Spring was in the very act of birth when Lewis found himself once more
in the old carryall threading the River Road. This time he sat beside
Old William, and the horses plodded along slowly, tamed by the slack
reins lying neglected on their backs. Old William was not driving. His
hands, loosely holding the lines, lay on his knees. Down his pink cheeks
and into his white beard crawled tears from his wide blue eyes.
"Glen dead! Little Glen Leighton dead!" he said aloud from time to time,
and Lewis knew himself forgotten. He forgave the old man for the sake of
the picture he conjured--a picture of that other boyhood when "little
Glen Leighton" and the wood-cutter had hunted and fished and roamed
these crowding hills together.
The next day was one of pouring showers. Twice Lewis left the house,
only to be turned back by the rain. He was not afraid of getting wet,
but he was afraid of having to talk to Natalie indoors. He could not
remember ever having talked to her hemmed in by four walls.
But on the morrow he awoke to clean-washed skies and a fuzzy pale-green
carpet that spread across the fields and rose in bumps and mounds over
trees and budding shrubs. He left the homestead early, and struck out
for Aunt Jed's. As he approached the house, a strange diffidence fell
upon him. He was afraid to go in. For an hour he sat on the top rail of
a fence and watched.
At last Natalie came out. She started to walk toward him, but presently
turned to the right. Lewis followed her. At first she walked fast, but
soon she began to pause beside some burst of green or tempting downy
mass of pussy-willow, as though she were in two minds whether to fill
her arms and rush back, carrying spring into the house or to go on. She
went on slowly until she reached the barrier of rails that closed the
entrance to Leighton's land of dreams. Here Lewis came up with her.
"Nat," he said, "shall I help you over?"
Natalie whirled round at the sound of his voice. Just for a second there
was fright in her eyes; then color mounted swiftly into her pale cheeks,
and her lips opened to speak, but she said nothing. There was something
in Lewis's face that stopped her--a look of age and of hunger. She
wanted to ask him why he had come back, but her heart was beating so
fast that she dared not trust her voice.
Lewis was frightened, too. He was frightened lest he should find the
strange woman when he needed just the oldest pal he had in the world.
"Nat," he blurted out, "dad is dead."
When a man thinks he is being clumsy and tactless with a woman, he is
generally making a master stroke. At Lewis's words, so simple, so
child-like, the conscious flush died from Natalie's cheeks, her heart
steadied down, and her eyes filled with the sudden tears of sympathy.
"Dead, Lew? Your dad dead?"
She put her arms around him and kissed him softly; then she drew him to
a low rock. They sat down side by side.
"Tell Natalie," she said.
Lewis could never remember that hour with Natalie except as a whole.
Between the bursting of a dam and the moment when the pent-up waters
stretch to their utmost level and peace there is no division of time. He
knew only that it was like that with him. He had come in oppression, he
had found peace.
Then he looked up into Natalie's speaking face and knew that he had
found more. He had found again his old pal. "A pal is one who can't do
wrong who can't go wrong, who can't grow wrong." Who had said that?
H lne--H lne, who, never having seen Natalie save with the inner
vision, knew her for a friend. To Folly his body had cried, "Let us stay
young together!" To Natalie his blood, his body, and his soul were ready
to cry out, "Let us grow old together!"
Natalie had not followed the turn of his emotion. She broke in upon his
thought and brought him back.
"I never talked to your dad, but--we knew each other, we liked each
other."
Lewis started.
"That's funny," he said.
"Is it?" said Natalie. "I suppose it sounds odd, but--"
"No," interrupted Lewis, "that's not what I mean. It's odd because
H lne said just the same thing about you. She said you were great
friends--that women didn't have to know each other to be friends."
"They don't have to know men to be friends, either," said Natalie,
"unless--"
"Unless what?"
"Unless they love them. If they love them, they've got to know them
through and through to be friends. Love twists a woman's vision. Lots of
women are ruined because they can't wait to see through and through."
"Why, Nat," said Lewis, "you're talking like dad. Dad never
talks--talked--without turning on the light."
"Doesn't he?" said Natalie.
Lewis nodded.
"There are people that think of dad as a bad man. He has told me so. But
he wasn't bad to me or to H lne or Nelton or Old William, and we're the
ones that knew him best."
For a time they were silent, then Natalie said: "Lew, you're older than
you ever were before. Is it just losing your dad?"
Lewis shook his head.
"No," he said, "it wasn't that. I finished growing up just after I got
back to London. I'm not the only thing that has grown. My work--sometime
I'll show you my work before and after. I wish I could have shown it to
dad,--I wish I could have told him that I've said good-by to Folly."
"Good-by to Folly?" cried Natalie, with a leap of the heart. Then her
heart sank back. "You mean you've said good-by to foolishness, to
childish things?"
"Both," said Lewis. "Folly Delaires and childish things."
"Why?" asked Natalie, shortly.
"Because," said Lewis, "it was given me to see her through and through."
"And now?" breathed Natalie, drawing slightly away from him lest he hear
the thumping of her heart.
Lewis turned his head and looked at her. The flush was back in her
cheeks, her eyes were wide and staring far away, her moist lips were
half open, and her bosom rose and fell in the long, halting swell of
tremulous breath.
There is a beauty that transcends the fixed bounds of flesh, that leaps
to the eye of love when all the world is blind. The flower that opens
slowly, the face grown dear through half of life, needs no tenure in
memory. It lives. Tears can not dim its beauty nor age destroy its
grace, for the vision is part of him who sees.
The vision came to Lewis. His arms trembled to grip Natalie, to outrage
her trust, and seize too lightly the promise of the years.
"Now, Nat?" he said hoarsely. He raised his hands slowly, took off her
hat, and tossed it aside. Then with trembling fingers he let down her
hair. It tumbled about her shoulders in a gold and copper glory of light
and shade. Natalie did not stir. Lewis caught up a handful of her hair
and held it against his cheek. "Now," he said, "I stay here. Since long
before the day you said that you and I would sail together to the
biggest island you've held my hand, and I've held yours. Sometimes I've
forgotten, but--but I've never really let go. I'll not let go now. I'll
cling to you, walk beside you, live with you, hand in hand, until the
day you know me through and through.
"And then?" whispered Natalie.
"Then I'll love you," said Lewis, gravely. "For me you hold all the
seven worlds of women. I've--I've been walking with my back to the
light."
Natalie laughed--the soft laughter with which women choke back tears.
She put up her hands and drew Lewis's head against her breast.
THE END
JOHN FOX, JR'S.
STORIES OF THE KENTUCKY MOUNTAINS
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset and Dunlap's list.+
* * * * *
THE TRAIL OF THE LONESOME PINE. Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.
[Illustration]
The "lonesome pine" from which the story takes its name was a tall tree
that stood in solitary splendor on a mountain top. The fame of the pine
lured a young engineer through Kentucky to catch the trail, and when he
finally climbed to its shelter he found not only the pine but the
_footprints of a girl_. And the girl proved to be lovely, piquant, and
the trail of these girlish foot-prints led the young engineer a madder
chase than "the trail of the lonesome pine."
THE LITTLE SHEPHERD OF KINGDOM COME Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.
This is a story of Kentucky, in a settlement known as "Kingdom Come." It
is a life rude, semi-barbarous; but natural and honest, from which often
springs the flower of civilization.
"Chad." the "little shepherd" did not know who he was nor whence he
came--he had just wandered from door to door since early childhood,
seeking shelter with kindly mountaineers who gladly fathered and
mothered this waif about whom there was such a mystery--a charming waif,
by the way, who could play the banjo better that anyone else in the
mountains.
A KNIGHT OF THE CUMBERLAND. Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.
The scenes are laid along the waters of the Cumberland, the lair of
moonshiner and feudsman. The knight is a moonshiner's son, and the
heroine a beautiful girl perversely christened "The Blight." Two
impetuous young Southerners' fall under the spell of "The Blight's"
charms and she learns what a large part jealousy and pistols have in the
love making of the mountaineers.
Included in this volume is "Hell fer-Sartain" and other stories, some of
Mr. Fox's most entertaining Cumberland valley narratives.
* * * * *
_Ask for complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction_
GROSSET & DUNLAP, 526 WEST 26th ST., NEW YORK
* * * * *
THE NOVELS OF WINSTON CHURCHILL
THE INSIDE OF THE CUP. Illustrated by Howard Giles.
The Reverend John Hodder is called to a fashionable church in a
middle-western city. He knows little of modern problems and in his
theology is as orthodox as the rich men who control his church could
desire. But the facts of modern life are thrust upon him; an awakening
follows and in the end he works out a solution.
A FAR COUNTRY. Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.
This novel is concerned with big problems of the day. As _The Inside of
the Cup_ gets down to the essentials in its discussion of religion, so
_A Far Country_ deals in a story that is intense and dramatic, with
other vital issues confronting the twentieth century.
A MODERN CHRONICLE. Illustrated by J. H. Gardner Soper.
This, Mr. Churchill's first great presentation of the Eternal Feminine,
is throughout a profound study of a fascinating young American woman. It
is frankly a modern love story.
MR. CREWE'S CAREER. Illus. by A. I. Keller and Kinneys.
A new England state is under the political domination of a railway and
Mr, Crewe, a millionaire, seizes a moment when the cause of the people
is being espoused by an ardent young attorney, to further his own
interest in a political way. The daughter of the railway president plays
no small part in the situation.
THE CROSSING. Illustrated by S. Adamson and L. Baylis.
Describing the battle of Fort Moultrie, the blazing of the Kentucky
wilderness, the expedition of Clark and his handful of followers in
Illinois, the beginning of civilization along the Ohio and Mississippi,
and the treasonable schemes against Washington.
CONISTON. Illustrated by Florence Scovel Shinn.
A deft blending of love and politics. A New Englander is the hero, a
crude man who rose to political prominence by his own powers, and then
surrendered all for the love of a woman.
THE CELEBRITY. An episode.
An inimitable bit of comedy describing an interchange of personalities
between a celebrated author and a bicycle salesman. It is the purest,
keenest fun--and is American to the core.
THE CRISIS. Illustrated with scenes from the Photo-Play.
A book that presents the great crisis in our national life with splendid
power and with a sympathy, a sincerity, and a patriotism that are
inspiring.
RICHARD CARVEL. Illustrated by Malcolm Frazer.
An historical novel which gives a real and vivid picture of Colonial
times, and is good, clean, spirited reading in all its phases and
interesting throughout.
* * * * *
GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
* * * * *
ZANE GREY'S NOVELS
May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list
* * * * *
THE LIGHT OF WESTERN STARS Colored frontispiece by W. Herbert Dunton.
Most of the action of this story takes place near the turbulent Mexican
border of the present day. A New York society girl buys a ranch which
becomes the center of frontier warfare. Her loyal cowboys defend her
property from bandits, and her superintendent rescues her when she is
captured by them. A surprising climax brings the story to a delightful
close.
DESERT GOLD Illustrated by Douglas Duer.
Another fascinating story of the Mexican border. Two men, lost in the
desert, discover gold when, overcome by weakness, they can go no
farther. The rest of the story describes the recent uprising along the
border, and ends with the finding of the gold which the two prospectors
had willed to the girl who is the story's heroine.
RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE Illustrated by Douglas Duer.
A picturesque romance of Utah of some forty years ago when Mormon
authority ruled. In the persecution of Jane Withersteen, a rich ranch
owner, we are permitted to see the methods employed by the invisible
hand of the Mormon Church to break her will.
THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN Illustrated with photograph reproductions.
This is the record of a trip which the author took with Buffalo Jones,
known as the preserver of the American bison, across the Arizona desert
and of a hunt in "that wonderful country of yellow crags, deep canons
and giant pines." It is a fascinating story.
THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT Jacket in color. Frontispiece.
This big human drama is played in the Painted Desert. A lovely girl, who
has been reared among Mormons, learns to love a young New Englander. The
Mormon religion, however, demands that the girl shall become the second
wife of one of the Mormons--Well, that's the problem of this
sensational, big selling story.
BETTY ZANE Illustrated by Louis F. Grant.
This story tells of the bravery and heroism of Betty, the beautiful
young sister of old Colonel Zane, one of the bravest pioneers. Life
along the frontier, attacks by Indians, Betty's heroic defense of the
beleaguered garrison at Wheeling, the burning of the Fort, and Betty's
final race for life, make up this never-to-be-forgotten story.
* * * * *
GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
* * * * *
JACK LONDON'S NOVELS
May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
* * * * *
JOHN BARLEYCORN. Illustrated by H. T. Dunn.
This remarkable book is a record of the author's own amazing
experiences. This big, brawny world rover, who has been acquainted with
alcohol from boyhood, comes out boldly against John Barleycorn. It is a
string of exciting adventures, yet it forcefully conveys an unforgetable
idea and makes a typical Jack London book.
THE VALLEY OF THE MOON. Frontispiece by George Harper.
The story opens in the city slums where Billy Roberts, teamster and
ex-prize fighter, and Saxon Brown, laundry worker, meet and love and
marry. They tramp from one end of California to the other, and in the
Valley of the Moon find the farm paradise that is to be their salvation.
BURNING DAYLIGHT. Four illustrations.
The story of an adventurer who went to Alaska and laid the foundations
of his fortune before the gold hunters arrived. Bringing his fortunes to
the States he is cheated out of it by a crowd of money kings, and
recovers it only at the muzzle of his gun. He then starts out as a
merciless exploiter on his own account. Finally he takes to drinking and
becomes a picture of degeneration. About this time he falls in love with
his stenographer and wins her heart but not her hand and then--but read
the story!
A SON OF THE SUN. Illustrated by A. O. Fischer and C. W. Ashley.
David Grief was once a light-haired, blue-eyed youth Who came from
England to the South Seas in search of adventure. Tanned like a native
and as lithe as a tiger, he became a real son of the sun. The life
appealed to him and he remained and became very wealthy.
THE CALL OF THE WILD. Illustrations by Philip R. Goodwin and Charles
Livingston Bull. Decorations by Charles E. Hooper.
A book of dog adventures as exciting as any man's exploits could be.
Here is excitement to stir the blood and here is picturesque color to
transport the reader to primitive scenes.
THE SEA WOLF. Illustrated by W. J. Aylward.
Told by a man whom Fate suddenly swings from his fastidious life into
the power of the brutal captain of a sealing schooner. A novel of
adventure warmed by a beautiful love episode that every reader will hail
with delight.
WHITE FANG. Illustrated by Charles Livingston Bull.
"White Fang" is part dog, part wolf and all brute, living in the frozen
north; he gradually comes under the spell of man's companionship, and
surrenders all at the last in a fight with a bull dog. Thereafter he is
man's loving slave.
* * * * *
GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
* * * * *
End of Project Gutenberg's Through stained glass, by George Agnew Chamberlain