me some brandy
or whiskey!"

Rand was silent and confused.

"I forgot," she added half bitterly. "I know you have not that commonest
and cheapest of vices."

She lay quite still again. Suddenly she raised herself partly on her
elbow, and in a strong, firm voice, said, "Rand!"

"Yes, Mornie."

"If you are wise and practical, as you assume to be, you will do what I
ask you without a question. If you do it AT ONCE, you may save yourself
and Ruth some trouble, some mortification, and perhaps some remorse and
sorrow. Do you hear me?"

"Yes."

"Go to the nearest doctor, and bring him here with you."

"But YOU!"

Her voice was strong, confident, steady, and patient. "You can safely
leave me until then."

In another moment Rand was plunging down the "slide." But it was past
midnight when he struggled over the last bowlder up the ascent, dragging
the half-exhausted medical wisdom of Brown's Ferry on his arm.

"I've been gone long, doctor," said Rand feverishly, "and she looked SO
death-like when I left. If we should be too late!"

The doctor stopped suddenly, lifted his head, and pricked his ears like
a hound on a peculiar scent. "We ARE too late," he said, with a slight
professional laugh.

Indignant and horrified, Rand turned upon him.

"Listen," said the doctor, lifting his hand.

Rand listened, so intently that he heard the familiar moan of the river
below; but the great stony field lay silent before him. And then, borne
across its bare barren bosom, like its own articulation, came faintly
the feeble wail of a new-born babe.

III.

STORM.

The doctor hurried ahead in the darkness. Rand, who had stopped
paralyzed at the ominous sound, started forward again mechanically; but
as the cry arose again more distinctly, and the full significance of
the doctor's words came to him, he faltered, stopped, and, with cheeks
burning with shame and helpless indignation, sank upon a stone beside
the shaft, and, burying his face in his hands, fairly gave way to a
burst of boyish tears. Yet even then the recollection that he had not
cried since, years ago, his mother's dying hands had joined his and
Ruth's childish fingers together, stung him fiercely, and dried his
tears in angry heat upon his cheeks.

How long he sat there, he remembered not; what he thought, he recalled
not. But the wildest and most extravagant plans and resolves availed him
nothing in the face of this forever desecrated home, and this sham