table before him, laid the will upon it ready for
the signing.

Hiram took a pen; Torrey went to the door and brought in the two clerks
waiting in the hall. The three men stood watching while Hiram's eyes
slowly read each word of the will. He dipped the pen and, with a hand
that trembled in spite of all his obvious efforts to steady it, wrote his
name on the line to which Torrey silently pointed. The clerks signed as
witnesses.

"Thank you," said Hiram. "You had better take it with you, judge."

"Very well," said Torrey, tears in his eyes, a quaver in his voice.

A few seconds and Hiram was alone staring down at the surface of the
table, where he could still see and read the will. His conscience told
him he had "put his house in order"; but he felt as if he had set fire to
it with his family locked within, and was watching it and them burn to
ashes, was hearing their death cries and their curses upon him.

* * * * *

The two young people, chilled by Mrs. Whitney's manner, flawless though
it was, apparently, had watched with sinking hearts the disappearance of
her glittering chariot and her glistening steeds. Then they had gone into
the garden before Torrey and the clerks arrived. And they sat there
thinking each his own kind of melancholy thoughts.

"What did she mean by that remark about Doctor Hargrave?" asked Arthur,
after some minutes of this heavy silence.

"I don't know," said Adelaide.

"We must get mother to go at father," Arthur continued.

Adelaide made no answer.

Arthur looked at her irritably. "What are you thinking about, Del?"
he demanded.

"I don't like Mrs. Whitney. Do you?"

"Oh, she's a good enough imitation of the real thing," said Arthur. "You
can't expect a lady in the first generation."

Adelaide's color slowly mounted. "You don't mean that," said she.

He frowned and retorted angrily: "There's a great deal of truth that
we don't like. Why do you always get mad at me for saying what we
both think?"

"I admit it's foolish and wrong of me," said she; "but I can't help it.
And if I get half-angry with you, I get wholly angry with myself for
being contemptible enough to think those things. Don't you get angry at
yourself for thinking them?"

Arthur laughed mirthlessly--an admission.

"We and father can't both be right," she pursued. "I suppose we're both
partly right and partly wrong--that's usually the way it is. But I can't
make up my mind just w