n miserable helplessness.

Dick broke the wretched silence. "Stephanie," he said, "you must take
him home again, and I must go on to the Collinsons--for if he will not
be taken to help, help must be brought to him. I shall be able to take
two or three short cuts, and they will ride or drive back with me, so
it won't be so very long. But oh, my dear, I do hate to leave you!"

Stephanie shook her head. "We are thinking of him now," she said
quietly, and without another word turned Murphy round. With a last
hurried look, Dick plunged rapidly into the bushes at the side of the
trail, and she could hear the rustling of his footsteps growing fainter
in the distance. Then began the weary journey home again.

They had only travelled a short distance from the little clearing, but
to Stephanie it seemed hours before the log-cabin and the field of corn
came into view. And having reached home, she had to face a new
difficulty. She could not, unaided, lift her father from the cart. So
she backed it into a sheltered place among the trees, and brought the
rough chairs and barrels from the log-cabin to support the shafts.
Then she unharnessed Murphy, and led him to his shed, moving as if she
were in some terrible dream.

Returning to the cabin, which already looked deserted and strange, she
ransacked every corner until she found a little of some coarse, crude
spirit in an old bottle. Mixing it with water, she strove to force
some into her father's mouth, but he did not seem able to swallow. So
she began her long helpless vigil beside the cart, knowing that there
was nothing she could do. If only Dick were there! The shadows grew
long and longer, and still the Captain lay motionless in the cart
beneath the great trees; and still Stephanie kept her patient watch
beside him. Only once did her father speak in all those terrible
hours. She had been bending over him adjusting his coverings, when she
found him looking up at her with a brighter, more gentle look than she
had seen upon his face for years. "I thought you were your mother,
little girl," he said faintly, "your hands move as hers did."

"They are not as soft as hers, father," said Stephanie in a broken
voice.

"No," answered the Captain, "they are not as soft, poor brave little
hands. But their touch is as tender, my dear, their touch is as
tender."

After that the silence fell again--a greater, deeper, more divine
silence, though Stephanie did not know it.