dull color flooding her
sallow skin, "for a man to turn his back on greed and gain and devote his
life to altruism----"

"Now, now," said the boarding-house keeper, pacifically, "you've no call
to take me up like that. Land knows I set a great store by Mr. Daragh, if
he is Irish as the pigs. Never had a human being under my roof that was
easier to suit and made less fuss, but he's _queer_ and I'd say it on my
dying bed!"

The other woman stood looking down at Jane Vail's pretty letter which
managed, in spite of the plain, creamy envelope and the many alien hands
through which it had passed, to retain a startling individuality, and she
spoke in the little smothered voice which was her proclamation of intense
feeling. "If--_she_--with the life she leads--has--has disturbed Mr.
Daragh----"

"Now, then, you look here," said the Vermont villager with sudden
sharpness, "I guess her life is about as important as anybody else's I
might name! I guess if Mr. Daragh's 'disturbed,' as you call it, it's no
worse for him than it's been for others. My land, Jane Vail could of had
her choice of the town, where she comes from. There's _four_ wanted her,
to my certain knowledge, and they say Martin Wetherby (Wetherby Ridge is
named for his family--they go back to Revolutionary days) never _will_
get over it. And I guess that Mr. Harrison that rolls up here in taxis
and limousines is sitting up and taking notice, sure's gun's iron! And
if Mr. Michael Daragh----"

"Sh ..." said Emma Ellis.

The big Irishman came into the room, graver even than usual, but his eyes
lighted warmly at sight of the missive at his place. He nodded to the
watching women, tore it open and read it swiftly, and as he read the
gladness spread and deepened in his face.

"_I_ had a letter from Jane, too," said Mrs. Hills, seating herself.
"Going to Maine for some special work she's got to do."

"Yes," said Michael Daragh. "Special work, indeed." He folded the letter
and put it back in his pocket, and the table filled up with the other
members of the household, the music students and the school teachers and
the elderly concert-going ladies in their staid silks ... all the sound
and sensible persons whom the missing boarder made so drab and colorless
by her glowing presence. He smiled sunnily at Emma Ellis and was
astonished to see tears in her light eyes, but he was used to tears and
woes and secret sorrows, so he smiled again and more convincingly and
went stu