e better friends. You
see," she went on, smiling frankly, "mother and I are already talking
with you as if we knew you as well as Felix does."

"I hope that you will, and that very soon," he responded, and his
manner reminded her for a fleeting instant of the winning deference,
the slightly ceremonious politeness, of her brother's habitual
demeanor.

"That was just a little like Felix," she thought. "Perhaps he has been
with Felix so much that he has unconsciously caught something of his
manner. Felix has a very pleasing manner, but--I like this man's
better."

"I don't think Mr. Gordon so very unlike Felix," her mother was
saying, "that is, unlike Felix used to be. Naturally, he has changed a
good deal of late years. It's to be expected that a young man will
change as he grows up and enters upon his life's work. But Mr. Gordon
looks more as I used to think Felix would when he grew up, and
something as my husband did when we were married, but still more--"
she paused, searching his countenance with puzzled eyes. He started a
little, as if pulling himself together.

"Now I know," she exclaimed. "Penelope, Mr. Gordon looks like your
Grandfather Brand! If you wore your hair longer, Mr. Gordon, and had
no mustache, you'd look very like an old picture I have of him when he
was young. He was such a good man and I admired and respected him so
much! I used to hope, when Felix was a little boy, that he would grow
up to be like his grandfather."

"He has grown up to be a very able man," Gordon responded gravely. "He
has opened the way toward being a famous one, and he has the capacity
to go far in it. He has much more talent than I."

"Are you an architect, too?" asked Mrs. Brand.

"No, I have not done anything, yet. But it is only now becoming
possible for me to do anything of consequence." His manner and
expression grew suddenly even more earnest and serious. "And there is
so much that I want to do, that needs to be done, so much that urges
one to action, if he feels his responsibility toward others."

Mrs. Brand was looking at him with startled, swimming eyes. "Oh, you
are so like Father Brand!" she exclaimed. "How often have I heard him
speak in just that way! He was rather a stern man, because he wanted
to hold people to a high standard. But he fairly burned to do good in
the world and make it better. I used to hope, when Felix was a little
boy, that he'd have the same kind of spirit when he became a man."

She s