I saw Bennington this
morning and he had heard from the men over Todd Stewart's way. Dust the
piano, polish up the chandelier, and decorate with--smiles," he added, as
he saw the shadow on his wife's face.

"I'll have the maid put the reception room in order," Virginia replied,
with an attempt at merriment.

Then through the long afternoon she fought to a finish with the yearning
for the things she missed daily. At supper time, however, she was the same
cheery woman who had laughed at loss and lack so often that she wondered
sometimes if abundance might not really make her sad.

In the evening the men sat on the ground about the door of the Sunflower
Inn. Their wives had not come with them. One woman was sick at home;
little Todd Stewart was at the beginning of a fever, and the other women
were taking turns at nursing. Virginia's turn had been the night before.
She was weary now and she sat in the doorway listening to the men, and
remembering how on just such a moonlit September night she and Asher had
sat together under the Sign of the Sunflower and planned a future of
wealth and comfort.

"The case is desperate," Cyrus Bennington was saying. "Sickness and
starvation and the horses failing every day and the need for all the
plowing and getting winter fuel. Something must be done."

Others agreed, citing additional needs no less pressing.

"There are supplies and money coming from the East right now," Jim Shirley
declared. "A hunting party crossed south two days ago. I was down on lower
Plum Creek searching for firewood, and I met them. They said we might get
help from Wykerton if we went up right away."

"Well, you are Mr. Swift, Jim," one of the men exclaimed. "If you knew it
two days ago, why in thunder didn't you report. We'd have made a wooden
horse gallop to Wykerton before night."

"How'd I round up the neighborhood? I didn't get home till nearly noon
today. And, besides, they said Darley Champers has the distributing of the
supplies and money, and he's putting it where it will do the most good,
not giving to everybody alike, he says."

A sudden blankness fell upon each face, as each recalled the last words of
Champers when he left them on the Sabbath day in August.

"Well, you said a wooden horse could have galloped up to Wykerton." Jim
Shirley tried to speak cheerfully. "A horse of iron might, too, but who's
got a critter in Grass River Valley right now that could make a trip like
that? Mine couldn'