experience
no other sensation than that of curiosity in listening to the will. Her
interest in the affairs of Templeton Thorpe ended with the signing of the
ante-nuptial contract, supplemented of course by the event which
satisfactorily terminated the agreement inside of a twelve-month. But
Anne, practically alone in the world as she now found herself to be, was
suddenly aware of a great sense of depression. She wanted her mother. She
wanted some one near who would not look at her with scornful, bitter eyes.

George's presence is to be quickly explained. He had spent the better part
of the week with Anne, sleeping in the house at her behest. For a week she
had braved it out alone. Then came the sudden surrender to dread, terror,
loneliness. The shadows in the halls were grim; the sounds in the night
were sinister, the stillness that followed them creepy; the servants were
things that stalked her, and she was afraid--mortally afraid in this home
that was not hers. She had made up her mind to go away for a long time
just as soon as everything was settled.

As for the furnace-man, Judge Hollenback had summoned him on his arrival
at the house. So readily had Wade adapted himself to his new duties that
he now felt extremely uncomfortable and ill-at-ease in a room that had
been like home to him for thirty years. He seemed to feel that this was no
place for the furnace-man, notwithstanding the scouring and polishing
process that temporarily had restored him to a more exalted office,--for
once more he was the smug, impeccable valet.

Braden was the last to arrive. He timed his arrival so that there could be
no possibility of an informal encounter with Anne. She came forward and
shook hands with him, simply, unaffectedly.

"You have been away," she said, looking straight into his eyes. He was
conscious of a feeling of relief. He had been living in some dread of what
he might detect in her eyes. But it was a serene, frank expression that he
found in them, not a question.

"Yes," he said. "I was tired," he added after a moment.

She hesitated. Then: "I have not seen you, Braden, since--since the twenty-
first. You have not given me the opportunity to tell you that I know you
did all that any one could possibly do for Mr. Thorpe. Thank you for
undertaking the impossible. I am sorry--oh, so sorry,--that you were made to
suffer. I want you to remember too that it was with my sanction that you
made the hopeless effort."

He tur