m not one of the nagging kind. I don't intend to rub it in, but
I'll own it, once and for all. Go on, please. What else?"

Judge Trent waved his hands. "Nothing else, practically."

"Why, there must be a lot more to tell. If _I'd_ been the one to go up
there I should have a thousand things to tell you."

The lawyer raised one devout glance toward the ceiling. "I'm sure of
it, Martha; but you know the limitations of a mere man. Beside, I
suppose pretty soon now you will be seeing for yourself. Miss Derwent
said she should go early this season."

"Why, yes. Next week. I just received the letter to-day. It comes as a
surprise, and I shall have to hurry, getting ready to close my house.
Edna hadn't expected to be free so quickly, but her parents' plans have
changed, and so hers can. She's been up at the farm, too, and seen
Sylvia, you know."

"Yes. We all know Sylvia now," returned the judge with grim humor.

"Oh, I wish you would tell me more," begged Miss Martha. "Did she treat
you decently before you came away?"

"Oh, yes. You know Thinkright's peculiar notions. His hell-fire is
right here or nowhere, and he's been teaching Sylvia how to keep her
toes out of the flames,--how to climb up out of these lowlands of
sorrow. She was pretty well stranded after years of vagabond life.
Excuse me, Martha, but we all knew Sam; and after our rebuff she was in
a fit state to swallow Thinkright's cheerful theories whole. I don't
claim much knowledge of what I can't see or touch, but it wouldn't
surprise me if the Power that Is let us sidetrack ourselves on purpose
to put Sylvia in Thinkright's care. I shouldn't have known how to
handle the results of Sam's training, and if you'd had the job I
suspect you'd have begun at the outside and tried to teach the girl
habits of order and all that. Thinkright and I sat up late one night
talking the matter over. Sylvia would have driven you to drink, and you
would have driven her to join a traveling circus."

"Calvin!" interrupted Miss Martha, gasping. "I'm a white ribbon"--

"You are, Martha, without a spot or stain; but it wouldn't have been
any use to try to veneer Sylvia, as it were. Now these remarks are not
opprobrious. They are designed to comfort you for the apparent mistakes
of the trip to Hotel Frisbie. Things have come out better than we could
have arranged them. Sylvia's guardian angel was holding Thinkright in
the background, like a trump card, as you might say"--

"No, I