d the windy
sunshine darting among the laurel bushes and brightening the brass on
the harness of the patient horse outside the gate.

"I wonder," Helen said, speaking as if she were not quite awake,
"whether Mr. Pinderwell ever read philosophy."

"No," Zebedee answered in the same tones; "he took to wood-carving."

This time she leapt the abyss unaided and with a laugh.

"But then, he never had a stepmother nodding beside the fire. What is
going to happen to her?"

"She has very little strength."

"But she isn't going to die?"

"Not yet, I think, dear." The word slipped from him, and they both
listened to its echoes.

"I wish you'd go," she whispered.

"I'm going." He did not hesitate at the door or he would have seen her
drop into a chair and let her limp arms slide across the table as she
let out a noisy sob of happiness because his friendliness was still only
a cloak that could sometimes be lifted to show the man beneath.

Almost gaily, she went to Mildred Caniper's room.

"Zebedee stayed a long time today. I could hear you talking."

"Yes."

"Isn't he busy now?"

"He works all day and half the night."

"Oh." Mildred's twisted face regained a semblance of its old expression
and her voice some of its precision. "Then you ought to be looking after
him."

"I can't manage both of you."

"No, but Mrs. Samson could look after me." The words were slovenly
again; the face changed subtly as sand changes under water. It became
soft and indefinite and yielding, betraying the slackening of the mind.

"Mrs. Samson is a nice woman--very kind. She knows what I want. I must
have a good fire. I don't need very much. She doesn't bother me--or
talk. I don't want to be bothered--about anything. I'm still--rather
tired. I like to sit here and be warm. Give me that magazine, Helen.
There's a story--" She found the place and seemed to forget all she had
said.

Helen left the room and, as she sat on the topmost stair, she wished Mr.
Pinderwell would stop and speak to her, but he hurried up and down as he
had always done, intent on his own sad business of seeking what he had
lost. It was strange that he could not see the children who were so
plain to Helen. She turned to speak to them, but she had outgrown them
in these days, and even Jane was puzzled by her grief that Mildred
Caniper wanted to be kept warm, and, with some lingering faculty, wished
Helen to be happy, but needed her no longer.

Helen whispered into