them had
been conscious of his presence.

"Well, Parsons?"

"Mr. Billy, sir, has come back, sir. He and Mr. Fitzpatrick came
together. Shall I bring them out here or wheel you inside, sir?"

"Inside!" Burgeman senior almost shouted it. Then he turned to Patsy
and there was more than mere curiosity in his voice: "Who are you?"

"No one at all, just; a laggard by the roadside," she repeated,
wistfully. And then she added in her own Donegal: "But don't ye let
the lagging count for naught. Promise me that!"

The sick man turned his head for a last look at her. "Such a simple
promise--to throw away the fruits of a lifetime!" Bitterness was in
his voice again, but Patsy caught the muttering under his breath. "I
might think about the boy, though, if the Lord granted me time."

"Amen!" whispered Patsy.

She scrambled down the bank the way she had come. For a moment she
stopped by the lake and skimmed a handful of white pebbles across its
mirrored surface. She watched the ripples she had made spread and
spread until they lost themselves in the lake itself, leaving behind
no mark where they had been.

"Yonder's the way with the going and coming of most of us, a little
ripple and naught else--unless it is one more stone at the bottom."
She heaved a sigh. "Well, the quest is over, and I've never laid eyes
on the lad once. But it's ended well, I'm thinking; aye, it's ended
right for him."

XV

ARDEN

Summer must have made one day in June purposely as a setting
for a pastoral comedy; and chance stole it, like a kindly knave,
and gave it to the Sylvan Players. Never did a gathering of people
look down from the rise of a natural amphitheater upon a fairer scene;
a Forest of Arden, built by the greatest scenic artist since the
world began. Birds flew about the trees and sang--whenever the
orchestra permitted; a rabbit or two scuttled out from under
rhododendron-bushes and skipped in shy ingenue fashion across the
stage; while overhead a blue, windless sky spread radiance about
players and audience alike.

Shorn of so much of the theatricalism of ordinary stage performances,
there was reality and charm about this that warmed the spectators
into frequent bursts of spontaneous enthusiasm which were as draughts
of elixir to the players. Those who were playing creditably played
well; those who were playing well excelled themselves, and Patsy
outplayed them all.

She lived every minute of the three hours that spann