lawn-mower was purring briskly and as though no sentence of death had
been passed upon the master of the place. In this Haney saw the world's
action typified. The individual is of little value--the race alone
counts.

He shuffled down to meet the carriage at the gate, and Lucius helped him
in before Bertha could reach him, and they drove off down the street so
exactly in their usual way that Bertha was moved to say: "I don't
believe it! I can't realize we're quitting this town to-morrow."

"No more can I, but I reckon it's good-bye all the same--for me, anyhow.
I despise meself for asking ye to go, darlin'--I _don't_ ask it. Stay
you! I'm not demanding anything at all. 'Tis fitter for me to go alone.
Stay on, darlin'--'twill comfort me to lave ye safe and happy here."

She shook her head with quite as much determination as he. "No, Mart, my
mind is made up--I know my job, and I'm going to muckle to it like a
little lady, so don't fuss."

The air was beautifully clear and bracing, and a minute later Haney
remarked, sadly: "I reckon the doctor knows his trade, but 'tis bitter
nonsense to me when a man says the murky wind of the low country is
better for a sick man than this."

She was very tender at heart as she replied: "I'm afraid he's right,
Mart. I could see you weren't so well here; but I was selfish--I tried
to argue different. You'll be better down below, that's dead certain."

"Well, the bets are all laid and the wheel spinning. I'm ready to take
me exile--but I hate to drag ye down with me."

"Don't worry about me," she answered, with intent to reassure him. "To
be honest, I kind o' like the East."

At the door of Ben's office building she got out, leaving him in the
carriage. As she looked back at him from the doorway something which
seemed like anguish in his face moved her, and she returned to the wheel
to say, "Never mind, Mart, we'll buy a new home down there."

He was struggling as if with the pangs of death, but he said, "'Tis
childish, I know, but I hate to say good-bye to it all."

She patted his hand as if soothing a child, and, turning, mounted the
stairway. How weak and old he seemed at the moment!

Fordyce was at work. She could hear his typewriter click laboriously (he
was his own typist as yet), and she stood for a moment in the hall with
hand pressed hard upon her bosom, the full significance of this last
visit overwhelming her. Here was the end of her own happiness--the
beginning of