nd throttle him; we'll clean up the Speak
Easies and cut more windows in the cabins. Where did you get the
notion, son, that with more light and air there would be less
damnation?"

"I've lived in the cabins, sir."

"Well, we'll cut all the windows you want and have the school
and"--Markham was quivering--"we'll see if the Morleys can't rise up in
the land of their fathers and stamp the Hertfords under foot!"

"Yes, sir!" And then Sandy gave one of his rare, rich laughs.

From that day the preparations began. A school in the mountains of New
Hampshire was selected, and Sandy fitted out with everything necessary
and proper.

Markham was noted for a sense of propriety. He kept his mills and
lands in good condition because he was wise and sane; he housed his
employees decently for the same reason, and he insisted upon their
cooeperation. He never let his taxes lapse, nor his money lie fallow.
He had, hidden in a drawer of his desk, a valuable diamond ring that he
took out in secret moments to enjoy. Occasionally the jewels were sent
to Boston and put on the wheel because the artistic soul of Levi
Markham demanded that through no carelessness of his should their
lustre become dimmed. For much the same reasons Sandy Morley was
entered upon his career in a manner befitting the hope that was in
Markham for him.

The day Sandy was sent from Bretherton, Olive Treadwell and her adopted
son, Lansing Treadwell, sailed for a year's stay in Europe, and Levi
and Matilda Markham grimly agreed to leave things as they were.

"There's no use stirring up pudding past a certain point," Matilda
said. "If you do it's apt to go heavy."

"And it's the part of wisdom to watch a rising batch of bread," Levi
returned humorously. "When you can't get pudding--or when the pudding
fails--look to bread and make the best of it!"

CHAPTER X

Cynthia Walden came slowly up the trail leading to the old gray house.
Since the day of the flood which bore old Ivy forever from sight, she
had confronted so many strange conditions that her eyes had the
haunted, frightened expression common to the mountain people. The
curse of the hills seemed to have settled upon her. She often said to
herself, "poor whites," in order that the significance might be fully
understood. Old Ivy had said that the cows were all that stood between
them and the fate of others who had, through misfortune, accepted the
title despised by the quality.

Well, s