warmed, and the homelikeness of the place appealed to him as it never had
before. To her other gifts, which were many and diverse, Miss Van Brock
added that of home-making; and the aftermath of battle is apt to be an
acute longing for peace and quiet, for domesticity and creature comforts.

He had not seen Portia since the night when she had armed him for the
final struggle with the enemy; he told himself that he should not see her
again until the battle was fought and won. But in no part of the struggle
had he been suffered to lose sight of his obligation to her. He had seen
the chain lengthen link by link, and now the time was come for the welding
of it into a shackle to bind. He did not try to deceive himself, nor did
he allow the glamour of false sentiment to blind him. With an undying love
for Elinor Brentwood in his heart, he knew well what was before him. None
the less, Portia should have her just due.

She was waiting for him when he entered the comfortable library.

"I knew you would come to-night," she said cheerfully. "I gave you a day
to drive the nail--and, O David! you have driven it well!--another day to
clinch it, and a third to recover from the effects. Have you fully
recovered?"

"I hope so. I took the day for it, at all events," he laughed. "I am just
out of bed, as you might say."

"I can imagine how it took it out of you," she assented. "Not so much the
work, but the anxiety. Night before last, after Mr. Loring went away, I
sat it out with the telephone, nagging poor Mr. Hildreth for news until I
know he wanted to murder me."

"How much did you get of it?" he asked.

"He told me all he dared--or perhaps it was all he knew--and it made me
feel miserably helpless. The little I could get from the _Argus_ office
was enough to prove that all your plans had been changed at the last
moment."

"They were," he admitted; and he began at the beginning and filled in the
details for her.

She heard him through without comment other than a kindling of the brown
eyes at the climaxes of daring; but at the end she gave him praise
unstinted.

"You have played the man, David, as I knew you would if you could be once
fully aroused. I've had faith in you from the very first."

"It has been more than faith, Portia," he asserted soberly. "You have
taken me up and carried me when I could neither run nor walk. Do you
suppose I am so besotted as not to realize that you have been the head,
while I have been only