or the improvident and
incorrigible Hooker. But it gave a wonderful sincerity and happiness
to his slumbers that night, which the wiser and elder Peyton might have
envied, and I wot not was in the long run as correct and sagacious as
Peyton's sleepless cogitations. And in the early morning Mr. Clarence
Brant, the young capitalist, sat down to his traveling-desk and wrote
two clear-headed, logical, and practical business letters,--one to his
banker, and the other to his former guardian, Don Juan Robinson, as
his first step in a resolve that was, nevertheless, perhaps as wildly
quixotic and enthusiastic as any dream his boyish and unselfish heart
had ever indulged.

At breakfast, in the charmed freedom of the domestic circle, Clarence
forgot Susy's capricious commands of yesterday, and began to address
himself to her in his old earnest fashion, until he was warned by
a significant knitting of the young lady's brows and monosyllabic
responses. But in his youthful loyalty to Mrs. Peyton, he was more
pained to notice Susy's occasional unconscious indifference to her
adopted mother's affectionate expression, and a more conscious disregard
of her wishes. So uneasy did he become, in his sensitive concern for
Mrs. Peyton's half-concealed mortification, that he gladly accepted
Peyton's offer to go with him to visit the farm and corral. As the
afternoon approached, with another twinge of self-reproach, he was
obliged to invent some excuse to decline certain hospitable plans
of Mrs. Peyton's for his entertainment, and at half past three stole
somewhat guiltily, with his horse, from the stables. But he had to pass
before the outer wall of the garden and grille, through which he had
seen Mary the day before. Raising his eyes mechanically, he was startled
to see Mrs. Peyton standing behind the grating, with her abstracted gaze
fixed upon the wind-tossed, level grain beyond her. She smiled as she
saw him, but there were traces of tears in her proud, handsome eyes.

"You are going to ride?" she said pleasantly.

"Y-e-es," stammered the shamefaced Clarence.

She glanced at him wistfully.

"You are right. The girls have gone away by themselves. Mr. Peyton has
ridden over to Santa Inez on this dreadful land business, and I suppose
you'd have found him a dull riding companion. It is rather stupid here.
I quite envy you, Mr. Brant, your horse and your freedom."

"But, Mrs. Peyton," broke in Clarence, impulsively, "you have a horse--I