he intended to get
one with the first money he earned after he came out of college, but she
had hoped in her heart they would go out of fashion by that time and
there would be something less fiendish-looking to take their place. They
always looked to her as if they were headed straight for destruction,
and the person on them seemed as if he were going to the devil and
didn't care. She secretly hated the idea of Stephen ever sitting upon
one of them, flying through space. But now he was gone beyond all such
fears. He had wings, and there were no dangers where he was. All danger
and fear was over for him. She had never wanted either of her men to
know the inward quakings of her soul over each new risk as Stephen began
to grow up. She wanted to be worthy to be the mother and wife of
noblemen, and fears were not for such; so she hid them and struggled
against them in secret.

The motor-cycle came on like a comet now, and turned thundering in at
the big gate. A sudden alarm filled Mother Marshall's soul. Had
something happened to Father? That was the only terrible thing left in
life to happen now. An accident! And this boy had come to prepare her
for the worst? She had the kitchen door wide open even before the boy
had stopped his machine and set it on its mysterious feet.

"Sp'c'l d'liv'ry!" fizzed the boy, handing her a fat envelope, a book,
and the stub of a pencil. "Si'n'eer!" indicating a line on the book.

She managed to write her name in cramped characters, but her hand was
trembling so she could hardly form the letters. A wild idea that perhaps
they had discovered somehow that Stephen had escaped death in some
miraculous manner flitted through her brain and out again, controlled by
her strong common sense. Such notions always came to people after death
had taken their loved ones--frenzied hopes for miracles! Stephen had
been dead for four months now. There could be no such possibility, of
course.

Just to calm herself she went and opened the slide of the range and
shoved the tea-kettle a little farther on so it would begin to boil,
before she opened that fat letter. She lit the lamp, too, put it on the
supper-table, and changed the position of the bread-plate, covering it
nicely with a fringed napkin so the bread wouldn't get dry. Everything
must be ready when Father got back. Then she went and sat down with her
gold spectacles and tore open that envelope.

She was so absorbed in the letter that she failed for t