She had been an only daughter who since her teens had nursed invalid
parents until death had claimed them and left her mistress of the
homestead where she now lived. There had, it is true, been a boy; but in
his early youth he had shaken the New Hampshire dust from off his feet
and gone West, from which Utopia he had for a time sent home to his sister
occasional and peculiarly inappropriate gifts of Mexican saddles,
sombreros, leggings, and Indian blankets. He had received but scant
gratitude, however, for these well-intentioned offerings. It had always
been against the traditions of the Websters to spend money freely and
Ellen, a Webster to the core, resented his lack of prudence; furthermore
the articles were useless and cluttered up the house. Possibly the more
open-handed Thomas understood the implied rebuke in the meager thanks
awarded him and was hurt by it; at any rate, he ceased sending home
presents, and by and by Ellen lost trace of him altogether. Years of
silence, unbroken by tidings of any sort, followed. Ellen had almost
forgotten she had a brother when one day a letter arrived announcing his
death.

The event brought to the sister no grief, for years ago Thomas had passed
out of her life. Nevertheless the message left behind it an aftermath of
grim realizations that stirred her to contemplate the future from quite a
new angle. She had never before considered herself old. Now she suddenly
paused and reflected upon her seventy-five years and the uncertainty of
the stretch of days before her.

Through the window she could see her prosperous lands, her garden upon the
southern slope of the hill where warm sun kissed into life its lushly
growing things; her pasture pierced by jagged rocks, and cattle-trampled
stretches of rough turf; her wood lot where straight young pines and oak
saplings lifted their reaching crests toward the sky; her orchard, the
index of her progenitor's foresight. All these had belonged to the
Websters for six generations, and she could not picture them the property
of any one bearing another name; nor could she endure the thought of the
wall being sometime rebuilt by an outsider.

What was to be the fate of her possessions after she was gone? Suppose a
stranger purchased the estate. Or, worse than all, suppose that after she
was dead Martin Howe was to buy it in. The Howes had always wanted more
land.

Imagine Martin Howe plowing up the rich loam of her fields, invading with
his