ge where he might be
matched against Otto Brand. He grew melodramatic in his imaginings, and
saw himself at a fire, fighting the flames to reach Mazie, while Otto
Brand shrank back. He stood in the path of runaway horses, and Otto
showed the white feather. He nursed her through the plague, and Otto
fled fearfully from the disease.

And then having reached the end of impossibilities, he stood up and
shook himself.

"I'm a fool," he said to the flames, shortly, and went to bed, to lie
awake, wondering whether Mazie Wetherell had reached that chapter of his
book where he had written of love, deeply, reverently, with a
foreknowledge of what it might mean to him some day. It was that chapter
which had assured the success of his novel. Would it move her, as it had
moved him when he reread it? That was what love ought to be--a thing
fine, tender, touching the stars! That was what love might be to him, to
Mazie Wetherell, what it could never be to Otto Brand.

At breakfast the next morning he found Mrs. Brand worrying about her
waitress.

"I guess she couldn't get back, and I've got a big day's work."

"I'll go and look her up," Van Alen offered; but he found that he was
not to go alone, for Otto was waiting for him at the gate.

"I ain't got nothin' else to do," the boy said; "everything is held up
by the rain."

It was when they came to the little stream that Van Alen had forded the
night before that they saw Mazie Wetherell.

"I can't get across," she called from the other side.

The bridge, which had been covered when Van Alen passed, was now washed
away, and the foaming brown waters overflowed the banks.

"I'll carry you over," Otto called, and straightway he waded through the
stream, and the water came above his high boots to his hips.

He lifted her in his strong arms and brought her back, with her bright
hair fluttering against his lips, and Van Alen, raging impotently, stood
and watched him.

It seemed to him that Otto's air was almost insultingly triumphant as he
set the girl on her feet and smiled down at her. And as she smiled back,
Van Alen turned on his heel and left them.

Presently he heard her running after him lightly over the sodden ground.

And when she reached his side she said: "Your book was wonderful."

"But he carried you over the stream."

Her eyes flashed a question, then blazed. "There, you've come back to
it," she said. "What makes you?"

"Because I wanted to carry you myself."