t in the garden to feed the chickens. She had watched him from
behind the lilac bush, and when he had finally gone away she had followed
him some distance until he turned into the old corduroy road and was lost
in the gathering dusk. The man she had seen before, and had reason to
suspect. It was not for nothing that she had braved her grandmother and
gone hunting wild strawberries out of season.

With the caution of a creature of the forest Miranda opened the door an
inch further, and applied her eye to the latch hole again. The man's head
was in full range of her eye then, and her suspicion proved true.

When Marcia entered the big room and the heavy oak door closed behind her
her heart seemed almost choking her, but she tried with all her might to
be calm. She was to know the worst now.

On the other side of the room in a large arm-chair, with his feet extended
on another and covered by a travelling shawl, reclined a man. Marcia went
toward him eagerly, and then stopped:

"Mr. Temple!" There was horror, fear, reproach in the way she spoke it.

"I know you are astonished, Mrs. Spafford, that the messenger should be
one so unworthy, and let me say at the beginning that I am more thankful
than I can express that your letter of forgiveness reached me before I was
obliged to start on my sorrowful commission. I beg you will sit down and
be as comfortable as you can while I explain further. Pardon my not
rising. I have met with a bad sprain caused by falling from my horse on
the way, and was barely able to reach this stopping place. My ankle is
swollen so badly that I cannot step upon my foot."

Marcia, with white face, moved to the chair he indicated near him, and sat
down. The one thought his speech had conveyed to her had come through
those words "my sorrowful commission." She felt the need of sitting down,
for her limbs would no longer bear her up, and she felt she must
immediately know what was the matter.

"Mrs. Spafford, may I ask you once more to speak your forgiveness? Before
I begin to tell you what I have come for, I long to hear you say the words
'I forgive you.' Will you give me your hand and say them?"

"Mr. Temple, I beg you will tell me what is the matter. Do not think any
further about that other matter. I meant what I said in the note. Tell me
quick! Is my husband--has anything happened to Mr. Spafford? Is he ill? Is
he hurt?"

"My poor child! How can I bear to tell you? It seems terrible to put you