path running
among pleasant trees down by the river. Presently he caught a glimpse
of a cottage in a little open space, its brown shingled walls almost
smothered in a riot of sweet peas.

"That's our house. Don't you like it?" said the boy, who had already
forgotten his injury.

"I think it is splendid." And Grant, taking his young charge from his
shoulder, stepped up on to the porch and knocked at the screen door.

In a moment it was opened by Zen Transley.

CHAPTER XVII

Sitting on his veranda that evening while the sun dropped low over the
mountains and the sound of horses munching contentedly came up from the
stables, Grant for the twentieth time turned over in his mind the events
of a day that was to stand out as an epochal one in his career. The
meeting with the little boy and the quick friendship and confidence
which had been formed between them; the mishap, and the trip to the
house by the river--these were logical and easily followed. But why, of
all the houses in the world, should it have been Zen Transley's house?
Why, of all the little boys in the world, should this have been the son
of his rival and the only girl he had ever--the girl he had loved most
in all his life? Surely events are ordered to some purpose; surely
everything is not mere haphazard chance! The fatalism of the trenches
forbade any other conclusion; and if this was so, why had he been thrown
into the orbit of Zen Transley? He had not sought her; he had not dreamt
of her once in all that morning while her child was winding innocent
tendrils of affection about his heart. And yet--how the boy had gripped
him! Could it be that in some way he was a small incarnation of the Zen
of the Y.D., with all her clamorous passion expressed now in childish
love and hero-worship? Had some intelligence above his own guided him
into this environment, deliberately inviting him to defy conventions
and blaze a path of broader freedom for himself, and for her? These were
questions he wrestled with as the shadows crept down the mountain slopes
and along the valley at his feet.

For neither Zen nor himself had connived at the situation which had
made them, of all the people in the world, near neighbors in this silent
valley. Her surprise on meeting him at the door had been as genuine as
his. When she had made sure that the boy was not seriously hurt she had
turned to him, and instinctively he had known that there are some things
which all the weight o