bert turned a curve in the road a figure appeared ahead, a figure
that seemed to add the finishing touch to the almost perfect scene--a
girl, her arms full of marigolds, walking along the flower-bordered
pathway.

She wore a pale-green gown, her bronze hair was shaded by a big straw
hat, and she seemed a harmonious part of the gold-and-green picture of
the summer woods.

The young doctor drew up at her side. She was a little pale and
weary-looking from her long, hot walk, and she gladly accepted his
invitation to ride. Jim had needed another man for the haying, she
said, and she was the only one who could be spared to go and seek one;
she was very fortunate to get a ride home.

As Gilbert helped her into his buggy he looked at her wonderingly. Was
she really content with her homely tasks, or could it be possible that
she was making this sacrifice voluntarily?

"Can you be quite content to settle down here in Elmbrook, when you
might be making fame for yourself in a big city?" he asked. "I don't
believe you realize that you might some day move throngs with your
voice."

She smiled, with a tinge of sadness. "Well, you see, I am quite sure
of my work here," she said half playfully, "and one could never be
certain of a steady supply of 'moved throngs.'"

"You could," he cried earnestly. "You are wasting your talents."

She shook her head. "It is better to waste one's talents than
something better."

"What, for instance?"

"One's life."

"How could it be better employed, in your case, than by giving the
world your voice? You need to be more ambitious," he added bluntly.

She turned upon him that steady, scrutinizing glance that, from the
first, had made him conscious of inner unworthiness. Her eyes were
bright, and had lost the tired look; the cool breeze had brought back
the rose-leaf tints to her face, and had blown one bronze curl across
her forehead.

"You ought to hear Uncle Hughie on that subject," she said, with
apparent irrelevance. "He is always 'rastlin'' out some problem for
other people. One cannot live with him and be in doubt of one's duty."

"And he has taught you that it is your duty to remain at home?"

"Perhaps," she said, looking away into the mass of greenery by the
roadside. It was evident that she did not care to pursue the subject.

"Duty is generally the thing a fellow doesn't want to do," he remarked,
by way of making the conversation less personal.

"It's Uncle Hughi