, while he lives I shall not desert him. As for your
apprehensions"--she smiled tolerantly and whimsically--"though
flattering to me, they are quite unnecessary, and I beg you rid your
mind of them. I am--that which I am; yet I am more than I appear to be
to some and I shall not wantonly or wilfully hurt you--or yours."

The Laird of Tyee took in both of his the slim hand that rested so
lightly on his sleeve--that dainty left hand with the long, delicate
fingers and no wedding ring.

"My dear child," he murmured, "I feel more than I dare express.
Good-by and may God bless you and be good to you, for I fear the world
will not." He bowed with old-fashioned courtesy over her hand and
departed; yet such was his knowledge of life that now his soul was
more deeply troubled than it had been since his unintentional
eavesdropping on his manager's garrulous wife.

"What a woman!" he reflected. "Brains, imagination, dignity, womanly
pride, courage, beauty and--yes; I agree with Donald. Neither maid,
wife nor widow is she--yet she is not, never has been, and never will
be a woman without virtue. Ah, Donald, my son, she's a bonny lass! For
all her fall, she's not a common woman and my son is not a common
man--I wonder--Oh, 'tis lies, lies, lies, and she's heard them and
knows they're lies. Ah, my son, my son, with the hot blood of youth in
you--you've a man's head and heart and a will of your own--Aye, she's
sweet--that she is--I wonder!"

X

At the front of Caleb Brent's little house there was a bench upon
which the old man was wont to sit on sunny days--usually in the
morning, before the brisk, cool nor'west trade-wind commenced to blow.
Following Hector McKaye's departure, Nan sought this bench until she
had sufficiently mastered her emotions to conceal from her father
evidence of a distress more pronounced than usual; as she sat there,
she revolved the situation in her mind, scanning every aspect of it,
weighing carefully every possibility.

In common with the majority of human kind, Nan considered herself
entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and now, at a
period when, in the ordinary course of events, all three of these
necessary concomitants of successful existence (for, to her, life
meant something more than mere living) should have been hers in
bounteous measure, despite the handicap under which she had been born,
she faced a future so barren that sometimes the distant boom of the
breakers