seem to be staying here now. Staying and waiting for
something. Nobody really lives at "Eden" without little Jerry
to keep us all alive and keyed up. Nobody to take the big car
over the bluff road, beautiful as it is--for you know I'm too
big a coward to drive it and to do a hundred things I'd do if
you were here to brace me up.

Write me at once, little cousin, and say you will come home
just as soon as you have seen all of that God-forsaken country
you care to look at. And meantime I'll write as often as you
want me to. I think of you every day and remember you in my
prayers every night. You remember I told you I couldn't pray
out in Kansas. May the Lord be good to you and make you love
Him more than you think you do now, and bring you safe and soon
to our beautiful "Eden."

Yours,

EUGENE.

The sands of the blowout on Jerry's claim seared not more hotly her
fresh young hopes of prosperity, through her own effort and control,
than this sudden change from the artist, with his dreams of beauty and
power, to the man of easy clerical duty with a good salary and small
responsibility. Of course Aunt Jerry had been back of it all, but so
would Aunt Jerry have been back of her--if she had given up.

Jerry sat for a long time staring at the missive where it had fallen on
the floor, the typewritten neatness of the blue lettering only a blur to
her eyes. For she was back at "Eden," on the steep but beautiful bluff
road, with Eugene afraid to drive the big Darby car. She was in the
rose-arbor looking up to see that faint line of indecision in the dear,
handsome face. She was in the "Eden" parlor under the soft light of
rose-tinted lamps, facing Aunt Jerry and sure of herself, but catching
again that wavering line of uncertainty on Eugene Wellington's
countenance, and her own vague fear--unguessed then--that he might not
resist in the supreme test.

But idols die hard. Eugene was her idol. He couldn't die at once. He was
so handsome, so true, so gracious, so filled with a love of beautiful
things. How could she understand the temptation to the soul of an artist
in such lovely settings as "Eden" offered? It was all Aunt Jerry's
fault, and he would overcome it. He must.

It was so easy to blame Aunt Jerry. It made everything clear. He had
yielded to her cleverness and never known he was being ruled. With all
her flippant, careless youth, inexperience