in
spite of countless rumors put forth by the bears, has crept steadily
upward. Most of it is in the hands of conservative investors who know
its value, and some day those who sold it so freely for five and six
will be bidding fifteen and twenty for it. It is a safe purchase now on
any weak spot, and good for ten points more."

And Winn, fresh from the spell of Mona's eyes and the tender mood of
that afternoon, felt that he had reached a turning-point in his life
and that independence and the end of his suspense were in sight. Go to
the city he must, and at once, that was certain, and perhaps a small
fortune was almost within his grasp! The thought made his pulses leap.
All his life long he had been hardly more than a cipher, a poorly paid
menial, and now possible freedom and escape from serfdom was near. Then
another impulse came, which was a natural sequence of the others. He had
never, since boyhood days, felt that he had a home. His aunt's was but a
free boarding place, and irksome at that; the city and its ways were not
congenial to him--even the thought of going there now was obnoxious; and
as this realization grew, there came to him, much like the sound of
church bells, the sincerity, the honest friendship, the simple truth of
those people he had for three months lived among. And into this
appreciation also entered--Mona.

Like all men, he aspired to some wealth and the protection it means; and
now, when a little of it seemed within his grasp, there followed a
nobler impulse, and that the home-building one. Then when he thought of
the city once more, with its social hypocrisy, its vain display of
wealth, its cold, heartless life, where none seemed ready to extend a
hand to him, he felt more than ever it never was and never could be a
home for him. And then in sharp contrast to one city product, Ethel
Sherman, came a thought of the girl who that morning had decked the cave
with ferns and flowers, that it might seem more worthy of him. And now
herself and her life passed in review. He saw her at home, patient with
her mother's whims, helping when and where she could; at church bowing
in reverence to the simple devotions and joining in the singing; and in
the wild gorge where she hid herself away to practice. This last touch
of romance seemed to affect him more than all else, and as he thought of
those eyes, into which no shadow of falsehood ever entered, and how all
that was beautiful in nature, from the roses tha