career he had mapped out
for himself. Jessie would have looked out of place, he feared, in
Helen's elegant home.

But when he returned, and met the Glenoro girl coming down the northern
hill, her nut-brown curls dancing in the wind, her cheeks crimson from
its caress, her eyes as clear and radiant as the river which flashed
before her, he was forced to admit that Jessie was as perfectly in
accord with her surroundings as Helen had been in the flower-scented
drawing-room. He was bewildered. Was it possible, he asked himself,
for a man to have two natures, quite distinct in tastes? He worried
himself almost to distraction over the question; but as there was no
one to answer it, he drove it from his mind by spending the evening at
the Hamiltons' teaching Jessie to play chess.

And so the autumn passed very merrily for the minister of Glenoro,
disturbed only by occasional doubts as to his course, until, with the
opening of winter, came the Christmas holidays and Donald Neil. Duncan
Polite's heart grew happy again under his boy's sunny presence.
Donald's deep regret at the disappointment he was causing his best
friend made him assiduous in his attentions to Duncan. He spent so
much of his time at the old shanty on the hill that the old man's cares
were for the time forgotten.

Unfortunately, Donald's advent brought anything but peace in other
quarters. John Egerton asked himself with keen self-reproach if it
were possible that he was jealous of the young man. He could not help
resenting Donald's cool manner of appropriating Jessie's time and
attention. The young minister was not accustomed to being set aside in
that lordly fashion. He felt it was high time that this haughty youth,
who had behaved so ill to him ever since his arrival in Glenoro, was
taught a lesson. He would show him that John Egerton was to be shoved
aside by no man. So he steadily continued his visits to the
Hamiltons', and abated not one whit his attentions to their pretty
daughter.

Those were exciting days for Glenoro. Coonie was kept so busy
manufacturing and spreading tales of the rivals, that he quite
neglected Miss Cotton, and sometimes even forgot to linger on the road.
Jessie, herself, seemed to enjoy the excitement as much as anyone.
Perfectly secure in the knowledge that Donald loved her, and equally
sure of her love for him, she felt there could be no harm in having "a
little fun." She was carried away by the flattery, and to