don't seem as if that was hardly necessary, does it?"

"But I shall talk about it. When Father came home that night he
couldn't talk of anything else. He called it the prize puzzle of
the century. You had given him four hundred dollars of your own
money and pretended it was his and that you had--had stolen it,
Jed. He burst out laughing when he told me that and so did I. The
idea of your stealing anything! You!"

Jed smiled, feebly.

"'Twas silly enough, I give in," he admitted. "You see," he added,
in an apologetic drawl, "nine-tenths of this town think I'm a prize
idiot and sometimes I feel it's my duty to live up--or down--to my
reputation. This was one of the times, that's all. I'm awful glad
Sam got his own money back, though."

"The money didn't amount to anything. But what you did was the
wonderful thing. For now I understand why you did it. You
thought--you thought Charlie had taken it to--to pay that horrid
man in Middleford. That is what you thought and you--"

Jed broke in. "Don't! Don't put me in mind of it, Maud," he
begged. "I'm so ashamed I don't know what to do. You see--you
see, Charlie had said how much he needed about that much money and--
and so, bein' a--a woodenhead, I naturally--"

"Oh, don't! Please don't! It was wonderful of you, Jed. You not
only gave up your own money, but you were willing to sacrifice your
good name; to have Father, your best friend, think you a thief.
And you did it all to save Charlie from exposure. How could you,
Jed?"

Jed didn't answer. He did not appear to have heard her. He was
gazing steadily out into the yard.

"How could you, Jed?" repeated Maud. "It was wonderful! I can't
understand. I--"

She stopped at the beginning of the sentence. She was standing
beside the little writing-table and the drawer was open. She
looked down and there, in that drawer, she saw the framed
photograph of Ruth Armstrong. She remembered that Jed had been
sitting at that desk and gazing down into that drawer when she
entered the room. She looked at him now. He was standing by the
window peering out into the yard. Ruth had come from the back door
of the little Winslow house and was standing on the step looking up
the road, evidently waiting for Barbara to come from school. And
Jed was watching her. Maud saw the look upon his face--and she
understood.

A few moments later she and Ruth met. Maud had tried to avoid that
meeting by leaving Jed's