dale, since he
went. He was a poor, inarticulate fellow, but I've learned to realize
that he had a wide vision."

"Thank you, Dr. McPherson, but I have often wished him back."

Once outside McPherson's house, Truedale raised his head and sniffed the
clear, winter air with keen enjoyment. A sense of achievement possessed
him; the joy of feeling he had solved a knotty problem. He found he
could think of Pine Cone--and, yes, of Nella-Rose--without a hurting
smart. He was going to do something for her--for her people! He was
going to make life easier--happier--for them, so he prayed in his
silent, wordless way. He had a new and strange impulse to go to Lynda
and tell her that at last he was released from any hold of the past. He
was going to do what he could and there was no longer any dragging of
the anchors. He wanted her to help him--to work out some questions from
the woman's point of view. So he hurried on and entered the house with a
light, boyish step.

Thomas, bent but stately, was laying the table in the cheerful dining
room. There were flowers in a deep green bowl, pale golden asters.

Long afterward Truedale recalled everything as if it had been burned in
his mind.

"Is Miss Lynda in?" he asked, for they all clung to the titles of the
old days.

"Not yet, Mister Con. She went out in a deal of a hurry long about
three o'clock. She didn't say a word--and that's agin her pleasant
fashion--so I took it that she had business that fretted her. She's been
in the workshop all day." Thomas put the plates in place. They were
white china, with delicate gold edges. "Hum! hum! Mister Con, your uncle
used to say, when he felt talkative, that Miss Lynda ought to have some
one to hold her back when she took to running."

"I'll look her up, Thomas!"

Conning went up to the workshop and turned on the electricity. A
desolate sensation overcame the exhilaration of the afternoon. Lynda
seemed strangely, ominously distant--as if she had gone upon a long,
long journey.

There was a dying fire on the hearth and the room was in order except
for the wide table upon which still lay the work Lynda had been engaged
with before she left the house.

Truedale sat down before it and gradually became absorbed, while not
really taking in the meaning of what he saw. He had often studied and
appreciated Lynda's original way of solving her problems. It was not
enough for her to place upon paper the designs her trained talent
evolved; sh