had so often done before. For Deborah, too, was a pioneer. She, too,
had lived in the wilderness. Clearing roads through jungles? Yes. And
freeing slaves of ignorance and building a nation of new men. And now she
was doggedly fighting to save what she had builded--not from the raids of
the Indians but from the ravages of this war which was sweeping
civilization aside. With her school behind her, so to speak, she stood
facing this great enemy with stern and angry, steady eyes. Her pioneer
grandmother come to life.

So, with the deep craving which was a part of his inmost self, Roger tried
to bind together what was old and what was new. But his thoughts grew vague
and drifting. He realized how weary he was, and said good-night and went to
bed. There, just before he fell asleep, again he had a feeling of relief at
the knowledge that one at least in the family was to be rich this year.
With a guilty sensation he shook off the thought, and within a few moments
after that his harsh regular breathing was heard in the room.

CHAPTER XXVI

It was only a few days later that Edith arrived with her children.

Roger met her at the train at eight o'clock in the evening. The fast
mountain express of the summer had been taken off some time before, so
Edith had had to be up at dawn and to change cars several times on the
trip. "She'll be worn out," he thought as he waited. The train was late. As
he walked about the new station, that monstrous sparkling hive of travel
with its huge halls and passageways, its little village of shops
underground and its bewildering levels for trains, he remembered the
interest Bruce had shown in watching this immense puzzle worked out, the
day and night labor year after year without the stopping of a train, this
mighty symbol of the times, of all the glorious power and speed in an age
that had been as the breath to his nostrils. How Bruce had loved the city!
As Roger paced slowly back and forth with his hands clasped behind his
back, there came over his heavy visage a look of affection and regret which
made even New Yorkers glance at him as they went nervously bustling by.
From time to time he smiled to himself. "The Catskills will be Central
Park! All this city needs is speed!"

But suddenly he remembered that Bruce had always been here before to meet
his wife and children, and that Edith on her approaching train must be
dreading her arrival. And when at last the train rolled in, and he spied