" she explained. "I'm afraid I shall have to let you
return home this week. Unless," she added, "you can get something else
to do."

"I must. I will. To return home now would be to admit defeat. I'll never
do that. And we're all so dreadfully poor. I haven't any right to impose
myself on them, now that I've commenced to earn my own living."

"Perhaps the doctor can suggest another position for you, child," said
Mrs. Kilpatrick.

"Perhaps. Anyway, I must make my own living," declared Martha, with
conviction. "Other girls are doing it; I ought to be able to. I'll go
to New York or Chicago or some other big city, and I'll work at--at
something or other," she concluded, rather lamely.

Mrs. Kilpatrick smiled indulgently at her earnestness.

"That's the proper spirit, my child," she said. "I'm sure something will
turn up."

Martha gazed out through the trees, for at that moment the lumbering old
stage-coach came driving up from the little railroad station at the foot
of the hill, with a part of several carloads of visitors who had come on
the afternoon train from the North. She was still thinking rather
dismally of this sudden change in her future when a bell-boy brought a
card to Mrs. Kilpatrick.

"I forgot to tell you, Martha," broke in the latter, glancing at the
card. "I was expecting a Mr. Clayton from New York. He is a well-known
collector of curios and is coming 'way out here very largely to look at
my collection of scarabs. I feel a little tired now. Won't you see him
for me, Martha, and show him the collection?"

"Of course, Mrs. Kilpatrick."

"Show Mr. Clayton here, please," she said to the boy, "and ask him to
wait." Then, as the boy departed, the invalid turned wearily to Martha:
"Take me to my room now, dear, then you can come back with the scarabs."

George Clayton's thirty-three years sat lightly upon his shoulders,
though a close observer would have noticed that his clean-shaven face
was tanned a trifle more than one would expect, and one might likewise
have expressed surprise to find a slight suggestion of gray around the
edges of his slightly curly hair. The athletic build of his shoulders
and the erect bearing indicated that, while he might not be "the hope of
the white race" from a pugilistic standpoint, he was amply able to take
care of himself in any emergency.

Clayton's visit to the Springs was two-fold. He needed a rest, for in
the course of a law practice which had developed amazingly i