking as if they had known each other always. 
 Eleanor and Hugh forgot that the man who knew 
 how to tell such delightful stories, who emanated such 
 an attractive personality, who was so simple in his 
 manner, was one of those whose name was known in 
 Europe as well as America, who stood in the first 
 rank of modern painters. 
 
 Ines saw the group and went with David to take 
 her cup of tea from Eleanor's hand. 
 
 David's cousin studied her more carefully than 
 she had ever done. It was evident that David liked 
 her; it was evident, also, that she was very beautiful 
 in her dark, foreign style. 
 
 Sitting down near by, Ines soon monopolized the 
 conversation, the boys were drawn to her as the hum- 
 ming bird is drawn to the flower. Hugh Hinson for- 
 got that he had disliked her and found himself tell- 
 ing a big fish story, not realizing that everybody was 
 listening. 
 
 Guy Guille drew the lads away and the two girls 
 were left together. Then Eleanor began to see what 
 David liked in this lovely girl, whose clothes were 
 very costly, whose jewels were worth a fortune. 
 
 Beneath the Georgette crepe and diamonds, was a 
 girl like herself, simple-hearted, childishly credulous, 
 yet with the perceptions of a woman. She was as 
 well read as Eleanor, they talked of books which were 
 the foundations of philosophy, they talked of poetry
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 61 
 
 and art, and of course, they discussed the latest fash- 
 ions no two girls are long together without doing this. 
 
 Hugh stayed behind after everybody had gone. 
 He had "wanted to walk over with Eleanor but was 
 too shy to go boldly out with her, as Algie had done. 
 
 Across the campus he could see them now, Guy 
 was talking to Eleanor, who was looking up at him, 
 and Algie walked with Ines. 
 
 "I'll take it all back." said Hugh. 
 
 "About what?" 
 
 David was restlessly moving here and there, 
 straightening the flowers in a vase, roses that had been 
 specially ordered from the best florist, rearranging 
 the music on the piano. 
 
 Ines had sung for them, melodious French songs 
 and some English ballads. She had providentially 
 forgotten to take away the music. He would carry it 
 to her tomorrow. 
 
 The party had been a great success; he was glad 
 that Eleanor liked Ines. 
 
 "About Miss Guille." 
 
 "Oh, yes." 
 
 "She's got a lot to her." 
 
 "But you like Eleanor better." 
 
 Hugh vanished out of door. "Good-bye," he 
 called. 
 
 David laughed. 
 
 Going to his desk, he looked again at the check 
 book that puzzled him. 
 
 "I wish I knew who did this. 
 
 It's queer; mighty queer."
 
 CHAPTER SIX 
 Turkey and Good Cheer 
 
 DAVID drove his car to the door of Salem 
 House, the abode of about thirty charming 
 damsels who were dividing their time be- 
 tween study and fun. He tooted his horn cheerfully. 
 
 "I suppose we'll have to wait," he confided to 
 Hugh, with a resigned air, leaning back on the seat. 
 "Girls always have to find their duds at the last 
 minute." 
 
 "I thought Eleanor was well, different." 
 
 "She's a girl," Davie answered, conclusively. 
 "They're all alike." 
 
 Evidently Eleanor was just the same as the rest, 
 for the two lads in the car watched the tiny clock 
 tick away ten long minutes. 
 
 David was very silent for him. He acted glum, 
 absorbed in his own thoughts, a strange thing for 
 light-hearted David Ketron. Occasionally, he looked 
 sharply at Hugh as if he were trying to study him in 
 a new light. There was affection struggling with sus- 
 picion in the glance. It was not like David to be sus- 
 picious. Up to the present he had been almost too 
 credulous, too ready to believe in everybody who said 
 nice things to him. 
 
 The truth is that on this November day, when the 
 air smelled of snow, and fragrant odors wafted from 
 neighbors' kitchens told of pumpkin pies and spice 
 
 (62)
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 63 
 
 cakes, of preparation for the morrow's feast, when 
 everybody would give thanks for the mercies of the 
 year, David was absorbing a slow poison, inserted by 
 Tom Parsons, the evening before. 
 
 "You look sharp on Hugh Hinson," he said warn- 
 ingly. "He isn't what he seems. Too pious by half, 
 'cording to my notions. Does too much prayin' an' 
 not enough practicin'. They say he's been turning in 
 some pretty big checks at the bank lately, havin' 'em 
 cashed. Potter the assistant cashier told me. Now 
 how does a fellow like him get big checks to cash. 
 I'd like to know. He's poor as Job's turkey, like my- 
 self." 
 
 These words had sunk into David's mind partly 
 because he was thinking pretty hard about checks 
 these days. There was a mystery somewhere and he 
 did not know how to untangle it. 
 
 Strange to say, when David was not glancing at 
 Hugh, Hugh was glancing at David, not in suspicion, 
 but with a sort of pity on his bonny face, as if he 
 wanted to help his friend and didn't know just how. 
 
 "Here she is!" 
 
 Hugh sprang out to open the door for Eleanor 
 and help her in. He tucked a soft fur robe around 
 her. 
 
 "Got plenty of wraps, Eleanor?" David asked. 
 "It's a good hundred and twenty-five miles up to 
 Hillside and the air feels like snow. Guess we won't 
 get it today, but we'll have a wintry Thanksgiving." 
 
 "I'm warmly dressed, Davie, and I'm not afraid 
 of the cold."
 
 64 THAT KKTKON STREAK 
 
 "Hurry up then, Hugh. We must go and pick 
 ii]> Mr. Guille. It's jolly that he can go with us." 
 
 "Where is Ines?" 
 
 "Gone off on a visit with auntie. Mr. Guille 
 would have been alone for Thanksgiving. He's 
 mighty good company and grandmother will like him 
 because he's her kind." 
 
 At the house with the white pillars, they did not 
 have to wait. Guy Guille was standing on the pave- 
 ment. 
 
 "Hello," he said. "Isn't this great? Thought 
 I'd have to eat turkey all by myself tomorrow. Ran 
 up from New York to see Ines, and behold ! she had 
 flown." 
 
 "You'll need a warm coat," warned David. 
 
 Mr. Guille threw his overcoat open to disclose 
 a fur lining. 
 
 "Got it in Russia. They know what cold weather 
 means there where winter lasts nine months of the 
 year." 
 
 They were off, the big car rushing along like a 
 creature alive, covering mile after mile of open coun- 
 try. They passed farm houses and fields of corn- 
 stubs and dried spears of grain, ran through villages 
 where the trees stood grim and bare, having shed their 
 gorgeous October array ; through crowded towns with 
 mill hands on the street, at the noon hour. Weary 
 men and holloweyed girls were here, and little chil- 
 dren, learning to work when they should have been in 
 school, in order that the rich men might have bigger 
 profits and more luxuries.
 
 '['HAT KETRON STREAK 65 
 
 At one place, David threw out his hand toward 
 a mass of brick buildings on the border of a lake. 
 Interminable they seemed to be, with hundreds of 
 windows. One could hear the whirr of machinery 
 and catch the coppery flames of furnaces. 
 
 "They're my father's factories, part of them. He 
 has a lot in different towns, sort of a chain of in- 
 dustries." 
 
 "Must employ many persons," Guy Guille said, 
 sitting up straighten 
 
 "Thousands." 
 
 "Fine chance for work among so many em- 
 ployes," the artist remarked. "What's your father 
 doing for these people, David? Night schools I sup- 
 pose, and a place for evening recreation as well as a 
 chance to learn the better things of life and the way 
 to know God." 
 
 Guy Guille had such a casual manner of refer- 
 ring to religous things that even a college youth, who 
 considered himself far superior to such old-fashioned 
 ways of thinking, could not call this preaching. 
 
 "Blessed if I know," replied David, "but I don't 
 believe he's doing anything much. Dad isn't that 
 kind." 
 
 Up into the hills the car went and vegetation 
 changed. Here were spruces and white birch and the 
 graceful larch. 
 
 "Here's a good place for lunch," Eleanor said, 
 pointing to a flat field near the river. "The sun is 
 out now, and it feels warmer."
 
 66 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 "1 think that it would be better to stay right here 
 in the car, Eleanor. It isn't so warm as you think. 
 See that cloud ? It will snow before we get to grand- 
 mother's." 
 
 "You're right, David. I've had my eye on that 
 cloud for some time," approved- Mr. Guille. 
 
 "Hand out the things, Hugh. Andrie surely 
 knows how to put up a good lunch." 
 
 Eating drives away the dumps and it is good for 
 nerves to feast in the open air. David forgot his 
 grouch, whatever it was, and became his old, jolly 
 self. Hugh forgot his own private worry and they 
 had the best time ever. 
 
 Sure enough when the car drove up in front of 
 the great elm planted by grandfather's grandfather, 
 when he brought his wife to the log cabin that had 
 preceded the comfortable yellow farm house, the big 
 flakes were coming down fast. 
 
 "You go in, Eleanor, and introduce Mr. Guille 
 and Hugh. I'll put the car into the barn. How's 
 everybody, Josiah?" 
 
 Josiah scratched his head and meditated. He 
 never believed in being in a hurry. David had put 
 the car in beside a big, old-fashioned rockaway, and 
 a commodious sleigh before the answer came, "We'll 
 go for a sleighride tomorrow if there's snow enough 
 and take grandmother along. She used to be a good 
 sport. And after all an auto isn't in it beside a sleigh." 
 
 "Your grandmother's spry as ever, David. Been 
 a-lookin' fer you ever sence I kin remember, mos'. 
 My! you've growed. Was a leetle shaver w'en you
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 67 
 
 was here 'fore. Mus' be nigh onto ten year. We 
 ain't set eyes onto yer dad sence, either. Ain't he 
 never married agin' sence your ma died ?" 
 
 "No," answered David. "We used to have great 
 times didn't we down by the pond? And I liked 
 riding on the loads of hay." 
 
 Josiah sat on a bench and looked David over. 
 
 "Pretty much of a man, you be, Davie. Mos' 
 twenty-one, ain't ye?" 
 
 "In May." 
 
 "Wish I was young agin'. You bet I'd not be 
 wastin' my time choppin' wood here. Why ain'f ye 
 never been here since ye was a kid, Davie?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know." 
 
 But Davie did know very well and his face was a 
 little hot as he hurried toward the house. It was be- 
 cause he was a snob, he confessed, and thought that a 
 rich man's son was above coming to see an old lady 
 who lived on a farm. That was exactly why, and he 
 dared not deny it, even to himself. 
 
 "Dear boy," grandmother put a tiny hand on 
 each side of his face and looked straight into his 
 eyes, standing on tip-toe. "You're just like you used 
 to be." 
 
 "And so are you, Granny," David caught the little 
 old lady up in his arms and gave her a vigorous hug. 
 
 He had not imagined that he would be so glad to 
 see grandmother. It gave him a "homey" feeling 
 that he never experienced when he went back to the 
 splendid palace that his father and a housekeeper and.
 
 68 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 a troop of servants occupied he could not say that 
 they lived there. 
 
 "Oh, you big bear, let me down. It isn't digni- 
 fied." 
 
 Grandmother laughed like a girl and straightened 
 the pretty Mechlin lace cap with pink ribbons that she 
 wore to hide the tiny bald spot that was coming on 
 her head. 
 
 "Isn't she a dear?" Eleanor whispered to Hugh. 
 
 "You bet," he answered, with conviction. 
 
 "I'm glad I came," said Mr. Guille, "and I'd like 
 to paint this room and grandmother in it, just as it is 
 tonight. Van Dyke could not have found a better 
 subject in old Flanders. I wonder if she'd let me." 
 
 Unknown to grandmother, who innocently thought 
 that Mr. Guille was noting down some thoughts, the 
 artist sketched the room rapidly ; the wide black 
 rafters, the tiled fire-place, tiles brought from "furrin' 
 parts" by one who had been a sea rover, the shining 
 pewter on the mantlepiece, rag carpets in dull tints ; 
 claw-footed mahogany furniture. Even the lights 
 were artistic, though grandmother did not know it, for 
 she would have candles instead of lamps. 
 
 The mellow light fell on the dear old lady with 
 her smooth, peach-bloom face, on her black silk gown 
 with fine lace collar and cuffs, on her eyes, full of 
 God's peace, and on her small, efficient hands, busy 
 with gray socks for the boys "over there." 
 
 In the morning the landscape was white and the 
 big sleigh was brought out by Josiah, with two power- 
 ful Flemish working horses fastened to it. Into it
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 69 
 
 they all piled, even grandmother, who was all bundled 
 up and wasn't going to lose a moment of the fun. 
 
 For miles and miles they went, Josiah driving, a 
 picturesque figure in fur cap and heavy, worn great- 
 coat. The sun shone and the air was frosty, the bells 
 jingled merrily and everyone they met called out 
 "Good-morning" as if they were old friends. 
 
 At last they drew up at the white church with 
 green shutters where Washington worshiped once, 
 long ago, and while Josiah put the horses and sleigh in 
 the low red sheds Eleanor unwound grandmother 
 from her many wraps. 
 
 It took two pews to hold the party, highbacked 
 pews they were, and one of them bore a silver plate 
 with David's great-grandfather's name on it. His 
 name had been David too. That's why the baby boy 
 had received it, because it was an old, old name in the 
 family. David Prentice Ketron, he was, and Prentice 
 was grandmother's name and his own mother's. 
 
 David felt a bit strange in church. He had heard 
 many profound lectures and some dissertations on the 
 decay of Christianity, but he had not heard the Gospel 
 preached in a Christian church for a long time. 
 
 It was an old-fashioned sermon, preached by an 
 old man who looked like a patriarch, and it recounted 
 our mercies and privileges as a people who were free 
 and served God. 
 
 Afterward, the preacher and his daughter, who 
 brought her knitting, came to dinner and the preacher 
 asked the blessing and prayed especially for these dear 
 young men, that they might be led in the paths of
 
 7o THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 righteousness; especially for David, that he might not 
 forget that he was an heir to a great inheritance, not 
 the treasures of this world, that moth and rust would 
 destroy and thieves could break through and steal, but 
 to an inheritance pure and undefiled, to a crown that 
 fadeth not away, heir to the faith of his fathers, 
 who had passed into glory from Hillside and whose 
 bodies awaited the resurrection in the quiet church- 
 yard. 
 
 David felt queer when he was being prayed for. 
 He was having many new experiences and rather en- 
 joyed that, but he was not sure about this praying 
 business. It was too pointed and personal. It im- 
 plied that he had wandered from the path of right- 
 eousness and had forgotten the faith of his fathers. 
 The worst thing about it was that the old preacher 
 had struck the nail on the head. It was all true and 
 David knew it. 
 
 What would Algie and Tom Parsons and the 
 other Jolly Good Fellows have said if they had known 
 that David Ketron, gayest of the lot, had been "prayed 
 at." He thanked his stars that they never would 
 know it. They would howl and he'd never hear the 
 last of it. 
 
 David dismissed his thoughts and devoted him- 
 self to the abundant dinner that Mandy, Josiah's wife, 
 had cooked. Guy Guille carved the turkey and David 
 undertook to perform the same duty by a big, fat 
 goose. There was much hilarity and grandmother's 
 face was shining with happiness. At last, she had 
 her boy home again, after so long a time.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 71 
 
 "Going over to see the old place, Eleanor?" Mrs. 
 Prentice asked, in the pause between turkey and pie. 
 
 "I'd like to, grandmother." 
 
 "Your father don't come up any more, just the 
 same as Jared. Both of them have forsaken Hillside. 
 I remember them when they were boys, fine little fel- 
 lows, running in here for cookies, 'cause they hadn't 
 any mother. Kind of adopted me." 
 
 "Just as I have, grandmother/' 
 
 "Ain't they never made up that silly meadow lot 
 business? Such a foolish thing to quarrel over." 
 
 "Never, grandmother, but I'm hoping that they 
 will." 
 
 "Oughtn't to go down to the end of life with a 
 grudge. It ain't worth while, nor pleasant to think 
 about when you get to the last years where I be. I'm 
 glad you and Davie are good friends, as cousins ought 
 to be, but I think Jared's grown stubborn because he's 
 got too much money. Money's a good thing to have 
 a little of, but too much makes a man hard." 
 
 Grandmother had ideas of her own. David was 
 not much pleased to have the family ghosts and weak- 
 nesses aired before Guy Guille and Hugh. 
 
 "I'm helping to relieve father of his money," he 
 said, and everybody laughed. 
 
 Mandy brought in the pumpkin pies and nuts and 
 raisins and cheese which put an end of this line of 
 thoughts, to David's relief and Eleanor's also. 
 
 Before dark, the two cousins went over to the 
 old Ketron homestead half a mile awav. It was
 
 72 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 closed and cheerless. No one occupied it and it was 
 falling into ruin. 
 
 "When I'm twenty-one, Eleanor, I'm going to ask 
 father to give me the old place. It could be made very 
 comfortable if some money was spent on it and the 
 view is splendid." 
 
 "It is a shame to have it go to ruin, Da vie." 
 
 "Yonder lies the meadow lot that's made so much 
 hard feeling between my father and yours. Looks 
 innocent enough, doesn't it?" 
 
 "Maybe if you were to open the house and live 
 in it, Davie ' 
 
 "Yes, I've thought the same. You and I could 
 fix it up together and maybe, someday 
 
 "We could get them both under the roof, in the 
 old home, where they used to be when they were 
 boys" 
 
 "And we'd have grandmother there ! They 
 wouldn't dare refuse to make up, if she was there and 
 put a hand on each one's shoulder, because she was 
 the only mother they ever knew." 
 
 "Let's try it, Davie." 
 
 "We sure will, Eleanor. I'll see if I can get pos- 
 session soon. Father will do what I want, and in the 
 spring, when the snows melt, we'll have workmen 
 here. Perhaps by Easter, it will be in order and 
 then" 
 
 "Oh, Davie, you're a good schemer." 
 
 "We'll try it anyway, dear." 
 
 "We sure will," answered Eleanor, enthusias- 
 tically.
 
 CHAPTER SEVEN 
 
 A Package of Vouchers 
 
 > 
 
 HAVE the dear old farm house, boy ? Of course, 
 you may have it and welcome. I'm having 
 the deed made out to you at once. For years 
 I haven't seen the place, not since your mother died. 
 Didn't care to go for one reason or another, perhaps 
 I've been too busy making money. Or maybe I'm not 
 of the sentimental kind," so wrote Jared Ketron. 
 seated at his desk in the library of Sunny Bank, his 
 estate on the Hudson, just in the foot-hills of the Cat- 
 skill mountains. 
 
 It was one of those dream places on which rich 
 men love to spend their money. Jared Ketron did not 
 spend much time here, he came and went as he liked, 
 leaving a retinue of servants to keep the large grounds 
 and immense house in order. 
 
 Lifting his eyes now, he gazed through a wide, 
 one-paned window upon a sloping lawn, a small lake 
 and a bit of wild forest land. But he was seeing 
 something else ; a farm house with fields of grain 
 around it, a big kitchen, where he and Aleck ate buck- 
 wheat cakes and molasses. Yes, he and Aleck, and 
 there was Mother Prentice. Had she grown old ? He 
 had neglected his wife's mother, while not forgetting 
 to send her a generous check in January and July. 
 
 "I'm glad the boy went up there, with Eleanor. 
 She's a splendid girl. In some way we must make her 
 
 (73)
 
 74 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 life easier, but she won't accept a penny thus far. 
 Proud as her father. Some day, when I'm not so 
 busy, I'll run up to Hillside and eat some of those 
 cookies Mother Prentice used to make. Good, they 
 were and Aleck " 
 
 After a moment, he picked up his pen. 
 
 "It's a good idea that of fixing up the place and 
 making it liveable. Spend what you like and send the 
 bills to me. I'll pay them. Share the plans with 
 Eleanor, it was her grandfather's as well as yours. 
 Put in bath-rooms and whatever you and she agree 
 upon, but don't disturb that little room in the second 
 floor where I used to sleep." 
 
 David got the letter just before the Christmas 
 vacation began. He phoned to Eleanor. 
 
 "The roads are good. Let's go up to Hillside for 
 a couple of days. Dad's given me the place and will 
 pay for all changes and he wants you to feel that you 
 have a share in the fun." 
 
 Eleanor pocketed her pride and resentment 
 against Uncle Jared for the way he h.ad treated he/ 
 father all these years. 
 
 "All right, Davie, I'll go. But I must be home 
 for Christmas Eve." 
 
 "I'm not going home this vacation. Father's off 
 for a trip to California and I'm to be in New York 
 with Guy Guille, he's asked me to stay at the studio." 
 
 "That's fine. Shall we go tomorrow, Davie?" 
 
 "If it doesn't snow." 
 
 It was fun planning to make the old, half-ruined, 
 deserted farm house whole again, putting in modern
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 75 
 
 improvements, avoiding any radical changes that 
 would spoil the genuineness of the building or take 
 from it its characteristics. 
 
 Eleanor entered heartily into everything. 
 
 "It is pleasant to do just what you like and send 
 the bills to someone else. It's a new experience for 
 me," she said, laughing, as the two contemplated the 
 best parlor with its stained paper, small windows, 
 haircloth covered furniture and queer old pictures. 
 
 David looked at her with more seriousness in his 
 expression than she had ever seen. 
 
 "Yes, it's very comfortable. Makes a fellow feel 
 as if he were lying on nice, soft feathers so that he 
 won't know that there are any bumps underneath. 
 But I wonder whether this method of treatment is 
 going to make a man of me." 
 
 "Oh, Davie, Davie !" Eleanor laid her hand on 
 her cousin's arm, "thank God ! you are beginning to 
 see clearly. Uncle Jared's money can do you no 
 good unless you know how to use it." 
 
 "Sometimes I've wished that we hadn't any 
 money at all." 
 
 "It's hard to be poor, Davie. Ask Hugh Hinson. 
 Why do you look that way? Aren't you and Hugh 
 good friends any more?" 
 
 "There are lots of things girls can't understand," 
 David answered evasively, with his old, irritating su- 
 perior manner. "Now, let's get down to business. 
 What shall we do to this room?" 
 
 "Throw down the partition between this one and 
 the next, leave two fire-places, they are plain and
 
 76 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 handsome, cut some more windows, small like these, 
 and range them Swiss fashion on the side where the 
 view is. You can put five in a row," Eleanor promptly 
 replied. 
 
 On the way back in the car, David was silent and 
 moody. He drove so fast through the towns that 
 Eleanor suggested the possibility of arrest for speed- 
 ing. 
 
 "I don't care if they do arrest me," answered 
 Jared -Ketron's son in exactly the same tone which 
 the older man used when some one warned him about 
 a risky business venture. 
 
 Eleanor held her peace but did some thinking. 
 
 "It's something about Hugh," she decided. 
 
 Because she loved Davie and believed that Hugh 
 Hinson was gold through and through, a devoted 
 earnest Christian and hard worker, a much safer 
 friend for her impulsive, high blooded, reckless cousin, 
 than was Tom Parsons, she went to the phone and 
 called Hugh up. 
 
 "Can't you come over and see me tonight?" 
 she asked. 
 
 Hugh's hand that held the receiver trembled just 
 a little. Eleanor Ketron had never before honored 
 him with an invitation to Salem House. She was the 
 nicest girl he knew, although reserved in manner and 
 somewhat unapproachable. 
 
 "Surely I'll come. Will be there at eight." 
 
 In his small room, Hugh put on his best blue 
 serge suit at night it would not show the worn 
 places. He did not know that with his height and
 
 THAT KETKON STREAK 77 
 
 well-built frame, with his strong features and fine 
 eyes, he was as presentable in old blue serge as he 
 would have been in evening dress. Hugh owned a 
 dress suit, for he belonged to the Glee Club, he had 
 bought it from an English fellow who was a waiter 
 and the sleeves were a bit too short ; it didn't show. 
 
 "Have you quarreled with Davie?'' Eleanor 
 asked him straight out. She never beat about the 
 bush. 
 
 Hugh's face grew pale. 
 
 "No, I haven't quarreled with Davie, but he has 
 something against me. I don't know what it is." 
 
 "Why don't you ask him and find out what's the 
 matter? Hugh, you're the best friend he has. Don't 
 leave him to the cold mercies of that Tom Parsons ; I 
 don't trust him one bit. Algernon Van der Voort is 
 all right as far as his brains hold out, when he for- 
 gets his Dutch ancestors, but he can not help Davie. 
 Nor can any of that gang he goes with. You are the 
 only one he really respects." 
 
 "Honestly, Eleanor, there's something up, but I 
 can't imagine what it is. I believe Tom Parsons is at 
 the bottom of the mischief but how, I don't know r . 
 Nor for what reason. I know he does not like me." 
 
 "Naturally, you're not his kind." 
 
 This was high praise from Eleanor Ketron who 
 never flattered and was sometimes too frank to be 
 agreeable. Hugh would not have been a youth bud- 
 ding into manhood, decidedly human, if he had ig- 
 nored the implied compliment.
 
 78 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "I'll speak to him tomorrow. Besides, 1 must 
 say good-bye to you and to him, too." 
 
 "Good-bye? Oh, for Christmas holidays, I sup- 
 pose." 
 
 "No, for longer than that. I'm going West. 
 Eleanor, have a position as engineer. Later, I'll come 
 back and finish my college course." 
 
 "It's because he hasn't money enough," thought 
 Eleanor. She liked a man who had the courage to 
 work rather than borrow. 
 
 "So it's good-bye, Eleanor, for a while." 
 
 He looked down at her but she did not answer 
 his glance. 
 
 "I suppose it would be too much trouble, 
 for you to write sometimes," he stammered. 
 
 Hugh was very brave about going to work. He 
 was not one bit courageous in the presence of this 
 slender girl who measured five feet two. 
 
 "Too much trouble? Dear me, no. I shall be 
 glad to hear how you are getting along." 
 
 Hugh went to his room with his Head held in 
 military fashion, he walked as a man should. But 
 this was not because he was to be a member of an 
 Army Corps; Oh, dear no. It was because Eleanor 
 Ketron had promised to answer every letter he wrote. 
 
 That evening he packed. It didn't take long, for 
 he did not own much ; some clothes, a few books, fish- 
 ing tackle and a tennis racket. 
 
 Davie was in his room when Hugh entered next 
 morning.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 79 
 
 "Hello, Hugh," he said, but his tone was not en- 
 couraging. 
 
 Hugh did not sit down but leaned against the desk 
 where he could face David, seated. 
 
 "I came to say good-bye and wish you Merry 
 Christmas and many happy times. I'm off for home 
 and soon I'll be on my way to Arizona. Got a job 
 laying out a railroad. It's a good chance." 
 
 "I heard about it from Tom Parsons," David 
 answered, sullenly. 
 
 It was not like him to be so rude and Hugh 
 winced. 
 
 "Old chap," he said, warmly, bending over the 
 desk to look straight at David, "don't let's part this 
 way. We've been such good friends, Davie. Lately, 
 for the past month, you've acted strangely to me. I 
 can't understand it. Tell me what your grouch is, 
 and let's talk it out." 
 
 "I'd rather not, Hugh. You know what the 
 trouble is, there's no use pretending you don't. I 
 never would have believed it of you. If you ever 
 thought that I might become a real Christian, you were 
 mistaken. I've seen enough of your Christianity to 
 settle that. Prayers and hymn-singing and church 
 going, Oh, yes, you are a shining model, but^ thank 
 Heaven, I'm not a hypocrite." 
 
 Hugh felt as if he were turning to stone. This 
 from David Ketron. his friend. It was incredible. 
 
 However, Hugh was no coward, he was ready 
 to face the music and he could not hear his Chris-
 
 8o THAT KKTKON STREAK 
 
 tianity impugned or submit to be called a hypocrite 
 without protesting. 
 
 He sat down, quietly. 
 
 "Now tell me what this is all about," he de- 
 manded, "show your evidence that I have deceived 
 you, that I've pretended to be what I am not. A 
 prisoner at the bar is permitted to defend himself." 
 
 "Well, if you insist, look at this!" 
 
 David drew from his desk a package of cancelled 
 checks, took one from among the vouchers and handed 
 it to Hugh. 
 
 "You can't deny your own signature, I suppose," 
 he sneered. 
 
 David was in a very bad humor. Hugh had been 
 the one man outside of Guy Guille whom he trusted, 
 in whose religious sincerity he firmly believed. It had 
 been a struggle for him to give up this belief. In so 
 doing, he had persuaded himself that all Christians 
 were hypocrites, except Guy Guille that all religion 
 was a farce, that true faith in God and His Son Jesus 
 Christ, was a myth and that he himself, was justified 
 in doing just exactly what he pleased, whether right 
 or wrong. 
 
 David Ketron did not realize that in taking this 
 attitude, he was merely reflecting the views of Tom 
 Parsons, who had been instilling poison into his mind 
 for three years and had succeeded only too well. 
 
 Hugh stared at the check as if he saw a ghost. 
 He felt cold all over, as if he had a chill. 
 
 The check was drawn to the order of bearer; it
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 81 
 
 was for five hundred dollars and on the back \v;is 
 endorsed by "Hugh Hinson." 
 
 "You may remember that when you cashed that 
 check, the cashier, from motives of precaution, asked 
 your address and wrote it down. I made inquiries 
 and saw the address on his books, 55 Buchanan Street. 
 That's correct, isn't it?" 
 
 The voice was that of Jared Ketron, when con- 
 ducting a business deal, hard and cold; the face of 
 the lad behind the desk was like Jared's keen and 
 merciless, very, very unlike the happy-go-lucky David 
 whom Hugh had loved. 
 
 "You cashed a check for five hundred dollars on 
 November 3Oth, didn't you, at the Provident Trust 
 Company's Bank?" 
 
 "You were seen by 
 
 "Tom Parsons. I remember that he came in be- 
 hind me and asked me if I had come into a fortune. 
 So it was Tom ' 
 
 "No, it was the voucher," interrupted David, "I 
 never would have believed it, even if Tom had sworn 
 to it, if I had not received the voucher." 
 
 "Have you shown it to Tom?" 
 
 "No, I haven't shown it to anyone and don't in- 
 tend to. Oh. Hugh, Hugh, I trusted you so ! If you 
 had told me that you needed money, I would gladly 
 have given it to you." 
 
 "But you cannot trust my word when I say that 
 I never endorsed that check, that it is a forgery." 
 
 "It's your exact signature. I compared it, and 
 vou drew out five hundred dollars."
 
 82 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "For my mother. A small legacy she asked me 
 to draw for her and deposit in the First National 
 Bank. Go and find out. It isn't fair to me to leave it 
 this way. And I have no time to do anything. I must 
 take the noon train. Got word this morning that I 
 must report at the New York office at six o'clock. 
 We leave for the West tomorrow. I can't even go 
 home to see mother and Agnes. David, you're un- 
 just." 
 
 Hugh looked at his watch. 
 
 "As God is my witness, David Ketron, I never 
 wrote that signature or took a penny of your money. 
 Good-bye." 
 
 David sat staring at the check. Could he have 
 made a blunder? Who would dare to sign Hugh's 
 name? 
 
 He thrust the bundle of checks into the drawer, 
 for some one had his hand on the knob. 
 
 "Come in," he called. 
 
 It was Tom Parsons. 
 
 "So I hear that our paragon is off for the war," 
 he said jubilantly. "Did he pay back the five hundred' 
 dollars?" 
 
 "Call it off," answered David, gruffly. "I'm go- 
 ing to the gym. Want to come? That matter is 
 settled with Hinson and I never want to hear it men- 
 tioned again." 
 
 "Mum's the word," was Tom's response.
 
 CHAPTER EIGHT 
 Guy Guille's Studio 
 
 GUY GUILLE'S studio in New York was a 
 dream of beauty, so it seemed to David Ket- 
 ron, when he deposited himself and his suit- 
 case in it on the day before Christmas, 1916. 
 
 "Glad to see you," said his host, coming to greet 
 him, palette in hand, black velvet cap pushed well back 
 on his black hair, cordiality shining from his eyes. 
 "Your room is over there. I keep bachelor's hall, 
 you know, go out to get my meals and a woman comes 
 in to clean up, as much as I'll let her." 
 
 Two doors opened from the immense studio into 
 two bedrooms, connected with each other by a large 
 bathroom. Everything was very simple here, but im- 
 maculately clean. White beds, plain bureaus, straight 
 chairs, an outlook upon an open square where there 
 were trees, now white with snow, and squirrels, sitting 
 up on their haunches and saucily twitching their tails 
 as a greeting to David. 
 
 s Guille's quarters were well up-town, where there 
 \vas room to spread out and nature had a chance to 
 exist. In the building 'there were many artists and 
 many studios. It faced the river but David could not 
 see from the bedroom the big, gray ships of war 
 lying at anchor, awaiting the order to depart for the 
 war zone. 
 
 He unpacked his suit-case, washed off the dust 
 of travel, brushed his hair and looked around, 
 
 (83)
 
 84 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 Not a picture was there on the wall, not a knick- 
 knack or embroidered piece of linen. It was a man's 
 room, essentially. 
 
 Over the bed, hung a large illuminated parch- 
 ment, made by a skilled hand. David read it : 
 
 "Trust in the Lord and do good; so shalt thou 
 dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight 
 thyself in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires 
 of thine heart. 
 
 "Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in 
 him, and he shall bring it to pass. 
 
 "Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him. 
 
 "The steps of a good man are ordered by the 
 Lord * * * though he shall fall, yet shall he not 
 be utterly cast down ; for the Lord upholdeth him 
 with his hand. 
 
 "I have been young and now am old ; yet have 
 I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed beg- 
 ging bread." 
 
 Had this been other than Guy Guille's home, 
 David would have turned away from these words 
 with a shrug of his square shoulders. But he was 
 flattered at the invitation to pass the holidays with so 
 distinguished an artist. Famous men are permitted 
 some eccentricities and Guy's ran to religion. David 
 could not ignore this while he accepted hospitality." . 
 
 "This room looks like grandmother's," he thought. 
 "She's this kind, so is Eleanor. I thought Hugh was, 
 but I was wrong." 
 
 David sighed. It had been hard to give up 
 Hugh's friendship, harder to give up his ideal of 
 Hugh, but Davie, being a chip of the old block and
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 85 
 
 unregenerate, was hard as flint and stubborn as a mule 
 when he made up his mind. Besides, people are al- 
 ways more severe on those whom they have loved 
 and are disappointed in. 
 
 He firmly believed that Hugh Hinson was false, 
 that he had proved himself dishonest and a hypocrite. 
 So firmly was his idea fixed in his mind that he would 
 not even go to the First National Bank to see whether 
 Hugh had deposited five hundred dollars to his 
 mother's credit it was, of course, David's money 
 nor would he try to clear him. 
 
 If it were true that Hugh had been badly treated 
 by some one who wished to injure him, if it were true 
 that it was another check that he cashed that day Tom 
 saw him and not the one signed by David Ketron, 
 then that would prove David to be in the wrong. Just 
 now, David loved himself and his own will better than 
 anything else, and it would be humiliating to own that 
 he was unjust and had made a mistake. 
 
 Exactly so had been Jared Ketron's attitude to- 
 ward his brother. 
 
 Guy had laid aside his palette, covered with 
 splashes of carmine and ochre and green, had re- 
 moved his big, stained apron and the black velvet cap 
 which he called his "inspiration" and by one of those 
 strange fancies which every one of us has in one way 
 or another, wore invariably when he painted. 
 
 "Hungry aren't you, David? Suppose we go out 
 at once for dinner. It's a little early, but I have an 
 engagement over on the East side this evening, prom- 
 ised to talk to some fellows over there. Perhaps you'd
 
 86 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 rather go to some place of amusement. If so, just 
 suit yourself." 
 
 Herein lay Guy Guille's charm, he never forced 
 anyone to do things, not even to become Christians. 
 
 ''He gently leadeth us," he said of the Lord, "he 
 beckons but he does not push. He said 'And I, if 
 I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me'." 
 
 "I'd like to go with you." 
 
 "And I'd like to have you. Do you know, I keep 
 that bedroom full most of the time. Npt with swell 
 fellows like you, Oh, dear no. For the last week, I've 
 had a young chap there who came to New York and 
 fell among thieves, literally, confidence men. He 
 was green and believed they would help him to suc- 
 cess and they had stripped him of all he possessed 
 when I met him walking up and down over yonder 
 by the river and brought him home. It's always 
 seemed to me that home was meant for just that, a 
 place where wanderers could find shelter and comfort. 
 It has as big a meaning as 'mother' which isn't just 
 the woman who lives in your house, but the one who 
 loves you and gathers you in her arms and comforts 
 you. God meant homes and mothers to be symbols 
 of himself and his love and the home he has prepared 
 for us in the beautiful mansions. Here we are, 
 David." 
 
 Guille entered a small door and led the way 
 through a room crowded with men sitting at pine 
 tables, through a long corridor and out into a square 
 court. 
 
 "Guess you never ate dinner in a place like this, 
 David."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 87 
 
 "Guess I never did." 
 
 "Got the best cook here you'll find in New York. 
 If Mr. Carnegie knew about him, he'd offer him a 
 larger salary than the President of Harvard receives.' 
 You'll see." 
 
 David saw. He not only saw, but marvelled and 
 ate; clear soup, well-cooked chicken, a salad such as 
 his father's chef could not equal, oranges and bananas 
 and coffee, in Turkish fashion, served in tiny cups set 
 in filagree brass. 
 
 A glass roof was supported by slender columns, 
 the walls were hung with ivy, strange languages were 
 heard on every side. Guy Guille gave his orders to a 
 dark-faced waiter in a tongue unknown to David. 
 
 "Armenians," explained the artist, "refugees who 
 escaped from cruel tyranny and brutal persecutions to ' 
 live in peace and prosperity in little old New York. 
 You'll find about everything in tliis Island if you look 
 for it, David." 
 
 "I'm having the greatest experience of my life, 
 Eleanor," wrote David a week later from Guille 's in- 
 laid desk in a corner of the studio. 
 
 "If you could only see this place. Pictures, pic- 
 tures everywhere ; in gilt frames, on easels, half- 
 finished, some of them. Turn any canvas of the many 
 packed carelessly in heaps against the walls and you'll 
 strike a treasure. 
 
 "He's a great man, is Guy Guille, and has been 
 everywhere. And he's a good man, too, note that, " 
 for they are mighty few. The first evening I was 
 here, we went over to the East side ; right in among 
 the foreigners. You would have thought it was Rus-
 
 88 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 sia or Poland or Italy. People crowded into tene- 
 ments three families in a room, sweat shops where 
 tired women worked and even little children. 
 
 "Guy talked to a hundred Russians in a Settle- 
 ment hall, bearded, heavy faces, but such eyes ! with 
 a world of suffering and misery in their depths. He 
 can't speak Russian well, though he understands some, 
 and what he said was translated. I never heard any- 
 one explain things like he does, Eleanor. He told 
 these men that Jesus was just a working man, like 
 they are and how they listened ! 
 
 "But we haven't spent all our time in the slums 
 by any means. Guy (he asked me to call him this 
 and I think it's a great compliment) knows lots of 
 people. Took me to the Artists' Club, a splendid 
 building, where I met a lot of distinguished men 
 whose names you would know. He went to dinner 
 with Countess Poloski, who is over here speaking for 
 the Poles. 
 
 "We've done the town, and next week, I'll tell 
 you all about it. 
 
 "We plan to be in the old farm house at Easter, 
 don't we? And have Uncle Aleck and father meet 
 there. I wonder if we can work it! Wouldn't it be 
 great ? 
 
 "I'd forgotten to mention that we've seen a good 
 deal of Ines this week. 
 
 "I'll tell you more next week. Give my love to 
 'Uncle Aleck and think up some way to work our little 
 scheme at Easter. I believe Grandmother would know 
 how to do it. 
 
 "Your affectionate cousin, David.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 89 
 
 "P. S. It isn't only girls who add postscripts, is 
 it? Have you heard from Hugh Hinson?" 
 
 David told Guy all about Hugh the last night be- 
 fore he left. New Year's Day had made him think 
 of all sorts of Good Resolutions spelled with big 
 letters. He did not doubt that Hugh had used a check 
 in his name, Oh, no ! he could not give up his opinion 
 on that point, while he argued, feeling very virtuous 
 and almost religious, that sinners ought to be par- 
 doned. 
 
 He expounded this theory to the artist, who was 
 stretched out on a couch covered with a fine rug 
 brought from Persia on one of his horseback tours 
 in the Orient. Guy liked to go into the out-of-the-way 
 corners. 
 
 One day, he saved a child's life. The father gave 
 him this rug made by his ancestors in this very old 
 mud-walled house, a priceless rug, in faintly-tinted 
 jewel colors. 
 
 Guy did not enthuse on the theory. He said that 
 from one viewpoint it was correct of course, sinners 
 ought to be pardoned, that was clear; Christ taught 
 it by his acts. On the other hand, he called David's 
 attention to the fact that something devolved on him. 
 Up to the time that he found the veucher and heard 
 from Tom Parsons that Hugh had drawn five -hundred 
 dollars, he had believed in Hugh's integrity. 
 
 "Then why," said Guy, "do you not investigate? 
 Why condemn him out and out? Is it altogether fair 
 to one who has hitherto been honorable, to doubt his 
 word and accept circumstantial evidence?" 
 
 "There is the voucher. Hugh's name is on it."
 
 90 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "Are you sure that he wrote it? He declares that 
 he did not." 
 
 "If he did not, who did?" queried David. 
 
 When he thought it over, he was inclined to agree 
 with Guy that he ought to investigate the matter. 
 Then the family stubbornness came upon him. Hugh 
 must have written the signature endorsing the check. 
 
 Just before he left Guy's studio, he wrote a letter 
 to Hugh and mailed it to his old address in Buchanan 
 Street, the only one he knew as he went to the train. 
 It was a very forgiving letter, a very magnanimous 
 spirit did David show. He was willing to forget the 
 wrong done to him. Anyway, he was willing to call 
 Hugh his friend again, if he would say he was sorry, 
 and he'd tear up the voucher. 
 
 It was exactly the kind of epistle that some mil- 
 lionaire's son could write. But it did not sound one 
 bit like Dave Ketron, the real David, divested of his 
 father's money, a generous-hearted boy, with little 
 of the snob about him, the David whom Hugh had 
 known and loved. 
 
 He added just a word more. "I can't forget my 
 debt to you. Five hundred dollars isn't enough to 
 cover it." 
 
 On the whole, it was a despicable letter, the kind 
 that ought to be torn up at once. David realized this 
 as soon as he had dropped it into the post box from 
 which no letter ever could be fished out. 
 
 "I'm no better than a cad," he thought. "No 
 gentleman would have written such things. I'm glad 
 I didn't show it to Guv. He would not have liked it."
 
 CHAPTER NINE 
 David Comes of Age 
 
 HAVE you heard from Hugh, Eleanor?" 
 "Why should I hear from Mr. Hinson?" 
 Eleanor drew herself up proudly. To 
 tell the truth, she had been very eager to get 
 news from the young man, had watched the mails 
 daily. 
 
 "No, I've heard nothing. You are the one he 
 would write to first, anyway." 
 
 "I fancy not." 
 
 David's tone was peculiar; it denoted trouble. 
 
 ''Why, what's the matter between you and Hugh ? 
 You've been like David and Jonathan." 
 
 "You wouldn't understand if I told you. It isn't 
 a matter for girls," he said with masculine majesty. 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 "But if you should hear, let me know, will you?" 
 
 "Yes. Now tell me about the old house. I'm 
 awfully interested. And I've thought of a plan. 
 Grandmother Prentice urged me to bring father up 
 there for a change. The air of those hills is very 
 bracing and of course, it's father's native air. The 
 doctor said it would do him a world of good and he 
 seemed pleased when I told him what grandmother 
 said. The beginning of April will be just the time for 
 him to go and it's vacation for me." 
 
 "You could get him there a few days before 
 Easter," David suggested, enthusiastically. "Don't tell 
 him a thing about the changes in the old homestead." 
 
 "I won't." 
 
 "Then on Easter morning, you and grandmother 
 
 naturally, she'd be in the secret take a walk with 
 
 Uncle Aleck over to the farm, and father and I will 
 
 (91)
 
 92 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 be there, with a good dinner ready and a bright fire 
 burning. There's nothing like eats, Eleanor, to bring 
 people around to seeing things straight. Eating salt 
 together was the way of Arabians of cementing friend- 
 ship and good will. I believe it will work." 
 
 "I believe it will, too, Davie." 
 
 January and February passed, with heavy snow 
 and much sleet. David went back and forth to Hill- 
 side and as the work was chiefly to be done on the in- 
 terior of the building, the painting outside could be 
 left till the last. Workmen were busy transforming 
 the rough old farmhouse into a place of modern 
 comfort, without altering the original form or detract- 
 ing from its original simplicity or character. 
 
 Tom Parsons was now David's most intimate 
 friend. His pleasant mouth was assuming a cynical 
 twist like Tom's, and he became noted for his sharp, 
 and sometimes unkind witticisms at the expense of 
 others. 
 
 "In April I'll be twenty-one," David said to Tom, 
 as they strolled one day under the elms to the Davis 
 Quadrangle. 
 
 "In April?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "It's a big thing for a millionaire's son to come 
 of age. I was twenty-one last year, but nobody made 
 it a marked day." 
 
 David walked more in dignified fashion. A bit 
 inclined to boasting, and this was not to be wondered 
 at considering his up-bringing, he could not resist the 
 temptation. 
 
 "Of course, it is different in my case. My father 
 gives me an interest in the business then." 
 
 "Money's the biggest thing in the world. If you'd 
 been poor, you'd understand what I mean. You'd 
 prize money above anything if you were like me." 
 
 David's thoughts flew to Hugh Hinson.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 93 
 
 "Above character or morality and even religion," 
 David rejoined, sarcastically. 
 
 "I didn't say that," muttered Tom Parsons. 
 "Funny, Hugh Hinson has never let anybody know 
 whether he's dead or alive," went on Tom. He was 
 keen enough to know when he had come to the limit 
 with his patron. "I suppose, after the mean trick he 
 played, he's afraid to let people know where he is, for 
 fear he'll get nabbed." 
 
 "You let Hugh alone!" David exclaimed, unex- 
 pectedly, and strode off toward his rooms in a very 
 bad humor. 
 
 This affair of Hugh lay heavy on his conscience. 
 No answer to his letter had ever come and Eleanor 
 had not received a line. She tried to make herself be- 
 lieve that she never liked Hugh Hinson, handsome, 
 young giant, with eyes that were true and voice that 
 had a sincere ring to it. 
 
 Success did not crown her efforts however, and 
 the more she tried to forget Hugh and their last con- 
 versation over the telephone, the more she thought 
 about him. 
 
 Hugh Hinson had disappeared completely out of 
 her life and David's. 
 
 March blew itself out and April first dawned, 
 sunny, balmy, sweet with odors of violets and narcis- 
 sus which, were wafted from florists' shops in the 
 cities. 
 
 "We'll get the real kind, soon, daddy," Eleanor 
 said, gleefully, as the two sped through the rolling 
 country on the express train. 
 
 At the Junction, they took a dinky little car, with 
 only half a dozen passengers in it. None of them 
 recognized in the feeble, middle-aged man Aleck Ket- 
 ron, who had climbed the tallest trees as easily as a 
 squirrel and swam the creek four times running in 
 his boyhood,
 
 94 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 Eleanor had not met with any difficulties in per- 
 suading her father to accept grandmother's invitation 
 to spend the month of April with her. Quite joyously, 
 he entered into the plan, never telling Eleanor how 
 often, how very often he had longed for escape from 
 the crowded city where he seemed to be shut in by 
 prison walls, how he had longed for a breath of piney 
 air and the sweep of long, low hills, bright green, and 
 even for a glimpse of grandmother's face. 
 
 She was waiting at the door, when they got there, 
 after dusk according to plan, driving from the station 
 in the heavy old rockaway by a circuitous route, to 
 avoid the Ketron homestead. 
 
 "You're welcome, Aleck," said grandmother. 
 ''Eleanor, he's tired to death. Take him to the big 
 room and let him rest. You're to do nothing but 
 sleep, Aleck, and eat and drink milk for the next few 
 days. Sunday will be Easter, and we'll all go and sit 
 in the old pew, to rejoice because the Lord is risen. 
 I'll send supper up right away. Mandy's baked some 
 of the biscuit your pa used to like and there's sponge 
 cake. An' he'd better have an egg, fresh, Josiah just 
 brought 'em in an' some sauce and a cup o' tea. That'll 
 be enough for him tonight." 
 
 "I'll get so fat I can't walk, Grandmother Pren- 
 tice, if you feed me up like that." 
 
 "Well, it'll do you good to get some flesh on your 
 bones. You'd do for the skeleton man in the circus." 
 
 "Eleanor, Eleanor, it's good to get home." 
 
 Alexander Ketron lay resting on the four-poster, 
 spread with a hand-woven blue and white spread that 
 had come down from past generations, while Eleanor 
 placed a bountifully laden tray on the table beside 
 him. 
 
 "After a month of this, you'll be able to go back 
 to business, dear father,"
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 95 
 
 "I've lost my job, dear, and nobody wants a worn- 
 out, middle-aged man." 
 
 "Then I'll take care of you. Don't worry. Just 
 eat and sleep and play that you're a boy at home 
 again." 
 
 Her father looked at her earnestly. 
 
 "Who's living in the old homestead, Eleanor?" 
 
 "I think it's unoccupied. When I was here with 
 David for Thanksgiving, no one was living in it." 
 
 "And I suppose it is all run down." 
 
 "It was then." 
 
 "I'd like to see it. Those were happy days, dear, 
 when Jared and I " 
 
 "Eat your supper now, father, and don't think 
 about things. We'll go over to the old place when you 
 are strong enough." 
 
 It rained for two days, ,and Alexander Ketron 
 was glad to stay in bed and have Eleanor and grand- 
 mother amuse him in the good, old-fashioned way 
 which women, thank God ! have never modernized, 
 the same tender, gentle fashion that belongs to all 
 ages. 
 
 Easter dawned, cloudless. 
 
 "There'll be a big attendance today," grandmother 
 said. 
 
 The three were sitting at the round breakfast 
 table of dark mahogany. In the center were some 
 early crocuses found by Eleanor that morning. 
 
 "Put plenty of cream on your oatmeal, Aleck. 
 You see that he does, Eleanor. If there ain't enough, 
 Mandy'll get some more. Our cow gives real cream, 
 not the kind you see in the city." 
 
 "Nobody ever sees this kind, even at a dollar and 
 a half a quart," Aleck said, helping himself liberally. 
 "Grandmother. I'd like to live in the country again. 
 I wonder what anybody could buy the old place for,
 
 96 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 or whether Jared would be willing to sell it. 1 sup- 
 jx>se not to me." 
 
 "Oh, mebbe he would sell/' the old lady said. 
 
 "I can't ask him." 
 
 "Well, eat your breakfast now. It's no use to 
 rake up old scores. Eleanor, we'll drive 'round by the 
 homestead after church, if your father wants to see 
 it, I've got a key. Jared gave it to me, so's I could 
 go in occasionally." 
 
 "I'd like to go." 
 
 Josiah was waiting at the close of the service with 
 the rockaway and the strong Norman horses that 
 worked all the week. 
 
 "We'll drive over to the Ketron place, Josiah," 
 said grandmother. 
 
 David's plan, also, had worked to perfection, 
 even more than he knew. Jared Ketron had entered 
 with unusual enthusiasm into all the designs which 
 David and Eleanor had made for remodeling the home- 
 stead. He had pored over the drawings which had 
 finally been made by a well-known New York archi- 
 tect, recommended by Guy Guille with much more in- 
 terest than he had felt about the building of his im- 
 posing palace on the Hudson. 
 
 He and David arrived by auto on Saturday eve- 
 ning, without a single satellite. Even Marcellus, Jared 
 Ketron's valet, had been left behind and the rich man 
 would have to prepare his own clothes with his own 
 hands, a thing that he had not dojie for years. 
 
 "Here's your deed, Davie," he said on Easter 
 morning. "The place is yours." 
 
 "Thank you, dad. To do what I like with ?" 
 
 "Of course. It belongs to you. You can burn 
 it up or give it away whatever you like. Only I 
 should prefer to have it stay in the family." 
 
 "Don't you worry. Rut remember, I hold you to
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 97 
 
 what you said. I'm free to do what I please and no 
 observations or objections made." 
 
 "That's the ticket. Twenty-one today ! My ! your 
 mother would have liked to see you, big, husky fel- 
 low." 
 
 Sentiment is embarrassing, especially when one is 
 twenty-one. 
 
 David laid his hand affectionately on his father's 
 shoulder. The "old man''- a term of endearment 
 was getting pretty gray, and his eyes looked tired. 
 
 "Like the way we've fixed things here?" he asked. 
 
 "Everything's fine. I see you left the old room 
 just as it was, the one we used to sleep in." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Jared Ketron, the successful financier, went to the 
 row of five small-paned windows set close side by side, 
 Swiss fashion, and stared out at the farmland and 
 forests. Over yonder was the meadow lot that had 
 caused all the bitterness between him and his brother 
 Aleck. 
 
 As boys, they had fished over in the brook rip- 
 pling its way across the meadow, they had driven the 
 cows to pasture and shucked corn, always together. 
 Often, they had run away to Grandmother Prentice's 
 for cookies; how good they had tasted. 
 
 "I wonder if the meadow lot was worth all 
 the price," Jared said, aloud, his stubbornness falling 
 from him like a worthless garment today, when Christ 
 the Lord was risen and all men rejoiced. 
 
 The rockaway -came up the road and turned in 
 at the gate, newly-painted. The long, low house shone 
 forth in fresh dress, pure white. Roses and vines had 
 been replaced and trimmed ; beds gay with pansies 
 were on either side of the brick walk; the grass was 
 coming up green around the veranda. 
 
 "Jared must have sold the house," Eleanor's 
 father remarked, "and they've done it over. I'm sorry. 
 I'd like to have bought it if :
 
 98 THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 David flung the door between the white pilasters 
 wide open. 
 
 "Come in, Uncle Aleck. Dinner's most ready. 
 Hello, grandmother! Get him into the living room 
 quick, Eleanor, before he balks," Davie. whispered. 
 
 Aleck did not balk, but he turned pale. Perhaps 
 he knew that a crisis was near, maybe his heart was 
 moved to tenderness at the sight of his old home, even 
 though it wore a different aspect. 
 
 David's voice was vibrant when he called out. 
 "Father, we have guests. Here's grandmother and 
 
 He got no further, for Aleck stepped forward, 
 firmly. 
 
 "How are you, Jared?" 
 
 "First rate, Allie," he gave him the old, boyish 
 name and grasped his hand. 
 
 "The Lord is risen, indeed," murmured grand- 
 mother, while Eleanor slipped away to the dining 
 room to hide her tears of joy. 
 
 "It's funny," David commented, when he found 
 her with her head buried in a cushion on the window- 
 seat. "Girls cry when they are sad and they cry 
 when they are happy. Get up, dear, and see if the 
 table is all right. The lady who consented to cook 
 our meals, for a consideration, isn't much on style. 
 Eleanor, they've made up! And they're sitting in 
 those two big easy chairs we put on purpose in front 
 of the fire, talking over old times. I haven't seen 
 father so happy in years." 
 
 "What's grandmother doing?" 
 
 "Just listening and smiling, sweet as a peach in 
 her pink ribbons. Oh, Eleanor, it's succeeded grand- 
 ly. The trouble all along has been the Ketron stub- 
 bornness. Neither one of them was ready to give up 
 his own will and say he was sorry." 
 
 "Look out for yourself, Davie," warned Eleanor, 
 "you've got a lot of stubbornness in you."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 99 
 
 "And you're a chip, too." 
 
 Then they both laughed, but in their hearts, they 
 knew it was all true, the Ketron inheritance had come 
 down to them in good measure. 
 
 What a dinner that was! Now, it was flavored 
 by laughter and good-will ! 
 
 At the end, when they had sat long over the fruit 
 brought by Jared from his conservatory, Aleck rose 
 and solemnly congratulated David on his attainment 
 of twenty-one years. 
 
 "God bless and keep you, dear boy, in the days 
 to come." 
 
 Grandmother kissed Davie and so did Eleanor, 
 but his father sat very still. 
 
 David stood up in his place and made a little 
 speech. 
 
 "We're all together in the old homestead on 
 Easter Day. Eleanor and I fixed it up together, and 
 now that I shall soon be head over heels in business 
 and it's no use to leave the place empty, father and I 
 have agreed ' 
 
 Jared sat up straight and looked keenly at David. 
 What was the young cub up to? 
 
 "Father and I have agreed," repeated David, well 
 knowing that he was being watched, "to make over the 
 whole thing to Eleanor." 
 
 "Oh, Davie!" murmured Eleanor. 
 
 Then Jared Ketron shone out brilliantly. Maybe 
 he did not like what David the rascal had done ; 
 but he was game, all right. 
 
 He nodded approvingly and turned to Aleck with 
 a smile. 
 
 "This includes the meadow-lot," he said. 
 
 And this was the nearest to making an apology 
 for his meanness during all the years that Jared Ket- 
 ron ever came. Aleck understood. He was cut off of 
 the same cloth himself.
 
 CHAPTER TEN 
 Easter Day 
 
 THAT Easter afternoon, Eleanor, her pretty 
 room furnished with elegant daintiness in 
 the most comfortable style by one who had 
 no end of money at his command, sat down 
 at the teak-wood desk that looked so plain and cost so 
 much, and wrote a letter to Hugh Hinson. 
 
 Every once in a while, she looked out over the 
 broad fields around the farm house. In her eyes 
 was that joy of possession that fills the heart of one 
 who owns a home after years of living in someone's 
 else, rented or otherwise. 
 
 "It's _ours, it's ours !'' her heart throbbed jubi- 
 lantly. "Father will rest here and get well. How good 
 God is!" 
 
 She resolved to ignore the apparent neglect which 
 Hugh had shown. It must be only apparent, for Hugh 
 was not the kind to be rude or forgetful, nor was 
 Eleanor ready to lose a friend. Friends like Hugh 
 are very rare in this world, Eleanor argued, better to 
 stoop a little than to go through life without them. 
 
 All about the beautiful Easter Day she told him 
 without referring to the reconciliation between the 
 two brothers, entirely a family affair. She smiled at 
 the sound of Uncle Jared's hearty laugh floating up 
 to her from the living room, echoed by her father. 
 The two were sitting in the dusk, telling stories of 
 pranks committed many years before. 
 
 She told Hugh about David ; how kind he was, 
 how thoughtful and generous. She and her father 
 were to live on the farm near grandmother's ; surely 
 he had not forgotten the happy Thanksgiving Day 
 
 (100)
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 101 
 
 they had spent together at Hillside. It seemed long 
 ago, didn't it? 
 
 In the next June she would graduate from col- 
 lege, but it was agreed that she should not teach. 
 Father was alone and now it was not necessary, for 
 the farm would produce all they needed and something 
 over. She intended to take a course in domestic 
 science and agriculture, would subscribe to the best 
 farm journals so that she could help in a really prac- 
 tical way. 
 
 What fun it would be to raise vegetables, and see 
 things grow ! Never, never would she go back to that 
 hot, close, noisy city to live, so long as something to 
 eat could be raised on the farm. 
 
 "How are you getting on, Hugh? Your letters 
 must have miscarried for no news of you has come ; 
 even Davie knows nothing of you. Do let us know 
 how you are getting on and what Arizona looks like. 
 
 "I'd like to do some real, active work. I envy 
 Ines Guille, who has been studying to be a nurse. 
 That is doing something worth while. For me, it's 
 stay at home with father; that's my duty. 
 
 "When I get back to college, I'll run down some 
 day and see your mother and sister. I thought Agnes 
 a dear girl, when she came up to commencement last 
 year." 
 
 Eleanor read her letter over, and laughed at her- 
 self. "I suppose that I ought, 'be rights' to be ashamed 
 of myself, writing to a man who hasn't written me 
 once. If it was anybody but Hugh Hinson, I should 
 not do it. In fact, it wouldn't be worth while. Grand- 
 mother would think that girls of the present day are 
 not so modest as those of ye olden times. Maybe they 
 are not. I'm going to risk it." 
 
 She sealed her letter and ran downstairs, laying 
 it on the hall table for somebody to mail. David came 
 along later, and marvelled as he read the address.
 
 IO2 THAT KETRON STREAK . 
 
 "Writing to old Hugh, is she? Well, isn't 
 Eleanor the girl? I'd like to have news of him. By 
 this time, he's torn my epistle to pieces in disgust. 
 Maybe, I ought to have looked up things about that 
 check, maybe " another thought struck him so hard 
 that he winced. "Maybe I ought to have believed in 
 him, even though his hand-writing did stare me in the 
 face. I never knew him to lie, or steal or be dis- 
 honorable. Why couldn't I have taken his word for 
 it? Now it's all off between us and somehow, tonight, 
 I want to be friends with Hugh more than with any- 
 one else." 
 
 From that moment on, David developed a con- 
 science that prodded him and every prod hurt. Had 
 he been unfair? Had he believed evil of his friend 
 without investigating? Why? 
 
 Into his mind crept a faint distrust of Tom Par- 
 sons. It was Tom who had suggested that Hugh 
 was not what he appeared to be, that he was a psalm- 
 singing hypocrite, long before the check turned up. 
 
 There are strange contradictions in human char- 
 acters. Although David Ketron was tormented by his 
 conscience, although he began to fear that he was not 
 the paragon he thought himself, even if he was Jared 
 Ketron's son and had a swell bank account, he would 
 not budge one inch to look up the matter, he would not 
 tell Eleanor the story or ask her advice! and he con- 
 tinued to go around with Tom Parsons as usual, while 
 he watched him with keen, critical eye and noted every 
 word he said. 
 
 He even egged him on to talk of Hugh and say 
 mean things about him. It eased his conscience to 
 hear Hugh abused, because it made his own actions 
 seem more reasonable. At the same time, his soul 
 longed for his friend, as the soul of David had longed 
 for Jonathan. 
 
 On that Easter Day, when Eleanor was writing
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 103 
 
 in her new home, Hugh was sitting in a rough hut on 
 the borders of a sandy desert in Arizona. Around 
 him were a few scrubby plants. The sun beat down 
 with scorching heat. He was enthusiastic over his 
 work, although it had certain dangers. Already his 
 superiors trusted him and prophesied that he would 
 make good in his profession,; already he had saved 
 some money for that last year at college. A man rode 
 up on a gray donkey. 
 
 "Mail for you, Hinson," he called out. 
 
 "One from mother, one from Agnes, half a dozen 
 others from people who don't count and none from 
 Davie," said Hvigh to himself. 
 
 He realized now how eagerly he had expected 
 one from Davie, for of course, he'd look up the mat- 
 ter of that forged check at once and write him when 
 he found out his mistake. It could not be possible that 
 David Ketron, his friend, would believe, honestly be- 
 lieve that he could be capable of such an action. 
 
 The man who had brought the mail sauntered 
 up to the place where Hugh was sitting, gazing across 
 the golden sand-waves of the desert as if he was try- 
 ing to look beyond them, to peer into the heart of a 
 mystery the mystery of life and friendship. 
 
 "Brought ye some grub," drawled the tall, lank 
 fellow with heavily lined face and a pair of keen brown 
 eyes. "Look kinder all in, ye do." 
 
 "It's good of you, Snooks," replied Hugh, taking 
 the dinner-pail. 
 
 Even if a fellow's heart is sad he can still eat, and 
 the steaming stew and Johnny-cake were not by any 
 means bad, cooked by an Indian squaw down in the 
 gully beneath them over which was to go a mighty 
 viaduct. 
 
 "Down on yer luck?" asked Snooks, stretching 
 himself out on the burning earth and cutting off a 
 big piece of tobacco.
 
 lO4 THAT KKTKON STKKAK 
 
 "Well not exactly," answered Hugh. 
 
 "Some girl, I s'pose," ventured Snooks with a 
 grin. 
 
 Hugh flushed a deeper crimson than was war- 
 ranted by the glare of the setting sun. 
 
 "Didn't mean nothin'," apologized Snooks. 
 "Thought ye wanted a letter that hadn't come. That's 
 all." 
 
 "I did, but it wasn't from any girl. It was from 
 my churn in college." 
 
 "Been to college, hav' ye, boy ?" 
 
 "Yes, for three years and I've come out here to 
 get a start and save some money so that I can finish. 
 My father'st dead and my mother's 
 
 "A widdy. So was mine. She's gone now, too. 
 Do ye know, it's queer thing howa fellow remembers 
 things w'en he's far off from home. There was 
 mother's doughnuts, now, I can't fergit 'em, an' 
 mother's hand, kinder soft, in spite of the hard work 
 she done. I got a lot o' folks in ole Vermont." 
 
 "Where did you live?" inquired Hugh, more for 
 the sake of making conversation than for any real in- 
 terest in Snooks' former residence. His mind was 
 still busy with the problem of David Ketron. 
 
 "Little place called Hillside, ain't known fer any- 
 thin' partic'lar, 'cept that Jared Ketron the big mill- 
 owner come from there." 
 
 Hugh woke up suddenly and leaned forward, 
 speaking with ill-concealed eagerness. 
 
 "Did you know the Ketrons?" 
 
 "Know 'em! Wai, I ruther guess I did. There 
 was two brothers, one of 'em knew how to make- 
 money, t'other didn't. They quarreled over a piece o' 
 land an' won't speak t' each other. Knew Mis' Prn- 
 tice, too, whose datter Jared married. He's got a boy. 
 I hear, who kin spend all the cash his father makes. 
 an' t'other brother has a girl, Eleanor, I seen her when 
 she was a baby."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 105 
 
 "I spent last Thanksgiving in Hillside." 
 
 "Where to?" 
 
 "Mrs. Prentice's." 
 
 "Ye don't say. Give us yer hand, boy. Spent 
 Thanksgivin' in ole Vermont ! Wai sometimes I 
 think ain't no use talkin' 'bout it, though ! Ever see 
 J'siah who works for Mis' Prentice?" 
 
 "Surely." 
 
 "He's my brother, but he don't know where I am. 
 Ye see, I was a black sheep. I done a mean thing 
 once an' run away out here. I'm thinkin' o' goin' back 
 sometime. D'ye think," he asked anxiously, "that 
 J'siah would be glad to see me?" 
 
 "I'm sure of it," was Hugh's hearty reply. 
 
 "To think that ye know the Ketrons," murmured 
 Snooks. "Wai, this here world's a mighty little place, 
 ain't it? I say, boy, if ye ain't too tired, let's foot it 
 to the camp. Tain't many miles an' there's a feller 
 over there in the tent that sure kin talk. Got a lot o' 
 soldiers in the camp ready to march fer the border if 
 the Greasers squeak." 
 
 "All right," assented Hugh, glad of a chance for 
 some diversion. 
 
 It was a splendid evening and the air, now that 
 the sun had set and the big jolly moon was rising, had 
 become cool and fresh. The desert stretching far away 
 beyond the deep ravine turned to silver and each scrub- 
 by bush, each cleft in the rocks nearby was a clearcut 
 shadow.. 
 
 Somebody had bestowed the name of Snooks on 
 the big Vermonter and it had stuck. Nobody knew or 
 cared to know what his real name was and he had al- 
 most forgotten that he was once called Sam. 
 
 He shared Hugh's cabin on the edge of a vari- 
 colored cliff of sandstone, sleeping in the bunk built 
 in the wall over Hugh's and eating the same food 
 with him and forty other men who were working for 
 Uncle Sam in a big government enterprise to open up
 
 io6' THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 this part of Arizona. Later the desert was to be ir- 
 rigated and some day, there would be fruit-farms 
 where now was billowy sand. Snooks wasn't afraid of 
 anything in this world ; he confessed, with vigorous 
 language that he did have some fear of \vhat might 
 happen to him in the next world, if he did not play 
 a square game here. 
 
 "A fellow's gotta be square," he said, as he 
 whittled a stick in leisure moments. "Sort of a game 
 we're playin' down here. One wins, t'other loses. It 
 don't matter in the long run, for they both come to 
 the same end at last an' six feet of earth is 'nough fer 
 the rich ez it is fer the poor. But ef you don't play 
 fair, if you cheat an' try to get t'other fellow's money, 
 you gotta pay. that's all there is about it. Ye gotta 
 pay when ye git over yonder." 
 
 He would point to the horizon ; evidently the 
 other world lay in the direction of the sunset. "Going 
 West" was literal to Snooks. 
 
 He was whittling, now ; he was always found cut- 
 ting up sticks when he did not have anything else to 
 do. Along his path of life he left behind him little 
 mementos of idle hours, a boat for a boy, a queer doll 
 for a girl or a whistle. 
 
 "They've got a great feller over there in the 
 'hut'," he commented, as the two walked along to- 
 ward the camp. "New kind. Don't preach, just gets 
 right down by your side an' grips, your hand an' talks 
 'bout God ez ef he knew him an' he was goin.' right 
 'long with us into the danger. He makes a feller be- 
 lieve- there is a higher power. So they say. I ain't 
 heard him." 
 
 Hugh remembered his slogan : "God go with 
 you." It meant by your side, walking right along; 
 you could almost touch Him if you reached out your 
 hand. 
 
 "I knew a man who talked that way." Hugh re- 
 marked.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 107 
 
 They were picking their way over rough ground 
 and stones to the small rude hut, crowded with 
 soldiers. 
 
 "Good kind, mighty rare. Most of 'em try to 
 punch religion down yer throat, they don't tell ye that 
 God's right 'long side," commented Snooks. Hugh 
 heard a familiar voice say: "That's fine, boys! At 
 it again! Now, all together." 
 
 He stood up on tip-toe to see who the man was, 
 toward whom every man's eye was turned in eager 
 attention. 
 
 There stood Guy Guille, world-famous artist, 
 beating time with a stick and singing for all he was 
 worth. 
 
 A series of short stories followed, told in Guy's 
 best style. The men shouted and clapped or sat in 
 perfect silence according to the subject. 
 
 From "Ye banks and braes o' bonny Boon'' to 
 "Three blind Mice," an ancient standby, the repertoire 
 ranged. Guy held up his hand. 
 
 "Haven't we had the finest time yet? Now some- 
 body knows a hymn that he used to sing when he was 
 home. Let's have one. And then we'll tell God how 
 much we thank him for keeping us well and happy 
 and go to bed. What shall it be, boys?" 
 
 "Abide with me," called out Snooks, who had 
 been enjoying himself thoroughly, singing like a trom- 
 bone. 
 
 "All right." 
 
 The men stood up. Most of them were no older 
 than Hugh Hinson. Some faces were hard, lined 
 with the results of days and nights of sinful pleasure, 
 others were boyish, unstained by the world. 
 
 "Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes ; 
 Shine through the gloom and guide me to the skies ; 
 Heaven's morning breaks and earth's vain shadows flee 
 In life, in death, O Lord, 
 Abide with me."
 
 io8 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 they sang, then vanished into the darkness and Guy 
 Guille was left in the small hut near the firing front. 
 
 "Great, ain't he?" asked Snooks, when they crept 
 under their blankets that night. 
 
 "You're right," said Hugh, "he's great, sure." 
 
 Hugh did not make himself known to Guy Guille. 
 He had a morbid feeling that David's suspicions of 
 him had cast a slur upon his character. Whenever he 
 could, he went to the camp, keeping ever in the back 
 of the hall, hoping that Guy would not recognize him, 
 listening eagerly to all the words spoken, absorbing 
 every hymn as if he were seeking comfort and help. 
 
 Hugh was working too hard, that was clear; day 
 after day in the burning 'sunlight he labored, some- 
 times blinded by the glare, his head almost bursting 
 with his heated blood. 
 
 Snooks watched him anxiously. At night, when 
 the boy tossed in his hard bunk, the big Vermonter 
 went to the brook and wet cloths in cool water to lay 
 upon his head and listened to Hugh's delirious words. 
 Little by little he pieced together the story, heard 
 about David Ketron and the false accusations, about 
 Eleanor Ketron. 
 
 "The boy's sick," he said to the man in charge 
 of the work. "He'd orter have a rest." 
 
 "I don't want a rest," said Hugh, with a new and 
 strange fierceness, when the superintendent suggested 
 that he go for a month to a more bracing clime. 
 "What do you think I came out here for? A pleasure 
 trip? No sir, I came to make money and I'm not 
 going to give in now." 
 
 "He'll go all to pieces some day," prophesied 
 Snooks, shaking his head. "If he'd only git that letter 
 he's been lookin' fer so long." 
 
 With this desire, Snooks otherwise Sam rode 
 his gray donkey over the miles that separated the gully 
 from the town where the post office was. Some letters 
 he brought to Hugh but never one from Davie, his old 
 friend who had so grievously misjudged him.
 
 CHAPTER ELEVEN 
 The Ketron Blood Cools 
 
 IN due course of time, Eleanor finished her college 
 course and settled down in the dear home where 
 her father was rapidly regaining his health, over- 
 seeing the work on the farm, watching the pink 
 apple-blooms open, then drop their petals while tiny 
 fruit formed, a promise of sauce and pies later. 
 Eleanor subscribed for journals giving directions for 
 scientific farming and David helped her by sending 
 the latest books on agriculture. 
 
 She had bee-hives where busy-winged creatures 
 flew in and out, making honey. The cows yielded such 
 creamy milk as the Ketrons had never seen in those 
 days when they lived in the crowded city, days they 
 were glad to forget. 
 
 Summer was fully ripe when one afternoon Jared 
 Ketron's big car hummed its way up the winding road 
 to the farmhouse and sounded a merry call to Eleanor. 
 "Just come to say good-bye for a couple of 
 months," the mill-owner explained, when they were 
 seated in the living-room where all five windows were 
 open upon a broad lawn with the glistening waters of 
 a pond showing through drooping willow-branches. 
 "Davie and I are going out West to see about some 
 business." 
 
 "Going clear across the continent?" inquired 
 Aleck. 
 
 "Don't know. Maybe. I haven't had a vacation 
 for years and this young chap here needs one, too. 
 He's done well, I tell you. David's going to make 
 good. Next year, when he graduates, he's intending 
 to learn the mill business from A to Z." 
 
 009)
 
 no THAT KETKON STREAK 
 
 "Good for David !" Aleck said, while Eleanor 
 clapped her hands. 
 
 The cousins went out into the orchard and sat 
 down on a rustic bench placed there by Aleck Ketron. 
 The flecks of sunshine speckled the grass and moss. 
 On the trees, apples were turning blush-red and pears 
 had a golden glow already. "Ines Guille and her 
 aunt are going with us," David said. Perhaps you 
 know that Guy is down in Arizona, spending the sum- 
 mer with the soldiers who are guarding the Mexican 
 border." 
 
 "In Arizona," mused Eleanor. "No, I did not 
 know it. I wonder if he's seen Hugh Hinson." 
 
 "Don't know," was David's laconic reply. 
 "Guy's a fine fellow, Eleanor/' he added, hastily, as if 
 in a hurry to change the subject, "but for the life of 
 me I can't see why he gives so much time to such 
 kind of work when he has a gift for painting." 
 
 "He paints, too." 
 
 "Yes. And he's got a high ideal of what's ex- 
 pected of him in this world." 
 
 There was a wistful note in David's voice. A new 
 and surprising note, for the Ketron streak was prom- 
 inent in David as well as in his father, a sorfof self- 
 sufficiency and stubbornness some called it pig- 
 headedness. Josiah was one of these. 
 
 "A Ketron mostly thinks he knows it all," Josiah 
 stated at the evening gathering in the store. 
 
 "Then you think that living up to what Christ 
 teaches is a high ideal ?" Eleanor followed up her 
 advantage. 
 
 "For Guy, yes. He's thirty-five; he's old. But 
 I'm young and I'm not going to give up all the fun 
 of this life." 
 
 "You needn't do that " began Eleanor. 
 
 David had been serious as long as he could stand 
 it. "Ry the way, Eleanor could you keep Andrie up
 
 I'll AT KKTKON STREAK 111 
 
 in the country while I'm gone? I'll pay him and he 
 can make Uncle Aleck more comfortable. The old 
 fellow's broken-hearted because I'm going away, 
 'Who'll press your clothes or fix your bath, Master 
 David?' he asked forlornly." 
 
 Eleanor smiled. 
 
 "Of course we'll be glad to have Andrie. David, 
 if you should meet Hugh out there 
 
 "I hope that I shall not," David answered, with 
 a touch of fierceness, "something might happen." 
 
 "What's the matter? What did Hugh do?" 
 
 "Eleanor, I told you before that it's something 
 girls can't enter into." 
 
 "I might help to make it right. You and Hugh 
 were such good friends." 
 
 "Well, we're not any more and I don't want to 
 see him or hear of him again/' 
 
 Even while he was speaking. David Ketron knew 7 
 that this was not true. He did want to see Hugh, but 
 he would not yield to this desire any more than Jared 
 Ketron had been willing to yield to his brother Aleck 
 in the matter of the meadow-lot. 
 
 That Ketron streak ! What trouble it had made. 
 
 "It's funny how much father is interested in Guy 
 Guille's work," continued David, getting on safe 
 ground again. "Guy wrote me a couple of weeks ago 
 and said he needed money, had spent all his own and 
 was praying for some more. Talks just as if hf was 
 asking his father to send him some. I read it to dad 
 an' for a moment he didn't say a word. Then what 
 does he do but get his check-book and write a check 
 for two thousand. 'Send him this, Davie, an' tell him 
 there's plenty more where it came from. That friend 
 of yours can call on me for all he wants. That's the 
 kind of religion I like, the kind that brings the God- 
 Man right to human beings,' I never thought dad 
 would talk like that."
 
 112 THAT KETRON STKKAK 
 
 "Good for Uncle Jared !" 
 
 "Tom Parsons has left college for good. Gone 
 into the navy. You didn't like Tom, did you, 
 Eleanor?" 
 
 "I detested him." 
 
 "He isn't worth getting so worked up over, 
 though I always liked him." 
 
 "Because he bowed down and worshiped an idol 
 of gold." 
 
 "Why don't you add, 'with feet of clay' ? You'd 
 have struck it right. You're mighty keen sometimes, 
 Eleanor. Parsons never liked work any better than I 
 did, he was the luxurious kind, could spend a lot of 
 money." 
 
 "Where did he get it?" 
 
 "Mostly out of me, or out of dad. Eleanor, when 
 I get through college, as dad told you I'm going to 
 learn father's business from beginning to finish and 
 I'm going to earn my own living." 
 
 "Davie, you're going to be a man." Eleanor an- 
 swered, jubilantly. 
 
 David went to his old room just before he was to 
 start for the West with his father and the two ladies 
 who were to be their guests in the long trip across 
 the continent in a new powerful car just purchased by 
 Jared Ketron. 
 
 A batch of mail was waiting for him. among the 
 letters was a package of vouchers from the bank. 
 
 He glanced at them hastily. 
 
 "Well, I'll be jiggered!" he exclaimed aloud, 
 staring at a check. "Pay to cash, signed by me, six 
 hundred dollars, endorsed 'Hugh Hinson.' Forged 
 like the other one was. But it cannot have been Hugh 
 who drew the money, he's too far away and this is 
 dated June twenty-first. Here's a mystery! Some 
 stupid clown did this, sure. He might have known 
 I'd detect it. But perhaps the fool thought I'd be
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 113 
 
 gone and would never see the vouchers. Father says 
 that besides being wicked, rascals are almost always 
 short-sighted and defeat their ends by leaving some 
 loop-hole unguarded. But who did this? The same 
 fellow who did the other trick. I can't bear to think 
 of how I talked to Hugh, of how I doubted his word, 
 fairly slapped him in the face with my meanness." 
 
 David could be swift when he wanted to be. He 
 was in a taxi in five minutes and at the Trust Company 
 Bank in ten. Inside of half an hour, he had all the 
 information needed to straighten up the first check. 
 
 On that date, Mr. Hinson had drawn out five 
 hundred dollars and closed up an account in his 
 mother's name. This was exactly as Hugh had said. 
 
 The second check for six hundred dollars had 
 evidently been cashed at the Empire Trust Company, 
 New York. It had their stamp. 
 
 Jared Ketron and his son each had accounts here ; 
 the cashiers recognized David at once. One of them 
 remembered paying out the money, he had also noticed 
 the man to whom it was paid. The forgery of David's 
 signature, even to a peculiar flourish that he made on 
 the "D" was so exact that no question as to its gen- 
 uineness had been raised. It was payable to "Cash" 
 and Hinson signed his name. 
 
 The clerk had, however, like the one who paid 
 the money on the first check, taken Hinson's address 
 in New York. 353 West 5oth Street. 
 
 David looked at his wrist-watch. 
 
 "I guess I'll have time. Hurry up. please I've got 
 to be off for Ohio in an hour," he said to the taxi 
 driver, who speeded up willingly for the handsome 
 young man. 
 
 It was an apartment house. David went to the 
 top floor and rang the bell. 
 
 "Mr. Hinson? Don't know anybody by that 
 name. Young, was he? About twenty-two or so? I
 
 i 14 THAT KKTRON STREAK 
 
 did have a lodger last month, on his way to training 
 for a sailor, I guess. He only stayed a week. I for- 
 get his name, but maybe I can find it wrote down 
 somewheres." 
 
 "Oh, never mind. I'm in an awful hurry. What 
 sort of looking fellow was this man? Tall, dark eyes, 
 pleasant face." 
 
 "No sir. Not that kind. He was slender an' his 
 eyes were set too close together for my way of think- 
 ing." 
 
 "Had a scar on his forehead ?" 
 
 David's mind was working fast. 
 
 "Seems to me he did." 
 
 "Went into the navy service?" 
 
 "Yes, I think so." 
 ' "Thank you very much." 
 
 David leaped down the stairs, not waiting to ring 
 up the elevator boy, and jumped into his taxi. 
 
 "Drive like the wind," he ordered. 
 
 "It was Tom Parsons," he muttered, "the traitor 
 and sneak. I believed in him and let Hugh go, more 
 fool I. Now, there's no chance to write. I can do 
 nothing but wait. But now I don't want to see Hugh. 
 I'm ashamed." 
 
 This was a new feeling for Jared Ketron's only 
 son and heir. 
 
 Eleanor paid her promised visit to Mrs. Hinson 
 and Agnes, wondering why she was willing to take 
 so much trouble when Hugh had not answered her 
 letter. 
 
 She found them in just the kind of a home where 
 Hugh's mother would live. In a tiny cottage sur- 
 rounded by gardens, where vegetables and fruit, cur- 
 rant bushes laden with rosy globules, holly hocks, 
 larkspur, mignonette were all growing in delightful 
 confusion.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 115 
 
 "Our Hugh has been transferred to a place near 
 the Mexican border. We haven't had news now for 
 two weeks but I'm sure he's happy and busy, and I 
 pray God that he may come home safe." 
 
 So did Eleanor. 
 
 For a girl who belonged to the unromantic, hard- 
 headed Ketron family, for a girl who had written a 
 letter to a man and had received no reply, Eleanor 
 Ketron was very sentimental and even happy. 
 
 No matter what Hugh Hinson did, she believed in 
 his sincerity and uprightness. There was some good 
 reason for his silence. She shrewdly decided that the 
 quarrel between him and FJavid was the reason. But 
 Eleanor would not own, even to her own heart, that 
 true confidence and respect are the foundations for 
 true love.
 
 CHAPTER TWELVE 
 The Streak Fades Away 
 
 SNOOKS got out of his bunk on a blistering day 
 in the latter part of August, went out softly and 
 plunged into the gully at whose base ran the 
 cooling brook, the only sign of water for sev- 
 eral miles. Even now, the brook was drying up and 
 the stones were white and smooth at the foot of the 
 rocks, 
 
 A beautiful sight were those sandstone cliffs, 
 turned into gorgeous rainbow colors by the glorifying 
 rays of the sun. 
 
 "Gimme some breakfast for the kid," Snooks 
 said to the squaw. "He ain't awake yit an' I ain't 
 goin' to disturb him, fer it's a holiday an' I'm off fer 
 town. I'll jest leave his grub by side o' his bunk an' 
 ef it's a little cold, he won't mind it." 
 
 This Snooks did, shaking his head as he saw how 
 flushed Hugh's face was, how his hair was wet with 
 perspiration that had a queer, clammy feel to it, as 
 the rough hand brushed it gently away from the sleep- 
 ing man's forehead. 
 
 "I'll be gone for a couple of days," Snooks ex- 
 plained to the superintendent. "I'm goin' tub git some 
 medicine fer the boy. He ain't well." 
 
 The gray donkey leisurely carried Snooks over a 
 glowing white road, unrelieved by green of any kind. 
 Everything was white, white with dust, withered with 
 the sun. If it would only rain ! But it never did. 
 Man and beast suffered from the eternal drouth. The 
 gray donkey minded it least of all, but even he was 
 weary and his long ears drooped sadly when he and 
 Snooks arrived at the "town," actually a group of a 
 
 (116)
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 117 
 
 dozen unpainted adobe houses, a general store and a 
 post office. Some soldiers were lounging around, try- 
 ing to get some enjoyment out of a day oft. 
 
 Just as Snooks swung his form from off the 
 donkey at the door of the "store," a large motor car 
 moved away, its wheels sinking into the thick dust of 
 the road. The soldiers gazed after it, the man who 
 kept the "store" was eagerly watching its departure 
 and every man, woman and child in the place was on 
 the street. 
 
 "Hes Joneses Corners got to be a place fer tour- 
 ists?" asked Snooks, "What under heavens be sech 
 folks here fer?" 
 
 "Wall, Joneses Corners is some place," answered 
 the man nearest to him, growing red in the face. 
 
 "I ain't runniir down Joneses Corners," apolo- 
 gized "Snooks, "but sech a sight ez that there car ain't 
 crossed my vision in all the time I been comin' here 
 fer mail which I never got." 
 
 "One o' them eastern mill-i-on-aires," explained 
 Tim Maguire, called the Mayor of Joneses Corners. 
 He was also the postmaster. "Got a lot o' mail, he 
 did. Name's Ketron, Jared Ketron." 
 
 Something made Snooks feel very queer, whether 
 it was the heat or the dust or the surprise he did not 
 know. When he came to himself somebody was fan- 
 ning him with a hat and another was pouring camphor 
 up his nose. This treatment was effective. 
 
 After he had expressed his opinion of it in no 
 mild tones, Snooks said : "Did he say which way he 
 was a'goin' ?" 
 
 "Want a ride?" jeered a voice. 
 
 "He's a-headin' fer the camp. The shuvver asked 
 the way. Wants to see the feller that the boys all fall 
 over theirselves to do things fer. My! the way them 
 guys talks about 'im is wonderful. 'Cordin' to them 
 there ain't nobody like 'im this side o' heaven."
 
 1 1 8 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "They're about right," assented Snooks, "he's got 
 the goods an' delivers 'em straight. I've seen 'im an' 
 I'm goin' straight on there now." 
 
 "Ye'll hev' to hurry an' foot it, I reckon. Yer 
 donkey's all in." 
 
 "Ill walk ef I hev' to," said Snooks, firmly. 
 
 "Mebbe the feller with the car is a friend o' 
 yourn," inserted some wag, and there was a loud 
 laugh. 
 
 Then Snooks paralyzed the crowd. 
 
 "Know'd him an' his brother w'en I was a boy," 
 he explained enjoying the effect of his words. 
 "Shouldn't be s'prised if he gimme a ride back home 
 in that there expensive car o' his'n." 
 
 "I got a letter fer Hinson," said the postmaster. 
 
 "(iimme it. An' I want somethin' fer fever. Best 
 medicine ye got. The kid's sick." 
 
 The whole population was present when Snooks, 
 now risen to high place in public estimation made his 
 exit from Joneses Corners on the best horse of the 
 mayor. It was twenty-five miles, good measure, 
 to camp, and Snooks did a lot of thinking as he 
 traversed that distance. 
 
 Snooks was tired of his wandering life. He had 
 a strange, new desire to get back to the "old place," 
 to see J'siah and eat pumpkin pie, to walk under the 
 great elms and see the white church with green shut- 
 ters. 
 
 "I must be gettin' religion," he mused. "Ain't 
 wanted to see the outside, let alone the inside of a 
 church before in years an' years. It's that feller over 
 to camp that's done it. Makes God seem kinder near, 
 somehow." 
 
 He lit a match and looked long at Hugh's letter. 
 
 "Never see that writin' before," he muttered, "an" 
 I've brought the boy a good many letters. Looks like
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 119 
 
 a girruls writin'. Mebbe it's be the one he's been 
 a-lookin' fer." 
 
 It had been a most successful journey across the 
 country from New York to Arizona. Weather per- 
 fect, roads in good condition, machine as nearly ideal 
 as the hand of skilled mechanician could make it. 
 
 ' The presence of Ines Guille, who had been busy 
 nursing poor wounded soldiers, heroes back from 
 France, had made it a happy time for David, who 
 began to dream dreams and feel himself a man. 
 
 And now they were on the way to the soldiers' 
 camp where they were to meet Guy and perhaps he 
 would go back with them, for summer was almost 
 over and his work in New York called him. 
 
 Over the rough roads went the car from Joneses 
 Corners, as swiftly as was possible in the dust. 
 
 Then, suddenly, there was a sharp crack and the 
 car stopped with a jerk. 
 
 "Tire bust?" asked Jared Ketron. 
 
 "I'm afraid it's more than a tire," answered the 
 "shuvver," looking over the machinery. 
 
 "Not a very cheerful place to stop," David re- 
 marked to Ines. 
 
 "Let's get out and walk awhile," she replied. 
 
 "It's a matter of an hour, perhaps longer,'' said 
 McLaughlin. "If somebody would pass by, I'd send 
 back to that town for a wheelwright. He'd do the 
 job in a few moments. I haven't the proper tools." 
 
 "Not much chance of anybody passing this way. 
 Toughest road I ever struck. Guess we'll have to 
 camp here till morning," Mr. Ketron responded. 
 
 "We shan't mind that," answered Ines. "It's a 
 beautiful night. Going to be moonlight." 
 
 "The baskets are full of good things to eat," in- 
 serted David. "Its lucky we loaded up at Joneses 
 Corners." 
 
 "Oh, it's delightful !" was Ines's exclamation.
 
 I2O I'n AT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "At any rate, we'll have supper and by that time, 
 somebody will come by and McLaughlin can see what 
 he can do while we are waiting." 
 
 Ham sandwiches, coffee from the thermos bottles, 
 luscious fruit vanished but nobody came. All about 
 them was the great stillness of a partially settled coun- 
 try at night-time. 
 
 Hour after hour passed, but no one wanted to 
 sleep. David told stories, his father joked with the 
 ladies and McLaughlin worked at the car. He held 
 out hopes that soon it would be repaired ; the damage 1 
 was not so serious as he feared. 
 
 Quieter and quieter it grew. The only noises 
 were the buzzing of insects and the occasional cry of 
 some strange night-bird, far away. 
 
 McLaughlin stopped pounding and listened. 
 
 "Somebody's coming," he said. 
 
 From the distance sounded a nasal voice, singing. 
 It was evidently an impromptu song, running thus : 
 
 "Oh. I'm goin' back to ole Vermont 
 Where mince-pies grow on trees, 
 I'm goin' to leave this desert place 
 Where there ain't nothin' but sand an' fleas." 
 
 It was a cheerful song, one that met an echo in 
 the soul of every one of the listeners. To Jared Ket- 
 ron it brought visions of the old farm-house and to 
 David, it meant Grandma Prentice and Thanksgiving 
 Day and Thanksgiving Day made him think of 
 Eleanor and Hugh. 
 
 Where was Hugh ? David and Jonathan the two 
 had been called in college. David knew now in the 
 darkness of the star-lit night that he wanted to see 
 Hugh, his soul clave to the soul of his friend. "That 
 Ketron Streak" was yielding to something better and
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 121 
 
 nobler ; he was ready to say what was hard for a 
 Ketron, "I was wrong. Forgive me." 
 
 But where was Hugh Hinson ? Even his mother, 
 whom Eleanor had met one day, was worried. No 
 news had come from Hugh for a long time. He 
 seemed to have dropped out of existence. 
 
 ""What's the matter, boss? 1 " the voice said, as a 
 tall figure, hatless. clad in cotton trousers and a shirt 
 which would be much the better for washing, material- 
 ized out of the darkness. "Kin I help?" 
 
 It was Snooks, on his way from town with the 
 mail-bag. 
 
 Catching sight of Ines, he stared, then touched his 
 forehead. "Didn't know there was a lady here ; two 
 of 'em, I vum," noticing Aunt Lennie, who was wish- 
 ing that cruel fate had not led her into the wild places 
 of the earth. 
 
 "Car's broke," answered the chauffeur. "Maybe 
 you'd be willing to go to town an' get me " 
 
 "Lemme look at it. Ain't no sort o' machinery I 
 can't mend. Sure ! I kin fix it." 
 
 And "fix it" Snooks did. In half an hour, the 
 horn merrily tooted and the passengers got in. 
 
 "We'll give you a lift if you're going our way," 
 said Jared Ketron. 
 
 "Don't mind if I do," assented Snooks, quite at 
 his ease. "I get the mail-bag, ye see, an' I'll jest hang 
 it on the nag's back. He'll foller all right. Wot 
 would the boys at Joneses Corners say if they could 
 see me in Jared Ketron's fine car," he added to him- 
 self with a chuckle, squeezing into a place between 
 David and the "shuvver." 
 
 Much as he had boasted, Snooks was shy about 
 disclosing to the mill-owner his identity. When they 
 arrived at the rough house where Guy Guille lived, he 
 knocked on the door loudly, waited till Guy himself 
 appeared and then slipped away into the darkness.
 
 122 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "Where's that fellow?" demanded fared Ketron, 
 "I want to pay him. He mended our car that got 
 stuck." 
 
 "What did he look like?" 
 
 "Like a Vermonter. Carried a mailbag." 
 
 "Oh ! that's Snooks. He's Hugh Hinson's nurse 
 just now." 
 
 "Hugh Hinson! Is he here?" came from David 
 Ketron's lips. 
 
 "Very much here. Worked too hard in the sun. 
 got fever and is as weak as a child, though getting 
 better, thank God," replied Guy. "I only heard of 
 him today and went over to see him at once. Make 
 yourselves at home, folks. This is a surprise. I have 
 two rooms for the ladies and the rest of us will camp 
 out." 
 
 "Where is Hugh ?" asked Ines of her brother, in ;i 
 quiet moment. 
 
 "In a tent over yonder. Needs nursing badly, 
 Ines," he suggested. "The Lord is going to save 
 Hugh because he sees that there's work for him to 
 do." 
 
 "Maybe He sent me here for that purpose." was 
 Ines's answer in a tone which David had never heard 
 from her lips. 
 
 "You'll go over in the morning, dear." 
 
 "And stay till he is well, Guy." 
 
 In all his life, David Ketron never passed such 
 a night as the one that followed. It seemed such a 
 small thing to confess to his old friend that he had 
 misjudged him, that he had been cruel and stubborn 
 and unjust. Yet this was just what was hard for any- 
 one who had Ketron blood in them. It had kept Jared 
 apart from Aleck his brother for many years. It was 
 boiling up even now in Eleanor, far away in the farm- 
 house in "ole Vermont."
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 123 
 
 Much time had passed since she had laid aside 
 her pride enough to write a letter to Hugh, who had 
 been so eager to hear from her on that evening which 
 seemed now so long ago. Of course, he had received 
 the letter, but did not wish to answer it. Perhaps 
 Davie was right in his judgment of Hugh Hinson. 
 
 In this way, so many misunderstandings can arise, 
 so many hearts are made bitter and sad. 
 
 David had to fight hard against that Ketron 
 streak in his own nature. Hour after hour he lay 
 upon the dry earth outside of Guy's cabin, with the 
 soft warm air touching his cheek so lightly and the 
 stars overhead. The dawn broke, a dim line of silver 
 in the east, followed by rose and magenta and gold 
 before he had settled the question with himself. He 
 knew that he \vas in the wrong, that Hugh had been 
 cruelly misjudged, but he hated, O so dreadfully! to 
 confess it and humiliate himself, he the son of Jared 
 Ketron. 
 
 David arose and went quietly into the living-room 
 of Guy's hut. On the table lay Guy's Bible, marked in 
 many places. The soft air was alive with the 
 humming of summer insects. 
 
 David turned to First Samuel and re-read the 
 beautiful story of two friends who had lived hundreds 
 of years before he or Hugh were born. 
 
 "And it came to ptars that the soul of Jonathan 
 was knit with the soul of David and Jonathan loved 
 him as his own soul. And Jonathan and David made 
 a covenant * * * And Jonathan stripped himself of 
 the robe that was upon him and gave it to David and 
 his garment even to his sword and to his bow, and to 
 his girdle * * * And Jonathan said to David. Go 
 in peace, forasmuch as we have sworn both of us in 
 the name of the Lord, saying. The Lord be between 
 me and thee, forever." 
 
 Brighter and brighter grew the light in the east-
 
 124 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 ern sky. Shafts of rose-color shot up into the zenith, 
 heralding the approach of Apollo's chariot, the rising 
 sun. A golden ball appeared above the horizon and 
 the whole earth was flooded with glory. 
 
 David heard a movement near him and there 
 stood Guy. 
 
 "You'll be going to see Hugh this morning, 
 Davie?" 
 
 "As soon as I can get there. Guy, don't you 
 think that it's a good thing for a fellow to stand oil 
 and look at himself as if he was somebody else?" 
 
 Guy nodded. 
 
 "Then," added David, with feeling, "he knows 
 what a snob and fool he is and, sometimes he 
 tries to do better." 
 
 The Chinaman put his head out of the door-way. 
 
 "Breakfast's ready," he called and Guy, putting 
 his arm through David's led the way to a table set 
 in the open air just where one could see the amethys- 
 tine colors of the cliffs of sandstone. 
 
 The bacon frying in an out-of-door stove smelled 
 good. There was coffee, condensed milk, baked beans, 
 brown bread also, and very good it tasted even to 
 Jared Ketron, accustomed to his chef's cooking. 
 
 "I'm going over to nurse Hugh Hinson," an- 
 nounced Ines. 
 
 Her aunt stared. 
 
 "And what shall I do?" she inquired, helplessly. 
 Camping out was not to Aunt Lennie's taste. 
 
 "Stay here and make me happy," suggested Guy. 
 "It isn't half bad when one gets used to it." 
 
 'Aunt Lennie groaned. When Guy and Ines made 
 a conspiracy always a good cause, she confessed 
 there was nothing left for Aunt Lennie but to give in 
 as agreeably as possible. 
 
 "Oh, well, I'll try to get used to it," was her 
 mournful reply.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 125 
 
 Everybody laughed except David. 
 
 "Davie, you and I will have to go on, I suppose," 
 Jared Ketron said. 
 
 "I'm going to help to take care of Hugh," David 
 responded. 
 
 Plainly it was hard for him to speak. As soon as 
 the words had left his lips, he felt an immense relief. 
 The Rubicon was passed ! 
 
 Guy laid a hand on his shoulder and in his eyes 
 was such an understanding look that David knew at 
 once that the artist had not forgotten the talk about 
 Hugh Hinson which they had had in the New York 
 studio. 
 
 "Hugh has called for you," Guy said, quietly. 
 
 Jared Ketron made quick decisions and rarely 
 opposed David. He saw that something serious lay 
 beneath this new resolve. He smiled a. little, thinking 
 that David had wished to remain in this desert place 
 because he desired to be with Ines. That idea pleased 
 him, for he liked the beautiful light-hearted girl who 
 could be so earnest, just as he liked and believed in 
 Guy Guille who lived so close to God that people saw 
 their Father through his words and life. 
 
 "McLaughlin, you and I will go to California 
 and leave these young folks here for two months, if 
 they can stand it that long. Then we'll come back 
 and pick you all up and if the invalid is well enough, 
 we'll make room for him, too." 
 
 A harsh voice broke in now. 
 
 "Mebbee you could make use o' me, too, Mr. Ket- 
 ron. I'm cal'c'latin' to go back to Hillside in ole Ver- 
 mont." 
 
 "It's Snooks," explained Guy Guille. "How is 
 Hugh this morning?" 
 
 Snooks grinned. 
 
 "He's a lot better. Hada letter, postmarked Hill- 
 side, be'n most all over creation 'fore it got here,
 
 126 THAT KKTKON STREAK 
 
 From a girrul, 1 reckon." Snooks openly winked ;it 
 Ines. "lie's been lookin' fer a letter but I 
 guess it wasn't this one, cause he talked 'bout hearin' 
 from Davie." 
 
 "Let's go right away to Hugh," exclaimed David. 
 
 "I'll be ready in five minutes, David," Ines an- 
 swered. 
 
 "Be you the David he's been a-wantin' so bad?" 
 asked Snooks, with a break in his voice. 
 
 But David Ketron could only nod a reply. 
 
 Two months later, Jared Ketron came again in 
 his big car to Guy Guille's cabin. It was October now 
 and the clear, dry air was full of life-giving power. 
 
 "All ready to go to Vermont?" asked Mr. Ket- 
 ron. "I don't call this young man an invalid. Stand 
 up by David, Hugh. A likely pair you are. And Ines 
 looks blooming too. Here's our old friend, Mr. 
 Snooks. 1 guess we can make room for you, too, 
 and if our car breaks down, you'll have to put it to- 
 gether again." 
 
 Aunt Lennie sank down upon the cushions of the 
 well-fitted car with a sigh of relief. 
 
 "I never want to see that place again !" she re- 
 marked positively. 
 
 Guy's eyes twinkled. 
 
 "Why, Aunt Lennie, I'm surprised. Such air. 
 such sunshine, such 
 
 Aunt Lennie silenced him with a stern look. 
 
 Snooks sang as he helped pile in people and rugs 
 and baskets, sang with a full heart and Aunt Lennie 
 echoed the words. 
 
 "Oh, I'm goin' back to ole Vermont, 
 
 Where mince-pies grows on trees. 
 
 I'm goin' to leave this desert place 
 
 Where there ain't nothin' but sand and fleas." 
 
 "Maybe it wasn't fair not to write to Eleanor 
 about Hugh," David confided to Ines as they neared 
 the old homestead some weeks later.
 
 THAT KETRON STREAK 127 
 
 The whole party was coming to Hillside except 
 Aunt Lennie, who being in a considerably battered 
 condition had begged to be taken to her home. 
 Snooks had been invaluable, and Jared Ketron had 
 promised him a good place in one of his factories. 
 
 First, however, he insisted on going home to see 
 J'siah and "Mis' Prentice." Besides, he had a deep 
 curiosity to see Eleanor. Romance was deeply-rooted 
 in Snooks' heart and he adored Ines. 
 
 "After all, home's the best place,'' said Jared. 
 "What do you say, Davie? Shall we get Aleck to 
 give us back the meadow lot? We'll build a house 
 there on the old place." 
 
 "What do you say, Ines?" 
 
 And then David was surprised at his boldness. 
 It was a quer way to ask a girl to share his life and 
 heart, for Jared Ketron was listening and smiling. 
 
 "I like it very much," Ines answered softly. 
 
 ''That much is settled," answered David's father, 
 laying his hand on that of Ines, while David possessed 
 himself of her other hand, "the day that house is 
 finished, Davie, I'll take you in as a partner." 
 
 "And what about Hugh?" he asked. 
 
 "There'll be a place for Hugh, also." 
 
 You know that girls very properly brought up and 
 even girls who have queer stubborn streaks in them 
 will sometimes lose their heads. It wasn't really fair 
 to come upon Eleanor so suddenly, nor for Jared Ket- 
 ron and David and Ines to see her rush to Hugh's 
 arms as if they were her only shelter and hide her 
 face on his shoulder. 
 
 The audience melted away and the two were left 
 alone in the wide hall where a cheerful log sputtered 
 and bunches of autumn leaves stood in oddly-shaped 
 Chinese jars. 
 
 "You never wrote," she murmured, remembering 
 herself and drawing away from Hugh, her face 
 aflame,
 
 128 THAT KETRON STREAK 
 
 "I couldn't till I'd seen Davie and made things 
 right with him, Eleanor." 
 
 "May I come in ?" called David, peeping out of 
 the doorway of the living-room. "Eleanor, I was to 
 blame 
 
 "No, I ought to have stayed long enough to 
 
 "Now, Hugh, let a Ketron eat humble pie for 
 once. I was proud and stubborn 
 
 Guy Guille appeared on the scene, followed by 
 Jared and Aleck Ketron. 
 
 "It's all been the fault of that Ketron streak," 
 went on David, "but it's gone for good now. Things 
 are going to be different. You and Hugh 
 
 "Oh!" said Eleanor, turning away, but stopping 
 when Hugh looked at her. 
 
 "And Ines and I - 
 
 "Oh, Davie!" 
 
 "Are you going to drive out the old curse of our 
 family. Father is going to ask Uncle Aleck to give 
 him the meadow-lot which made so much trouble be- 
 tween them, and we are going to live together in 
 Hillside." 
 
 "What about me?" called a voice from the door- 
 way. 
 
 There stood Grandma Prentice with eyes shining 
 and pink bows sticking out every way from her fine- 
 lace cap. 
 
 In an instant the young folks had her in the 
 midst of the group where she beamed upon them, her 
 heart so full of happiness that she could not speak. 
 
 "Mother," said Jared, solemnly, "the Ketron 
 streak of stubbornness has been all bleached out of 
 the family." 
 
 "It'll never get bleached out o' you, Jared Ket- 
 ron !" was Grandma's quick reply. 
 
 (The End.)
 
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