Classic Audiobook Collection - A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed ~ Full Audiobook [romance]

Episode Date: November 29, 2023

A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed audiobook. Genre: romance In this tender Edwardian romance, Judith Sylvester has grown up in the hushed comforts of a large house shaped by illness, duty, and the quiet authority of her wealthy invalid aunt. When Judith becomes engaged to the ambitious Dr. Carter Keith, she believes she is stepping at last into an ordinary, radiant future. But after she introduces Carter to Margery Gordon, a young woman from another guarded household, small shifts in attention become unmistakable, and Judith finds herself watching love turn into something stranger and less certain. Refusing to bargain for affection, Judith retreats into solitude and into an idea that has haunted her since childhood: the picture of a perfect lover, modeled on the devoted man who once wrote exquisite letters to her aunt. Those letters, full of tenderness and restraint, become Judith's private standard for what love should be - and a clue to a hidden connection between the families around her. As friendships deepen and other hearts move toward their own difficult choices, Judith must decide whether dreams are a refuge from life, or the very threads that can remake it. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 01 (00:21:37) Chapter 02 (00:40:52) Chapter 03 (00:59:30) Chapter 04 (01:18:39) Chapter 05 (01:37:59) Chapter 06 (01:57:29) Chapter 07 (02:20:04) Chapter 08 (02:38:14) Chapter 09 (02:57:19) Chapter 10 (03:16:45) Chapter 11 (03:38:50) Chapter 12 (03:59:11) Chapter 13 (04:18:46) Chapter 14 (04:39:16) Chapter 15 (04:58:46) Chapter 16 (05:17:40) Chapter 17 (05:39:07) Chapter 18 (06:00:04) Chapter 19 (06:20:16) Chapter 20 (06:39:56) Chapter 21 (06:58:37) Chapter 22 (07:17:32) Chapter 23 (07:38:02) Chapter 24 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. 1. Rose leaves The road was hot and dusty, but nevertheless it allured. Beginning in the hopeless ugliness of a small town's main street, it turned a corner at the post office and wandered forth lazily at its own capricious will. It widened for a moment at a group of overhanging willows, as though to rest in the fragrant shade, paused where the little stream crooned in the grass, went beside it for a time, then crossed it upon a wooden bridge, and climbed upward toward the

cool green hills. In its nature the road was opposed to things that hurried. To the care-free foot of the traveller who had plenty of time, it yielded a gentle acceptance and even gave some sort of sympathetic response. A swift step was annoying. A dog that ran would find himself very thirsty by the time he reached the brook, a horse and cart would stir up definite resentment, and the daring motor car that intruded upon the road with discordant wheezes would be swiftly mantled and choked by revengeful dust.

Turning aside from the general direction of traffic, the road narrowed as it approached solitude. Dust gave way to firm brown earth, and ferns grew thickly upon both sides of it, where in the spring, clusters of violets turned eyes of heavenly blue toward shining skies. Wild roses ran riot among the ferns,

spending prodigly of their divine incense when the pink and white censors swung in the passing breeze. The merest rills of water murmured along the road, children of deep pools in the hills answering the call of another pied piper that eventually would lure them to the sea. A flock of sheep grazed upon the upland pastures just below the pines,

kept within bounds by a rail fence that straggled half-heartedly across the hill at a perilous slant. A cloud overhung the hill, luminous in the sun. An argosy of silver upon celestial seas of turquoise, cleared for a port unknown.

Where the road paused at the willows, a girl stopped too. She was warm, breathless, and impatient of her burden. Under one arm was a fat, wriggling puppy, and in that same hand, she tried to hold a white linen parasol

over her head. The other arm clasped a loaf of bread which kept slipping out of the paper, and in the other hand was what remained of a blue pitcher full of cream. Spots and streaks down the front of her pink gingham gown bore eloquent testimony as to what had happened since she left the post-office.

The morning mail, tied in securely into a bundle, dangled from the ribs of her open parasol and occasionally rumbled her hair. Carefully she set down the cream, laid the bread beside it, and, having at last a free hand for the purpose, administered a resounding slap to the puppy. You little beast, said Marjorie as the open parasol fell into the road.

What do you suppose ever possessed me to take you? The puppy whined forgivingly in answer and made a lunge toward the cream. You shan't? Marjorie continued sternly. You're not traveling with a dining car. You'll wait till we get home, if we ever do. Hunger and thirst incarnate were struggling helplessly in her strong young arms. "'We'll sit down,' she went on determinedly, "'and talk things over a bit.

"'Just because I took you away from a crowd of boys "'who were abusing you is no sign that I intend to keep you. "'You're an abominable little beast, and I don't want you.' "'The puppy lifted pained brown eyes to Marjorie's flushed face, "'wined and licked her hand. "'I don't doubt you mean well,' she said, "'wiping her hand upon her stained gown. "'But you'll have to behave yourself

"'if you have the faintest desire to live with me.' hadn't i enough to carry with the mail and the bread and the cream eliza wants for tonight's dessert without taking you home too i had it all very carefully planned parasol in right hand mail and bread under right arm pitcher of cream in left hand skirts to drag in the dust unhindered and see what you've done too foolish to follow too little to walk very far even if you wanted to no rope to lead you with and possessed by a mad longing for cream How would you get it anyway? I'd have to break the picture before I could get you out, if you ever got your head into it. I wonder you haven't done it before now. I can't leave you here because you wouldn't be here when I got back.

I can't leave anything else here for the same reason, and besides, it's too far to come. A meadowlark circled through the blue spaces above the road and showered golden notes down upon Marjorie as he flew. A bumblebee, his little bit of a little bit. His wings dusty with pollen, crossed the road in search of a wild rose with the honey still lying at its heart. A cricket fiddled cheerily in the grass, and an impertinent yellow butterfly alighted

upon the edge of the cream pitcher. Go on, said Marjorie resignedly. Get into it if you want to. Do you care for butterflies in your cream, Algernon? She continued to the squirming puppy. I think I'll name you Algernan, because I hate it worse than any name I know. If I only had a rope or anything to make a rope of, or a bag, or anything I could make a bag of, might tie you up in my petticoat, I suppose. You'd tear the lace, and you'd be uncomfortable,

and you'd howl, but you'd come, Algernon. Oh, yes, you'd come. Of course, it isn't nice for a girl to walk along the highways in broad daylight without a petticoat, but you don't care about that. You don't care about anything but cream. Great goodness, there's an automobile. Scrambling to her feet, Marjorie rescued her parasol from the path of the approaching monster, took the cream pitcher and the bread and stepped back behind the willows. The car purred past in a cloud of dust which choked her and made even algern and sniff a little. Come on, she said grimly.

We'll resume our joyous journey. A readjustment made things easier. She closed the parasol with the mail inside of it. tucked it under her left arm with the bread, took the cream pitcher in her left hand, and clasping Algernan firmly with her right arm, started toward home. But where the road divided,

she hesitated and was lost. She should have taken the path that led along the riverbank, but like the road itself, she longed for the cool hills. A clump of overhanging elder, starry with sweet blossoms, offered a safe hiding place for whatever she might choose to leave. She stooped, concealed a part of her awkward load, and with only the parasol and puppy, followed the road that beckoned her upward, where the

sheep grazed and the pines breathed spicy fragrances afar. Youth and the joy of living sang in her blood. The world was as one of the golden apples at Atalanta's feet. Her annoyance was swiftly forgotten in the radiance of a morning that had not yet lost the first freshness, though it was almost noon. The stained gown was no longer among the things that mattered, and the squirming Algernon took on as by magic, beauty, charm, and desirability. You are a dear, she whispered, hugging him closer, and you're my little doggy for keeps, so you are. I won't give you away, and horrid boys shan't tease you, and you shall have three blue pictures full of cream every day, and a cushion to sleep on,

and perhaps even a little house all of your own. Want to walk? Clumsily, Algernan followed in the wake of the adorable being in pink, who had rescued him from the cruel boys and who still smelled deliciously of cream. He continually fell down, but she never stopped to pick him up even though he whined. It was all he could do to keep pace with the small feet that were always just ahead of him, no matter how bravely he strove onward. The white parasol flourished fantastically, striking him in the eye once when he happened to be near. On they went up the hill. The road was but the merest path now. Sometimes it lost itself for a moment in a group of trees, but always it emerged safely on the other side. A thousand enticing sense of bird and beast came to Algernon as he struggled along the trail, but he dared not stop.

Presently they reached the fence and Marjorie paused, leaning upon it to rest. Algernon having the habit of motion firmly fixed upon him, went straight on through the bars until he observed that he had nothing to follow. Then he sat down to rest. A very tired little dog with a scarlet tongue hanging out, panting for breath. You can walk now, Marjorie remarked, scornfully, and follow as though you had been trained to it.

Why couldn't you have done it when I had my arms full without you? Now that I have only a parasol, you're ready and willing to walk. Alginon wagged his tail politely, lay down in the soft grass, and went to sleep. Far across the valley the river crept sleepily toward the ultimate sea. It rose in a tiny lake, hidden among the hills, and before long, merged itself with another lake, bordered by lily pads and surrounded by a marsh. Marjorie could not see the source of the stream, but the deep pool of sapphire, surrounded by misty green,

sent gleaming arrows of impalpable silver even up to the pines. High noon blazed in the zenith. The sheep grazed peacefully upon the hillside. Algernan, with the weariness of the ages upon him, was still sound asleep. She called to him, but he did not answer. Then she leaned through the bars to poke him with her parasol, but he was out of reach. Little beast, she said to herself, I suppose I'll have to climb the fence.

She was unused to fences, most of her life having been spent in cities, but she got over, awkwardly enough, gathered up the sleeping puppy. and dumped him unceremoniously upon the proper side of the fence. The next thing, she resumed to herself, is to get back. I suppose it's easier to say than it is to do. Most things are. She climbed to the top, jumped, and caught her skirts on the projecting end of the highest rail. Her feet were on the ground, but she was held fast, unable even to turn.

Desperately she tried to wrench herself free, to tear her gown, to climb out of it, anything. But it buttoned down the back, was made of firm and excellent material, and as far as her efforts were concerned, she was fastened to the fence permanently. She laughed hysterically, then the tears came. It was impossible that she should be hung to a rail fence upon a hill. Ridiculous, she breathed. Absurd, preposterous. Her parasol, leaning against the fence was barely within her reach. She got it. tried to lift her skirts from the rail by poking it back through the bars, and failed. She leaned back against the fence with all her might, but accomplished nothing.

An hour or more passed. She wept, raged vainly against Algernon, who still slept peacefully at her feet, though fortunately beyond her angry reach, and eagerly watched the road below for some sign of life. No one went by. Down under the elder bush the bread was drying up and the cream was probably sour, There was no one to look for her or become alarmed about her before dark. Even though she should wave her parasol frantically, anyone who saw it might not interpret it as a signal of distress. The shadows lengthened. Her feet were numb and her back ached wretchedly. Alginon yawned, stretched

himself, and came humbly to Marjorie, wagging his insignificant tail. "'Don't you dare speak to me,' she whispered hoarsely. "'You beast, you brute, you animal, you abominable!' She choked back a sob, and Algernon, after the manner of his wild ancestors making beds for themselves in the long grass, turned around several times, yawned capaciously, stretched himself again, and closed his eyes. Far down upon the road was a gleam of crimson. Marjorie started forward, her mouth dry, and her body trembling. It was—' No, it couldn't be. Yes, it was a parasol.

A jaunty red parasol bobbing along serenely on that same dusty road. Marjorie screamed, but only succeeded in frightening Algernon. A white gown showed itself below the parasol now. She called again, not a harsh help, full of consonants that refused to carry, but a shrill sweet, Hello! With the final vowel long drawn out. The parasol hesitated, then stopped.

Marjorie put all her remaining strength into one last cry then waved her own parasol. The woman below did not move. She waved again but could not call. Algernan, deeply stirred by the adjacent emotion, scampered about madly, and in trepidation and excitement, produced his first bark.

Oh, breathed Marjorie tremulously. Thank heaven. The red parasol had turned where the road divided and was on its way toward her. shaking violently. She leaned against the fence and waited. The woman in white came quickly, with a long, free stride that suggested boyishness subtly transmuted into femininity.

Mist obscured Marjorie's vision. She looked up, her blue eyes swimming into a serene and tender face. "'Poor child,' said a deep voice exquisitely modulated. "'Lean back as far as you can. I'll have to help you out of your gown.' The strong, hands were already busy with buttons and hooks. Now then, stoop a little, turn this arm. So, now this. Wait a minute. Do you mind if I tear your petticoat? Here, lean on me.

Pale and almost disrobed, but free at last, Marjorie sank into a pathetic little heap at the foot of the fence. I didn't have to tear it, the lovely voice was saying, let me help you into your clothes again, then you can sit down and rest. How long have you? you been here? All day, I guess, sobbed Marjorie. No, I haven't either. It must have been about noon. It's only half-past two now, said the older woman, but it must have seemed ages. Cry if you want to, it'll do you good. Put your head on my shoulder, so. I'm Judas Sylvester. Everyone who wants to cry comes to me to do it. I'm Marjorie Gordon, returned the rescued one with a laugh that was half a sob.

I've come to spend the summer with Mr. Chandler. He was a friend of my father's. Yes, said Judas softly. I heard you were coming. Father died, continued Marjorie, choking on the words, just a month ago. He told me to come here. He said Mr. Chandler would teach me to live.

He will. He's taught me. I suppose you think it's queer that I don't wear mourning. Everybody said I was unnatural and criticized me for it, but I'd promised father. He said it was all right for people to feel sorry and to show that they did, but they had no right to inflict their gloom upon other people. And he said he couldn't understand why people should take it off at the end of a year or so

unless they meant that they weren't sorry anymore, and he wanted me to be happy but not to forget. I understand. Aren't you hungry? Yes, I think so. There's a loaf of bread and a pitcher of cream down under the elder bush. I left it there when I came up. Shall I bring it to you? No, indeed.

I'm all right, only tired and frightened and starved. They went down together, arm in arm, with Algernon, fully rested, but very hungry, following obediently. Marjorie paused once in a while to pick a wild rose, until she had a handful of them which she thrust into her belt. When they came to the elder bush, she filled her pink palm from the pitcher, fed the puppy first, then finished the cream herself. "'We'll remove the stains next,' said Judith practically.

She led Marjorie to the river, dipped her handkerchief into the cold water, and scrubbed industriously until the pink gingham was clean again. Marjorie bathed her tear-stained face, smoothed her rumpled locks, and sat down upon the grassy bank in the sun to dry her gown. Judith sat near her, in the shade of a drooping willow that now and then dropped tiny leaves upon the surface of the stream to go with the current into the lake below. Judith took a red rose out of her dark hair, and one by one cast the petals upon the water. A wistful smile hovered about the corners of her mouth. The velvety depths of her eyes were a light with mystery.

"'Why?' asked Marjoriously. "'To summon the prince, of course,' laughed Judith. "'Don't you remember the old fairy tale? Send yours downstream, too. A wish with every petal.' "'The same wish?' asked Marjorie curiously. Yes, if you like, I have only one. Marjorie took the wild roses from her belt, and one at a time scattered the petals upon the water. Slowly they drifted out of sight.

I don't see the prince, she observed after a pause. Give him time. The days of magic are not over yet. Long shadows lay upon the valley and the silver ripples deepened into gold. He's late, said Marjorie restlessly. and I'll have to get more cream and a fresh loaf of bread before I can go home. Aren't you too tired?

Can't I go? No, but I do wish you'd keep Algernon, until tomorrow. Keep whom? The puppy. I can't get him home with a parasol and the other things I have to carry. Do you live near here? Right over there, in a big white house. You can't miss it.

Judith indicated the region at the left of the river by a graceful inclination of her head. If you get lost, ask for Miss Bancrofts. She's my aunt. We live together. I needed try to say how much I thank you, said Marjorie. It's useless. You do not need to thank me. I'm only sorry I didn't find you sooner.

Goodbye until tomorrow. Goodbye. Shall you wait for the prince? Yes, if he isn't too long in coming. Here, doggie, you're to stay with me. The pink gown and white parasol moved slow. in the direction of the village. Alginon feigned to follow, lifted his voice shrilly, but the faithless one did not turn back. Judith held the puppy with difficulty while she untied a

long crimson tie of crape, which was knotted beneath her low collar. Presently, she had one end around Algernan's neck, and the other tied to a diminutive willow sapling back a little way from the shore. There, she said to herself. He's anchored, if the thing will hold him. Unaccustomed to restraint, Algernan lamented loudly, but Judith did not heed him. Her ears were strained to catch another sound. Smiling, with her head inclined toward the water, she waited with the prescience of a woman in love. When the dog paused for a moment to rest, she heard the murmur of a paddle in the water and caught her breath quickly. Almost immediately, a brown canoe appeared at the bend in the river, with a smiling young man in white flannels kneeling on a

crimson cushion in the stern. On the seat in front of him was a handful of wet rose petals, crimson and pink. How did you know? he called when he came within speaking distance. How did you know? she echoed as he turned the canoe towards shore. Because those red roses grow only in Miss Bancroft's garden. Where did the pink ones come from? Before she could answer, he had sprung ashore and caught her in his arms. Sweet, he breathed as he lifted her face to his. I've longed all day for the sight of you. It seemed as though evening would never come. It hasn't yet, murmured Judith.

No, but you have. Then Algernan, having heard and comprehended the sound of a familiar voice, leaped forward, uprooting the slender sapling to which he was tied, and dragging it by his strand of crimson's crape to the one godlike human who commanded his undying allegiance. With soft whinings and timorous barks he greeted his zing. master, who only held Judith more closely in his arms. Princess, he said,

Oh, woman of wonder, where did you find my pup? End of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 of Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 2. Alginon The Big White House was square and uncompromising an outline, but a wide porch surrounded it, two wide porches, rather,

since the upper story was similarly favored. Miss Cynthia was wont to observe that the house was an island bounded by an unlimited sea of porch, and to wish vainly for a real sea to wash over it at high tide that it might be kept clean. If grandfather had been gifted with imagination,

she was saying, he'd have made the house long and narrow and all the windows round. Then we could have thought we were living on an ocean liner, except that it would be so cheap and so comfortable that the illusion would be in danger. From the rear of the house came the shrill yelpings of an unhappy puppy. What is that? demanded Miss Cynthia. Do I hear something?

It's part of your longed-for illusion, Auntie, replied Judith with a smile. It's the moaning of the tide. Are we possessed by a dog? Temporarily, it seems. I didn't have time to finish my story last night. So I observed. When Carter's head appeared above the hedge, you left a young girl in pink hanging to a rail fence by her petticoats and ran down to meet him.

I didn't want to keep him waiting, Judith apologized with a blush. An evidence of immaturity, my dear, and if I may be permitted to say so, of inexperience. Men love what they have to wait for. What happened to the girl on the fence? I had to unfasten her gown and help her out of it.

She... There's Carter now. Sit down, commanded Miss Cynthia crisply. After having left her hanging on the fence all night, you haven't the heart to let her stand on the hill all the afternoon in her combinations, have you? It's not only unkind, but it's indecent. Well, continued Judith unwillingly, I got her out of her clothes and then helped her into them again,

and we came down the hill together. She had the puppy with her, and a parasol, and after she drank the cream, she had to get more. It was for dessert or something, and she asked me to keep the dog until today, and so I did. It seems he belongs to Carter. How did she get him? No, I don't mean Carter.

I mean the dog. I didn't have time to ask. I suppose she found him or someone who stole him gave him to her or sold him to her. Come right up, dear. She called, leaning over the balcony. Yes, dear, mimicked Miss Cynthia with a wicked flash in her eyes. Come right up.

I love to hear your fairy-like tread on this frail veranda. The long empty spaces echoed back the young man's ringing laugh. He kissed Judith, with the complacency of an accepted lover, then bent over Miss Cynthia's chair. You shall pay the penalty for that. Kiss your nephew, that is to be. I won't, she answered tartly. Please go over there and sit down.

The girl has her clothes on now, but I want to know how she came to drink the cream. She was hungry, laughed Judith. She had been hanging on the fence for hours, and the cream was in a blue pitcher under the elder bush. How did it get there, fairies? You'll have to ask her. She said she'd come over today and get the dog. Right here, interposed Carter. is where I come into the story.

She's not only not going to have my dog, but you'll have to explain how she came to be taking him home with her. Why, Carter, Keith, exclaimed Judith, I'm ashamed of you. What for? That isn't nice of you, it's selfish. Three things I have long to see, murmured Miss Cynthia pointedly. The sea serpent, a white rhinoceros,

and an unselfish man. The worries were sharp, but the light in her eyes and the smile that hovered about the corners of her mouth robbed them of their sting. She leaned back in her low chair and her crutch clattered sharply to the floor. Carter half rose from his chair, but she stopped him with the merest movement of her hand. Lines of bitterness and rebellion appeared for an instant where the smile had been, and her eyes became somber, as from smoldering fires. Then the unhappy mood vanished as quickly as it had come. Miss Cynthia's hair was silver, but her face was young and always would be.

Her delicate skin was peculiarly transparent, and the color that came and went so easily was not the scarlet that from time to time flamed upon Judah's cheeks, but a soft, dull pink. At times, she suggested a full-blown pink rose from which the petals had begun to fall, but this only when her eyes were sad. Deep, dark, and strangely brilliant, they dominated not only her feet. face but her body. From the firm, shapely throat that merged softly into the lace of her white gown, down to the small feet crossed upon a cushion, she was subordinate to the wonderful eyes that expressed her every mood and tense. The little feet were gaily clad in white silk stockings

and white satin shoes with buckles of old silver exquisitely wrought. There was nothing to indicate that one of them was helpless and always would be. Queerly enough, Miss Cynthia had a passion for shoes and squandered money without stint upon dainty things of velvet and satin in all the colors of the rainbow, with silk stockings to match, embroidered, and at times even inset with medallions of real lace. Once, when she had spent the money that should have gone for taxes upon a fascinating pair of slippers with solid gold buckles, Judith had remonstrated mildly but unmistakably. I don't know why I should spend money for things I don't want, Miss Cynthia had returned in self-defense. want the tax receipt, and I did want the slippers. And so, a gesture of airy disdain

permanently closed the incident. Judith had not spoken of slippers since, except in terms of admiration occasionally mingled with awe. Following the next extravagance, Miss Cynthia had observed, with judicial detachment, that, as her feet weren't useful, they might as well be pretty. She sent a keen glance to Judith as she spoke, but that wise young woman had not answered, save with a smile. Why am I selfish? asked Carter in the manner of one a thirst for knowledge. Because you're a man, explained Miss Cynthia with patience. Because you're not willing to give a dog to a little girl who wants him, and spend a bad

two hours hanging to a fence on his account, added Judith. But my dear girl, I can't give dogs to everybody. Did anybody ask you to? What kind of a dog is he? queried Miss Cynthia. Judging by his voice and his industry, he is something more than the summary of a diversified ancestry. He seems to be a dog of parts and distinction. He is, answered Carter. He's a thoroughbred collie, and I spent yesterday scouring the country for him with an automobile. I'm glad you've scoured it, Miss Cynthia flashed back. Now all we need is rain. If he's a thoroughbred, Judith continued,

it would be all the nicer of you to give him away. Carter looked at her to see whether she was in earnest. From the first he had had a certain fear of Judith, which, manlike, he was unwilling to admit even to himself. She was so strong, so capable, so perfectly at ease. It seemed impertinent in a way to assist her into an automobile or a boat, to open a door for her, or even to offer her a chair. Yet she had not the faintest suggestion of masculinity.

judith was all woman though finally tempered and fully adequate to her surroundings when she came into a room she dominated it by sheer force of her personality She carried herself well, with her chin held high, her stately head thrown back a little, and her dark, beautiful eyes calm, like water still not even. She met the world upon terms of equality and frank acceptance. She diffused about her a sort of gentleness and refinement. She did not seem to demand consideration,

but simply took it, as by right. Don't you think, Judith was asking in her cool voice, that it would be nice of you? "'Might be,' Carter admitted. He got up and walked about the balcony with his hands in his pockets. "'May I smoke?' "'Certainly. Where is the bone of contention?' "'Down in the backyard. You can't miss him if you follow your ears.'

"'We'll come down,' said Miss Cynthia, picking up her crutch and cane. She and Judith were upon the lower porch when Carter appeared with a frolic somalginon gambling at his heels. A frisking morsel beside a vast monument. He was past twenty-eight, but at that moment he was only a boy. Don't ask me to give him away, Judith, he pleaded. He's such a nice little doggy, and he's so glad to see me. You'd give him to me, wouldn't you? Of course. You shall have him and his entire family if you so desire. To do with as I choose? No. Not to sell or to kill, or to kill, or to give away, but to keep.

You'd better keep him yourself, smiled Judith. I don't want a gift with a string to it. In the case of quadrupeds, commented Miss Cynthia, strings are advisable and even necessary. Would you mind getting a rope now? I do not care to have him rampaging around among my flower beds. Someone once said that, life had troubles enough now without adding to it cats.

I go considerably farther than that, and I want to keep this place petless, if I may. Petless is a good word, replied Carter. It's legitimate, which is more than can be said of most coined words. If penniless and helpless, and merciless and pitiless and all the other lesses are good English, why not petless? It sounds well, said Judith thoughtfully. I suppose automobiles might mean having no car. Motorless is better, Carter put in. Where's the clothesline? "'Too far away to find easily and too new to cut,' Judith said. "'Wait a minute.'

She went into the house and returned shortly, with a wide, soft ribbon of baby blue over two yards in length. "'Isn't that too nice to use?' asked Carter doubtfully. "'No,' returned Judith with a smile. "'I'm not selfish.' "'Anything personal in that?' he asked, tethering the puppy to one of the fluted columns of the veranda. "'Nothing at all.'

I was merely offering a bit of information as to my own character. Information is unnecessary, he responded gallantly. There is nothing that is good and lovely and adorable that you are not. You're almost too perfect, Judith. His eyes were alight with love and admiration as he spoke. Please don't get sentimental, said Miss Cynthia plaintively. Leave all that until I've gone to bed and you two sit out here until the moon gets tired and goes to bed too.

Do I stay as late as that? asked Carter, lifting his eyebrows. Far be it for me to say, I know it seems well on toward morning when Judith tiptoes upstairs, trying desperately to avoid the squeaky board that always gives her away. The young man laughed. He and Miss Cynthia were very good friends, and he keenly enjoyed her harmless thrust. She was happy even to sit and look at him, to exult. To exult, in his magnificent physical strength, to admire the dark locks that would curl a little in spite of the heroic daily efforts with a wet brush, to adore his cleanliness, his youth, and the finely chiseled mouth and chin that carried more than a hint of stubbornness. His hands were large and

capable. His dark skin was clear, and he literally radiated the joy of living, if merely for the sake of life itself. Sometimes, in her black hours, Miss Cynthia envied Judith, though she never wished to take from her the smallest fragment of her happiness. The two had been engaged for a year and were to be married in the autumn, or whenever the new house was done. They had already discovered that readiness and even eagerness to lie was a marked characteristic of those employed in the building trades. Judith cared too little for clothes to plan any special trousseau, but for months past she had been embroidering with the most fairy-like of stitches, the length of sheerest linen she wanted for her wedding gown. She had a passion for it, and often said that could she choose but one fabric for

all purposes, she would ask for linen and be well content. Just now there was the faraway look in her eyes that came sometimes when she was at work upon it. She had retreated, as it were, into the virginal silence and austerity of her soul, and closed the door. Carter looked at her a little troubled, because she seemed so alien and apart from him. This was not the Judith he knew and loved, but a woman who, in an instant and at will, had assumed the quality of remoteness as some far star. Then his fear was lost in a sudden rush of loyalty, of love, of adoration.

To make one self-worthy of this peerless woman was incentive enough for any man to strive, to struggle, and to rise with fresh courage from every defeat. She was leaning against one of the columns of the porch looking out into the garden where Miss Cynthia's roses were all in bloom. subtle fragrances breathe their exquisite essence into the golden web of the afternoon. The yellow lilies. Mint, lavender, rosemary, elder blossoms, and above all, roses, roses,

till the senses were intoxicated with the ecstasy of the humblest among them. Judith was pale, but not colorless. Her gown was white, and by contrast, her firm flesh had the glow of ivory, tinted here and there with pink. She wore no Jewel save the single splendid ruby said in her betrothal ring. Anything more would have made her seem overdressed. Carter forgot Miss Cynthia and her caution about sentiment. He got to his feet a little unsteadily and murmured.

Judith! He choked back an overwhelming emotion as he spoke. Judith did not turn. Someone is coming, she said. I think it's Miss Gordon. A youthful figure in pale blue mull opened the gate, entered and closed it carefully. Marjorie came up the gravelled walk, with a smile that quite by itself, would take her far upon any way she might choose to go. Her big blue eyes were alluring in their trustfulness.

The all-pervading sweetness of her youth and innocence gave her the freshness of morning and spring. Judith went to meet her with both hands outstretched and welcome. I'm so glad to see you're none the worse for your unhappy experience of yesterday. Aunt Cynthia, this is Miss Gordon. My aunt, Miss Bancroft, of whom I spoke yesterday. Miss Gordon, Mr. Keith, sit down, please. I think you'll like this chair. Thank you, replied Marjorie.

I'd forgotten that this would be Sunday when I told you yesterday that I'd come today, but I promised, so I'm here. I suppose Algernon has been a perfectly terrible nuisance, but I'm a thousand times obliged to you. Algernon, perhaps because he heard his name or from a natural instinct of curiosity, came out from beneath his master's chair. Oh, you darling, cried Marjorie, rushing to him and picking him up in her arms. Did you miss me? I missed you. Abominable little beast, though you are.

Carter had risen. Might I inquire why you named him Algernan? Because I hate it worse than any name I know, and he was such a bad little doggie, but I guess I'll change it. What would you name him? I hadn't named him. I'd always called him the black and white one. Marjorie's face saddened. She dropped Algernan, who whined when he struck the porch. She turned troubled eyes to Judith, full of question and appeal. He happens to belong to Mr. Keith, said Judith kindly.

We're glad you found him. He's a thoroughbred collie and a very valuable dog. The blue eyes filled with tears, the sweet mouth quivered a little. Then swiftly, Marjorie regained herself control. Oh, she said. I'm glad I found him, too. I'll have to go now. I promised Mr. Chandler I wouldn't be gone very long. Goodbye, little doggie. Dear little doggy, her voice broke on the last words. Take him with you, Miss Gordon, if you'd really like to have him, put in Carter hastily.

Oh, but I mustn't, if he's valuable. Thank you, just as much. He isn't so valuable that I'm not glad to give him to somebody who would be kind to him. You see, he continued lamely. I have a lot of dogs all the time. It just happens so, you know, and it's the hardest thing in the world to find good homes for them. You have no idea how hard it is. I'd be ever so much obliged to you

if you'd take him. Honestly, I would. Only, please, don't name him Algernon. I won't, she promised, then immediately forgot it. Oh, thank you so much! She picked up the puppy and offered a small pink hand to Gartor.

It's perfect. lovely of you. Good-bye. Goodbye, Miss Sylvester. Goodbye, Miss Bankroft. I'd love to come again, if you'll let me. She went down the path again with the puppy after her blue ribbon and all. At the gate, she turned to smile and wave a friendly hand at the little group on the porch.

When the last glimmer of the blue gown had vanished upon the road, Judith went to Carter and patted his cheek. That was nice of you, she said warmly. I like you for it. It was beautifully done. Carter made a wry face and shrugged his broad shoulders. I don't know why I did it, so please don't praise me. Why? replied Judith.

It was partly to please me and partly to please yourself, and partly to please Miss Gordon. It was decent of you, Carter, commented Miss Cynthia. Then after a significant pause, she added, One of the most interesting things in the world to me is the vast, difference between what people say they are going to do and what they actually do. End of Chapter 2. Chapter 3 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertral Reed. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. 3. The House of Content. Dreaming Marjorie. The man's gentle voice had low music in it,

of the sort that is remembered after it has ceased. His wheeled chair was just within the open door and the girl was on the tiny veranda, sitting upon the top step, leaning against a pillar. No, I was just thinking. And wondering, perhaps, why your father sent you to me. She was startled, but did not betray herself. If father wanted me to come, surely that is reason enough. Martin Chandler beckoned to his attendant.

Outdoors, please. The man pushed the chair out upon the veranda to its customary corner. Is that all, sir? Yes, until I call you. In the gathering dusk, even Marjorie's face was pale. Her small hands crossed in her lap seemed pathetically empty and helpless. The puppy, craving a caress, notes softly at her arm, but she pushed him away. You don't have to stay, you know, said the man quietly,

but I hope you'll want to, though it must be dull. She did not answer, and after a pause he spoke again. You look like your father. Do I really? I'm glad you think so. Then her voice broke pitifully. Oh, I miss him so. Yes, I can readily understand that.

The sweet scent of the cedars came faintly through the twilight. Deep in their purple darkness somewhere, a mother bird was putting her brood to sleep with a murmurous lullaby, soothing the drowsy twitter under the shelter of her wings. God never wastes anything, Marjorie, the man went on. All the life has risen out of them. death, and all the death has only gone on to be made into life again. Nothing is lost, ever.

It's only changed. How do you mean? Has father? Father has changed as you and I will change. Life is immortal, though it expresses itself in forms that perish as the leaves. All things go back eventually to the one divine source, as a tiny stream in the mountain finds its way at last to the vast ocean that holds the world in its arms. The pale gold moon of June came out from behind a cloud

and shone full upon Chandler's face. Marjorie in the shadow of the veranda looked up at him curiously, yet with a strange new sense of approaching peace. He was fifty, and the last twenty-five years of his life had been spent in his wheelchair and his bed. Suffering and rebellion had left lines upon his face if one looked for them,

but the man's conquest of himself had in turn given him a serenity that was noble and beautiful, beautiful beyond all words. His dark hair had not whitened entirely, but was only silvered a little. His gray eyes were deep and calm, and the strong lines of his profile showed clearly, even in the half-light. The stately figure in the wheelchair did not suggest helplessness. It seemed that he was there simply because he wanted to be. Your father told you, didn't he? Chandler was saying. It was a railroad accident. Yes, Marjorie stammered. She He crimsoned with shame because he had read her thought, but the kindly dusk hit her face.

I don't talk about it much, he went on unemotionally. I don't deal in horrors. At first I thought I couldn't bear it, but I knew, though dimly enough, that God never places a burden upon shoulders unfit to carry it. The work of the world is done by those who are strong, and the suffering is borne by those who are brave. Sometimes a coward will shift his load and go on, thinking himself free, but he is not. he has lost the power of it himself and the strength and courage he needed for it and had at his command to use have gone divinely with the burden he laid aside when you can see the why of things they're no longer hard

the world is perfectly balanced for every hour of darkness there is one of daylight for every full tide a corresponding ebb and for every question there is somewhere an answer do we always find it she asked quickly i think so some time. All that is not clear in this life will be fully understood in some life to come. Tell me, he went on after a pause, about this afternoon. You know I see nothing except what comes to me. Why, it was nothing. I just went up there. They were all outside, so I didn't go into the house. Miss Sylvester was there, and a Mr. Keith, and Miss Bancroft, the old lady. Miss Sylvester calls her Aunt Cynthia. I know Miss Sylvester and Mr. Keith. They come here

often. There to be married soon. Are they? asked Marjorie idly. I didn't know. He seems nice and she's lovely. I liked her the minute I saw her. Before you saw her almost, didn't you? Yes. It seems funny now, but it wasn't at all amusing yesterday. When I saw her red parasol turn into the road that led up the hill,

I could have danced for joy if I could have moved my feet. Red usually means danger. Yesterday it meant salvation. She was more than kind. Yes, she always is. You can sit down and think of everything a woman ought to be, even write it out if you choose, and when you get through you'll discover that you've written an accurate description of Judas Sylvester. Sometimes I wonder whether she's merely human like the rest of us, or a saint temporarily come to earth to make us think better of a world that has her in it. I've often wished on you, Miss Bancroft, but she's a shut-in like myself, and so we've never met, though we've lived in the same town for twenty years or so.

Occasionally we send friendly messages to one another, by Judith, or exchange books, but that's all. I don't even know what she looks like. No one sees her very much except Judith and Keith. I don't like to ask Judith to describe her aunt, and of course, a man can't discuss a lady with another man. Sometimes Judith tells me of funny things she says and does, and I've often pictured her to myself, but I'm probably wrong. Tell me, how does she seem to you? I've pictured her as very tall and stately, with her shoulders stooped a little on account of her crutch,

dark hair just beginning to turn, deep blue eyes are grey perhaps, regular features, rather a large mouth with very white regular teeth and a frank smile, and a crisp, clear voice, not shrill, but rather high. Marjorie laughed. Am I wrong? he asked. Don't tell me I'm wrong.

Oh, but you are, absolutely. She wasn't out of her chair, but I could see that she wasn't very tall. She's a little person, not nearly as big as I am. Her hair is entirely white, and it shines in the sun like spun silver, and her eyes are very dark and wonderful. They are brilliant, like jewels. She has a lovely skin, clean. and delicate, with soft color in it,

a sweet mouth, plump little hands with dimples at the knuckles, and a beautiful voice, soft, but not low. She wore white and had on white satin shoes with silver buckles. I see, returned Chandler after a brief silence. I'll have to change my mental portrait of her. How old is she? Sixty by her hair, thirty-five or forty by her face, and how old by her mind and soul?

I don't know, laughed Marjorie. How many ages are there for the same person? Three. One of the body, one of the mind, and one of the soul. Sometimes a soul of six and a mind of fifteen are shut up in a body of thirty or more, and again, in a body of twenty, there'll be a mind of about the same age and a very old soul. You see all sorts of queer combinations. That is what makes life so unfailingly interesting. we can measure the age of the body by years, but not the others.

I don't see why not. Because they all grow differently and have different standards of measurement. You couldn't ask for a yard of water or a peck of linen, could you? A body progresses with a certain regularity, according to the measure of time, but the others grow by leaps and bounds and not according to time at all. In one night sometimes, the soul of a girl becomes the soul of an old woman. The body grows by food and work, the mind by use, and the soul through joy and pain.

How old am I? she asked curiously. About twenty. In body. And the rest? I don't know. I can tell better after you've been here a little while. I hope you'll want to stay. You're the prettiest thing that's ever been in this old house, Marjorie.

In the few days you've been here, you've made it seem more like a home than I have. ever thought it could. I'm glad, she returned gently. I have no home of my own, now that father... Share mine, little girl, and let me try to take his place as far as I may. If I had ever had a daughter, I should have wanted her to be like you. Chandler's attendant came out of the house swinging a lantern. He went down the road a little way to the point where the other road crossed it and came back

empty-handed. Where does he go? asked Marjorie. Just to the crossroads, to hang a light upon the sign. It is better that it should hang there for 364 nights without being needed than to miss a night when some wayfarer may pass and take the wrong road. Did you put up the sign? Yes, he laughed.

That is, I had it done. You and I are beginning to know each other. At the corner just below the house, there was a sign with a weather-vane on top of it, directing the traveler east or west, with the name of the nearest town and the distance. A cross-arm fastened to the same post gave similar information regarding points north and south. I shall never go myself, he went on, but I may show others the way. So much that hurts and distresses us comes from taking the wrong road.

The grim pity of it came suddenly to Marjorie and her eyes filled. Never out of this house and yard, she said half to herself. then to him inquiringly. In automobile, perhaps? No, he answered firmly. Keith has been here a dozen times with that trumpeting red monster of his to allure me into further danger.

I'm thankful to be able to stay here, so I shall stay. At first, he resumed after a brief silence, when it seemed that I simply could not bear it, I got a little blank book and began to put down the names of people I knew who were worse off than I. There were only two or three, so I took up history and biography as a serious business,

and whenever I found a man who had harder luck than mine, I put him down in the book. Presently, my list began to assume the proportions of the one the man sings about in the Mikado. It outgrew the book, then filled another, and by the time I'd filled the third one I felt better. I have them put away somewhere now, all labeled, people who are worse off than I am. Do you ever read them over? I haven't for years. I admit, however, that the first volume in the series is pretty well worn out and the second one frayed. The last pages in the third are comparatively fresh, but some of the poor fellows whose names are written there would have been mighty glad to change places with me.

I see, said Marjorie slowly. If I should do that, why, I'd have to put down almost everybody. "'Yes,' smiled Chandler. "'You have youth, beauty, health, sufficient income, and a thousand other things. Sit down someday and write out all you have to be thankful for, if you can find a ledger that will hold it all. And don't forget the things you have had,

even though you have them no longer. What we've had is ours forever, in a way to keep, and to make dreams of.' "'Dreams?' she repeated, wondering what he meant. child in the house of life there is much that is wrong penetrate deeply into the secret existence of anyone about you even of the man or woman whom you count happiest and you will come upon things they spend all their efforts to hide fair as the exterior may be if you go in you will find bare places heaps of rubbish that can never be taken away cold hearse desolate altars and windows veiled with cobwebs yet if the owner is well wise, these things will be concealed by a marvelous tapestry of dreams. Sometimes, a woman, bitterly disappointed in her husband, shelters him behind her own ideal of him, and smilingly bids the world admire and even approach, but not too near.

Oh, never too near. Where anyone has failed us, see how we strive to hide it, and when we ourselves have failed, there is always someone ready to help us in turn. But, because the dream persists and the dream persists and the the tapestry is beautiful beyond words, we have always something to live up to. It's only the everlasting difference between the real and the ideal, the vision and the fact, and to bring the two as near together as possible is the one object of those who weave the dreams.

I sit here, in my little house at the crossroads, and in fancy, the whole world goes by me. My corner might be the meeting place for all the nations of the earth, since the roads run straight. Turk and Japanese, South African and Eskimo, could exchange salutations at my signpost if they chose. And by knowing a few people well, I know the whole world, for human nature is the same the world over and does not change. Having only a drop of water, a microscope, and a dream, I fashion from it the sea. I know it, perhaps, as he does not, who only crosses it in a ship. Marjorie was silent. The twilight had deepened into darkness, and farther on, the twinkling lights in the other houses went out, one by one. A cheerful little clock in the

living room struck nine. A busy, impertinent one in the kitchen repeated it, and then the tall grandfather's clock in the hall boomed out nine solemn strokes with finality and approval. May I say good-night now, she asked. Surely. I wish you pleasant dreams. if the other sort come we will banish them together for this is the house of content good-night she offered him her hand then moved by an impulse of quick tenderness stooped to kiss him lightly upon the forehead smiling he turned his head to watch her as she took a candle from the table in the hall lighted it and went upstairs still retaining a little of the dear awkwardness of youth she stumbled once or twice upon the unfamiliar stairs Her soft step came lightly from overhead. He heard one window opened, another closed, and a shade drawn. Then her light streamed out upon the cedars, bringing a faint iridescence from their purple depths.

The memory of her light kiss lingered still upon his forehead, as though the wing of a butterfly had brushed him in passing. His face settled into unaccustomed lines of sadness. Out of all life had to give, he had received so pitifully little. The house of content could never be more than a refuge. It was, at the best, a negative possession. He longed for home and children that night as he had never longed for them before. If Marjorie had been his own flesh and blood instead of the daughter of his dead friend,

he might have held her close in his arms for a moment before she went away for the night. Whatever is mine I shall have, and I shall keep. He said the words aloud as he had many times. The phrase had become a habit with him When the iron entered his soul Swiftly his thought followed it And I don't want anything that isn't mine And so

Are you ready now, sir? His man appeared in the doorway Unobtrusively offering service Chandler waved him away Not yet, come back in fifteen minutes Very well, sir The light from upstairs striking the cedars Through the rest of the place into shadow

The small white house was set back a little way from the street. There was a bit of lawn and a white-picked fence and a shrub or two but no garden. At the corner where the roads from east and west met those from north and south, his lantern illumined a wide circle upon the gravel. He had carefully timed his beacon light and knew that it would burn until dawn. A larger lantern was used in winter. Marjorie's light went out. Chandler sighed from loneliness and hunger.

The things he was never to have pressed their denial bitterly upon him now. What has she done to me? He asked of himself. Has she stirred up all these years of useless raging against fate? I wonder if she has. The man came to the door again. Ready, sir? Yes, sighed Chandler.

Take me into the library and bring the light to the bookcase. For half an hour or longer he sought vainly among books, behind books and in desk and table drawers that had not been opened for a long time. His man helped him into bed, arranged the reading lamp upon the table near him, put the bell and the pitcher of water within his reach, and went into his own little room adjoining. Presently the house was quiet, save for the striking clocks, but while the lantern burned at the crossroads, another light burned too.

Impatient and bitterly rebellious, Chandler sat up in bed until sunrise, reading through his entire list of people who are worse off than I am. End of Chapter 3. Chapter 4 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Four. Marked Passages A wayfaring Robin having been afield since before dawn paused upon Marjorie's windowsill to rest. The sun shone full upon her face and the mass of yellow hair that lay upon her pillow, bringing forth gleams of gold with here and there an unsuspected tint of copper. The robin chirped inquiringly, but the little figure upon the big mahogany four-poster

did not stir. He called once more as to a comrade, and yet again, but there was no answer. With a final twitter he flew away just as the blue eyes opened. "'Wasn't there a robin?' murmured Marjorie drowsily. "'I thought there was a robin, in a cherry tree that had just bloomed.' The clock struck seven, bidding the laggards to rise. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, wondering where she was. Oh, yes, she remembered now. Father was dead, and she was in Mr. Chandler's house at Edgerton, where father had asked her to go.

Tears came at the memory, then swiftly she brushed them away. What was it that Mr. Chandler had said last night, that father was not lost, but only changed? She must not forget that, for there was mysterious comfort. in the thought. Because she was young, and it was June, she was singing to herself before she had fairly begun to dress. She loved the splash of the cool water upon her neck and arms, smiled at the pink and white and golden vision that smiled back at her from the mirror, and by the time she had plated her hair into a heavy, shining braid that hung far below her waist, she was fancying herself a mermaid upon the coral reefs of some far blue sea,

luring passing ships to their destruction. Her room appealed. Her room appealed. to her girlish love of prettiness. If a woman had done it, say Miss Sylvester, instead of old Eliza in the kitchen downstairs, it could not have been more lovely. She did not guess that Judith had done it at Mr. Chandler's request, nor did she guess with what anxiety

the lonely man had awaited her coming. If she could have seen the expression of his face as he fingered samples of dimity, chintz, and croton, after Judith had assured him that a young woman of twenty would be sure to want pink and white draperies, with old mahogany furniture, she might have been touched a little,

but in all probability would have been only amused. All the details of the room showed a woman's forethought and planning, from the roses that climbed a trellis upon the wallpaper to blossom in pink and white profusion at the freeze, to the chintz-covered screen in the corner that opened into a wonderful arrangement of pockets for the innumerable small belongings of a dainty girl's wardrobe.

The chins-covered couch was heaped with pillows and was so deep and soft that Marjorie, might sleep there if she liked on hot nights when it would be cool near the window. There was a low sewing chair, a big easy chair, and a straight back chair at the dressing table, all with cushions of the rose-strewn chintz.

Chandler's tired face softened with a smile when she came downstairs. Will you button me? She asked, backing up to his chair. Father always did, just those four buttons in the middle that I can't reach. You must forgive me if I'm awkward,

he replied, fumbling at the buttons. I've never done it before. You'll soon learn, she assured him in a matter-of-fact tone. But if you'd rather not, I'll go to Eliza. Please don't. At fifty, it's none too early to learn to do such things. How long have you been up? Oh, longer than you have, I fancy. It's a lot nicer to be buttoning a pretty girl's gown than to be roasted on a grill.

Who was roasted? demanded Marjorie turning. I was just thinking about St. Lawrence. He was fried, you know, and they've named crabs after him. Have you never eaten crabs as St. Lawrence? Marjorie hadn't. Neither have I. I've just read about him in cookbooks. Do you read cookbooks? Once in a while, for light reading, and sometimes when I'm hungry and Eliza's cooking has missed the mark. After you've read half a cookbook, you're not hungry at all. You've absorbed food with your mind, and your body has forgotten all about it. I'll cook for you, returned the girl eagerly. I can make fudge and chocolate cake and lemonade with mint in it, and two kinds of cornstarch

pudding, yellow and white. You shall make them all some day, and we'll have a feast. Are you ready for breakfast now? Very much so. In spite of the wheelchair, it was pleasant to be in the sunny dining room and watch Marjorie as she sat opposite him, pouring his coffee. Had things gone wrong? right with him long ago. Resolutely he put the tormenting thought aside.

All the joy of life for him had been crowded into one splendid hour that had vanished as quickly as it had come. Shall I bother you if I bring my sewing down here? she asked when they had finished breakfast. No, indeed, I wish you would. What do you do? she queried when they were settled upon the veranda. How do you keep from getting lonely? I don't, he muttered. then added in another tone.

Lots of things. I read, and play on the violin, and write sometimes. What do you write? Letters mostly, and now and then a story. Oh, how lovely, for the magazines! Four, but not in, he replied carefully, differentiating his prepositions. Three things are certain. Taxation, death, and the returned manuscript.

Do they send them back? "'Uusually. Once in a while one gets lost, but it doesn't happen very often. The relation between people and print is very interesting. Some get in free, others pay to get in, and some pay to keep out. And when it comes to literature or what passes for it, some people get their stuff printed free, others pay to have it done, and still others are paid by the people who print it. Must be nice to be paid,' commented Marjorie threading her needle. It is. I was once, and I've never forgotten it. Two dollars, for a joke. It was a great stimulant to my sense of humor. I've looked ever since for the funny side of things. Have you always managed to find it? Nearly always, I think, though it's never proved remunerative. Judith says it has paid me handsomely but intangibly. She's beautiful, I think. Yes. She comes Mondays and Thursdays to play accompaniments for me while I fiddle.

Then she'll be here today. This afternoon at two. She adds to her other virtues the gift of punctuality, which is said to be the politeness of kings. When Judith opens the gate, I can safely set my watch at two. If it is a minute or so out of reckoning,

one way or the other, it's the watch, not Judith. It was ten minutes past the hour by Marjorie's tiny gold watch when Judith appeared at the crossroads. following Chandler's hint, she made the correction when Judith lifted the rusty lash and called cheerfully, Good afternoon, everybody! She had a roll of music, two books, a bottle, and her red parasol. I can't shake hands, she laughed as she came up to the veranda, until I have laid down my burdens.

Here's a new novel for Miss Gordon. Marjorie, please, the girl interrupted as she took it. I wish you would. I'll be glad to, Marjorie, if you will call me, Judith. "'Here's a bottle of Aunt Cynthia's current wine from me,' "'she continued to Chandler, and a book from her, "'and new music for both of us from Carter. "'Isn't it a lovely world? "'And isn't everybody kind to everybody else?' "'Chandler had unwrapped the book while she was speaking,

"'as he had hoped there was a note inside. "'May I?' he asked. "'Then taking consent for granted he read in Miss Bankroff's quaint old-fashioned hand. "'Dear friend, I have enjoyed this, so I pass it on to you, I hope you won't mind my having marked it. Keep it as long as you like. I was much interested in the magazine article you sent as you knew I would be. If you have anything I haven't read, please send it by Judith. My mind is a parched prairie, and I'm praying for rain. Yours, Cynthia Bancroft. Marjorie, meanwhile, was looking at Judith with frank admiration. She had chosen a scarlet gown that afternoon, relieved with touches of black, and was as resplendent. as an oriental poppy might be, had it fragrance as well as beauty. She had dominated the place

from the moment she came to it. Everything else was subordinate and accessory to her. How is Miss Bankroft? Chandler asked. Very well, thank you, and especially happy this afternoon. The shopping agent has just come out from town

with a caravan of lovely things. When I go back tonight, we shall be paupers as far as Aunt Cynthia is concerned. It's fortunate for us both, that I have a little money of my own. Four times a year, a woman of taste and discernment went to Miss Bancroft, who was an easy prey to everything but hats.

As she never went outside her own hedge, she needed nothing but the lace scarf she habitually wore on cool evenings. She disdained gloves for the same reason and wraps of all sorts, though she had once yielded to the charms of a long white opera coat encrusted with lace and silver

and lined with white fur. Shoes, gowns, lingerie, and expensive daintiness for her dressing-table were the things that allured her most. When I left, Judith was saying, the serpent from the city was tempting her with a hat. A wonderful affair of white lace, real, too, if you please, heavy with white plumes and dazzling with a most marvelous buckle of brilliance.

The serpent was telling her that she ought to have it to wear on cool evenings when she sat out on the porch until late. It would be so lovely with her white coat. She'd brought one of those Egyptian scarves, too, a white one all glitter and sparkle, the sort you buy by the pound, and a new perfume that sells for five dollars an ounce. It made me think of a bit of verse I read somewhere, about a caravan coming from China with silks, spices, and myrr, and the tinkle of the camel's bells, only the bells in this case are profanely replaced by the horn on the serpent's automobile.

Has she a car? asked Marjorie. Of course she has a car. Hasn't Aunt Cynthia been buying things from her for years and years. She may have two or three, unless she's a thrifty person who wants to keep money in the bank for emergencies. Apropos of the automobile, Aunt Cynthia observed, just as I was leaving,

that it was like man's love, easy to get, but hard to keep. Like woman's love, too, perhaps, laughed Chandler. He was enjoying himself very much. Woman's love is rather the reverse of that, I think, returned Judith. Hard to get, but easy to keep.

let me take that bottle of wine into the house and put it into a cool place as she picked it up the cork came out and a dark stream ran down the front of her scarlet gown chandler was distressed but judith hastened to assure him that the damage was not permanent take me upstairs please she said to marjorie a little cold water will make me right again we seem to take turns scrubbing each other then as they went into the hall did you like your room oh so much it's a little cold water it's a little cold water we'll make me right again we seem to take turns scrubbing each other then as they went into the hall did you like your room oh so much it's a much it's all together the loveliest room I've ever had. I'm glad you like it, Judith answered. Then the voices were lost in a pleasant, feminine murmur that came agreeably to Chandler's ears. He picked up the book Miss Bancroft had sent him, read her note again, then slipped it between the leaves. A marked passage confronted him and idly he read, and though we choose to right or to left of us, on the heights or in the shallows, though in our struggle to break through the enchanted circle

that is drawn around all the acts of our life, we do violence to the instinct that moves us, and try our hardest to choose against the choice of destiny. Yet shall the woman we elect always have come to us straight from the unvarying star. He threw the book aside his face-working. In a few moments he was himself again, and when Judith and Marjorie came back with the stain removed,

he showed no signs of agitation. until late in the afternoon he and Judith sat at the piano trying the new music. We're doing very well, I think, he said. Yes, aren't we? But we'll have to do it a lot better before we try to play it for Carter. We'll have a dinner party, Chandler suggested. You and Carter and Marjorie and I with music afterward. Marjorie can cook, chocolate cake and two kinds of pudding.

Isn't she dear? said Judith with a low, sweet laugh. Through the window they could see Marjorie as she sat on the veranda with her sewing cast aside, vainly endeavouring to teach Algernan to set up on his signed legs and shake hands. She came into this old house like a sunbeam, sighed Chandler. I begin to feel as if I had a daughter and I dread to have her go away. But she's not going, is she? I don't know. She came merely in obedience to her father's dying request.

No time limit was set upon her stay, but of course she'll go sometime. "'It must be incredibly dull here.' "'Perhaps not as dull as you think,' returned Judith kindly. Marjorie came in just then with the puppy under her arm. "'He can almost sit up,' she announced. "'But he won't shake hands. "'Sit up, Algernon. "'There, that's right.

"'Oh, did you hurt your little nose?' "'Won't you come home with me?' asked Judith and stay to dinner. "'Aunt Cynthia would be so glad to have you. "'I'd like to.' replied Marjorie with a doubtful glance at Chandler. Go, he said eagerly. Please do. Won't you miss me? Not I, he parried. Haven't I a new book? We'll see that you get home safely, interposed Judith.

Perhaps Carter will take us out in the car tonight if it isn't being repaired. I must dress then. Will you wait? I shan't be long. That was kind, said Chandler gratefully, as Marjorie's door closed upstairs. It must be lonely for her here. I'm poor company for anybody and especially for a young woman. I'm sure you're not fishing for a compliment. Don't I come twice a week and am I not young? Both young and beautiful, but I have no delusions about your coming.

It's only your unselfishness and kindness of heart expressing itself as your nature demands. I wasn't fishing either, she assured him playfully, but the heightened color in her cheek showed that she would pleased. When Marjorie came down, Chandler had found a book for Miss Cynthia, and upon a corner of the library table had written a brief note carefully phrased thus. Dear friend, thank you for Judith and the wine and the book. I shall like it the more because you have marked it. Already I feel that I know you, through the subtle freemasonry of your marked passages. Will you please send me your photograph? M.C. Marjorie was in white with her yellow hair piled high on her shapely head.

To Chandler's delight she went to him instead of Judith to be buttoned. Just the four in the middle that I can't reach. You're improving. In a week you'll be doing as well as father. He was smiling when they went away, arm in arm, leaving Algernon, who was fain to follow, lamenting at the gate. At the crossroads they both turned back to wave friendly farewells at the man whom they could not see, but who, as they surmised, would watch them until they were out of sight.

For a long time he sat there. thinking. The memory of Marjorie's presence lingered in the house like a slowly fading light. Indefinable fragrances filled the room. The echo of her laughter seemed not to have died away. His face saddened, then he said aloud, "'Whatever is mine I shall have and I shall keep, and what isn't mine I surely don't want.' He took up the book again and read one marked passage after another. An hour later, his man came to tell him that dinner was ready, But he only waved him away and asked for the reading-lamp. Miss Cynthia had marked this, not with a parenthesis, as was her want, but with heavy lines underneath.

Is it not silence that determines and fixes the savor of love? Deprived of it, love would lose its eternal essence and perfume. Who has not known those silent moments which separated the lips to reunite the souls? In the margin she had written very lightly, where? Where, indeed, Chandler echoed in his thought. More than once he had suspected her of an experience similar to his own. This passage was in the familiar parentheses. It is death that is the guide of our life, and our life has no goal but death.

Our death is the mould into which our life flows. It is death that has shaped our features. Once more in the margin she had written very faintly, when. Chandler's thought, repeat. her. When? It was almost midnight when the automobile left Marjorie at the gate and purred noisily on. She came in, humming, surprised to find him waiting for her. Did you have a good time?

Lovely, I'll tell you all about it tomorrow. Pleasant dreams, Marjorie. And to you? And though we choose to right or to left of us, Chandler read again, on the heights or in the shallows, though in our struggle to break through the unshoused. that is drawn around all the acts of our life. We do violence to the instinct that moves us and try our hardest to choose against the choice of destiny. Yet shall the woman we

elect always have come to us, straight from the unvarying star. A light step sounded beside him. I forgot, said Marjorie. I'm sorry. Miss Bancroft gave me a note for you. Good night again. She was lovelier than ever as she stood in the half-light of the candle she carried in a turquoise blue, Camona, her little bare feet thrust into blue-satin Chinese slippers, embroidered in green and gold, and her wonderful golden hair rippling almost to her feet. Good night, my dear. Thank you for coming back. When her door had closed, he tore the note open eagerly, while his book slipped unheeded to the floor. Then he smiled at the characteristic whimsicality of it.

Without the grace of a beginning, it said merely, No, I won't. C. B. End of Chapter 4. Chapter 5 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertiel Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 5. Pillows As Carter had told Marjorie, he had a lot of dogs all the time.

He had not outgrown a boyish passion for pets, and, in addition to a thriving kennel of collies, he kept pigeons and rabbits, though he was secretly ashamed to admit the existence of the rabbits. The four corners of the Warner Place were devoted to livestock, pigeonhouse, chicken house, rabbit hutch, and doghouse. The chickens belonged to Mr. and Mrs. Warner and were the only profitable part of the menagerie. An article in a stray copy of an agricultural journal had let Carter to believe that, if he had a few pigeons, he might, in a year or two, give up the practice of law in the city and devote himself to raising squabs for the market. A hurried calculation on the

margin of the paper showed him that, at the normal rate of increase, it would eventually take four men divided into two shifts all day and all night to get the squabs ready to ship. Every morning, of course, he would go down, inspect each bird, tie its legs together with a red string, and put a tag on it, Keith's Squabbs. At first he considered the advisability of using his full name. Carter Keith's Squabbs looked better upon the whole, but as the brand became known, it might lead to embarrassment. Judith, for instance, when she had Mrs. Carter

Keith on her visiting cards, might be asked occasionally if she were the Squab Woman. And he was very sure that some of his friends in town would christen him, the Squab lawyer, and that, with the fatality attending such things, the name would stick.

Then the feathers. Pillow factories would be glad to get them, if the price was right. Where were the pillow factories anyhow? He made a memorandum in his notebook. find P.Fs. Get feather rates and particulars. The first few pillows, of course, he would want himself being about to go to housekeeping. Or would Judith think he was infringing upon her province?

Already she had gone to town several times on the mysterious excursions that women call shopping. Perhaps they had pillows. Aunt Belinda? He inquired at the breakfast table. Does the bride buy the pillows? What pillows? What bride? queried Mrs. Warner, somewhat startled, though by this time well accustomed to irrelevant questions. Any bride? All pillows. Er, sofa, and that sort of thing, you know? He concluded with a

comprehensive gesture. Why? I guess so. The old lady took off her spectacles, wiped them on a corner of the tablecloth, and readjusted them. Did you? I disremember. Yes, I did. We had geese and ma and me save the feathers and made my things. pillows. Suppose you hadn't had geese and Uncle Henry had. Would he have made the pillows? He did have geese. Everybody had in those days. Did he give you the feathers? No, he gave him to his sister-in-law's cousin. She was married six months before we was. She was a master hand at patchwork. My, her quilts. She always got the first prize at the County Fair. She got a three-year's hand-running for the same quilt. Mine wasn't nothing

alongside of hers. Carter's legal mind eagerly following up a clue was not thus to be diverted. Why didn't Uncle Henry give you his feathers instead of saving them for his cousin's sister-in-law? Sister-in-law's cousin, I said. She's Miss Jacob Sims over to Jonesville. I had one of them sovereign postcards from her yesterday with a picture of her husband's store on it. You can see the sign in the picture as plain as day. Sims General Store. Don't it beat all what they can do with them cards? Sister-in-law's cousin then.

Why didn't he give you his feathers? Mind me, had enough of our own. Do you suppose I'd have gone around asking my intended for feathers when I had plenty? But if you hadn't had any, I'd have got him some way. From him. Perhaps, why? Oh, I just wanted to know. What else did you buy when you went to housekeeping?

The sheets and pillow slips and towels, all the tablecloths and napkins, two blankets, one comfort, and six quilts all pieced by hand. Ma gave us a churn and a big rag rug, and Henry's spa give us two stoves and a cow, and Henry's Uncle Ned give us a sausage grinder. Never mind all the wedding presents. I was just asking about the feathers.

Your last question, rejoined Aunt Belinda with Summa's parody. Unless I disremember it was, what else did you buy when you went to housekeeping? So it was, returned Carter good-humoredly. I beg your pardon. I was merely endeavoring to discover the established precedent. The what?

The usual custom. Oh, then by a characteristically feminine process, independent of logic, Aunt Belinda's mind penetrated the inmost recesses of the young man's thought. Why don't you ask her? She suggested kindly. Carter blushed as he rose from the table. Thank you. I believe I will. I hadn't thought of that. Aunt Belinda followed him to the door. Mr. Keith, she said timidly. Don't you think that poor dog has suffered enough? What dog? He was unable for the moment to compass the vast distance between pillows and pups. The one in the shed.

with a rabbit tied to his neck. He's been there three days now, and when the wind comes from that way? Oh! With an effort, he recalled the half-grown collie that had killed a baby rabbit, and, with the body of his victim, fastened to his collar,

had been shut up in a dark shed to repent of his sins, with only a pail of water to sustain him. Yes, I guess so. I'll go out there. Your uncle Henry'll bury the rabbit, she called after him, then she added to herself. "'It needs it.' "'Shame-faced, hungry and ill.'

The collie came sheepishly to his master when Carter opened the door of the shed. Relieved of his odorous burden, he followed him out into the yard, blinking in the bright sunlight. "'That'll be about the last rabbit you'll take any interest in, old man, unless I'm much mistaken,' Carter remarked half to himself.

"'There's a highly moral lesson in it, for even so do our sins follow us. "'Go on up to the house now and ask, for something to eat with a farewell pat he dismissed the dog and started at a run for the eight-17 train uncle Henry had just left the barn with two tin pears full of foaming milk the dog nosed at them eagerly with pathetic little wines learned your lesson inquired the old man if you have you can have breakfast otherwise not I'll feed him father called mrs. Warner from the porch you go and bury that

rabbit. Having become accustomed to obedience early in his matrimonial career, father dutifully did as he was requested. When he came back, the collie was asleep in the sun, his penance over. Murmorous coos came from the pigeon houses, a cheery and industrious medley rose from the chicken yard, and shrill barks and yelpings came from the kennels. A white-winged pensioner of carters fluttered down from the roof, drank from a deep tile set into the ground, and went back to his own corner. Mr. Warner settled down into an old chair on the back porch with a long sigh of content. From within came the clatter of pots and pans, the rumble of stove-lids, and the brist-strokes of a broom. As Aunt Belinda worked, she sang to herself, in a quavering old voice

somewhat off the key but with a peculiar sweetness. Carter had lived with them for five or six years, and seemed more like a son than a mere border. The two old people had a little room downstairs off the sitting-room, and the entire second floor was given over to the young man. At his own expense he had fitted up a modern bathroom with a shower, and he had a sitting-room, den, and bedroom, as well as an extra bedroom for an occasional guest. In reality, the place was his at a very moderate rental. He had gradually replaced the worn old furniture with that of his own choosing and the faded carpets by good rugs.

The old people adored him and spent their lives in the endeavor to anticipate his slightest wish. when he bought his automobile uncle henry had a new shed built for it and laboriously made a wide path from the shed to the road once when carter brought home the menu of a banquet aunt belinda studied it for two days then posted uncle henry off to town on a very hot day to buy three or four new cookbooks which she had seen advertise in her household journal She experimented faithfully, but as nothing seemed to turn out right, she went back to the simple fare she knew so well how to provide. In return, Carter gave them something more than a tolerant tenderness. He remembered birthdays, was generous at Christmas, subscribed for the magazines they liked, and occasionally gave Aunt Belinda a rose or two from the huge boxes he brought out from town for Judith. Once he took them both to dinner at his club and afterward to the theatre, but as their excitement and mystification seemed greater than their pleasure, he had not done it again.

Aunt Belinda came out on the porch, wiping her flashed face with her apron. He was asking about pillows, she began as she sank into a dilapidated chair. What was he asking? He, in the Warner household, always meant Carter. Everything but what he wanted to know. I suppose that's the way of a lawyer. He wanted to know whether he would have to buy the pillows or she would, but he kept "'lept asking me about the feathers you give your sister-in-law's cousin when she was married.' "'Any mention of the approaching wedding always saddened the old people.' "'Aunt Belinda took off her spectacles and wiped away a bit of mist.

"'Some ways it don't seem as if I could have him go away,' she said with lips that quivered a little. "'If we'd had children!' "'If we'd had children,' Uncle Henry interrupted, "'they'd have got married and gone off and left us and we'd have felt worse. It's according to the way of children. You and I did it. I've been thinking these last few days, rejoined Aunt Belinda,

that I know now how Ma felt when we drove away. I remember she was crying, and I never understood how she could when we was so happy. The day that boy quits tramping around overhead till we're afraid the ceiling's coming down, and putting his wet towels on the floor, and covering the whole place with his litter,

and begins to move his mrs. menagerie. There, there, mother, comforted Uncle Henry. Don't take it so hard. We've got each other left, and that's all we started out with. It's more than wonderful and magnificent, Carter was saying. It's astonishing. Miss Cynthia had succumbed to the metropolitan wiles of the serpent

and bought the hat as Judith had foreseen. She was wearing it even though they were in the house. Since she bought it, she had taken a it off only to sleep. You may say anything you like about it, returned Miss Cynthia somewhat on the defensive, but you can't tell me that it isn't becoming. No, Carter rejoined in his most judicial manner. I can't.

That is, unless I want to lie, and as Aunt Belinda says, I do admire to tell the truth. Miss Cynthia's cheeks were pink, and her eyes sparkled brilliantly. The hat was large, even for a fashion of appearance. given to extremes and hats. It was composed simply of Irish lace, a twist of tool, a mass of white plumes, and a buckle that put the evening stars to shame. One long plume, drooping lightly over the brim to Miss Cynthia's shoulder, might conceivably have stirred covetedness in the soul of Henry of Navarre. We might rent it, suggested Judith mischievously. Not while I'm wearing it, the owner flashed back. I didn't mean that, but from

half-past ten, say, until three or four in the morning, that's the time you'd naturally expect a hat of that sort to be out. If it has to be out at those hours, I'll take it out myself. If you try me too far, I'll sit up with you and sleep late mornings, as Judith does. Judith laughed and stooped to kiss the flushed face under the nodding plumes. Get my scarf, commanded Miss Cynthia, and the other things. With the delight of a child she spread forth her treasures for Carter's inspection. the net scarf, so heavy with silver bangles that Miss Cynthia's frail shoulders must bend a little under the burden of it, a tea-gown in pinks and blues that would have allured a pompadour,

a lace fan, a bottle of perfume, a pair of black velvet slippers with rhinestone buckles, and a wonderful veil of white chiffon that seemed once to have been laid over roses and remembered it. "'That's good,' said Carter approving of the veil. "'That means you're coming out in the car.' "'What?' demanded Miss Cynthia with astonished eyes. That veil, that's what it's for, you know. It isn't, she denied.

It's merely to protect my hat from the dampness when I sit out on the porch in the evening. Oh, he returned sincerely disappointed. Won't you come? No, I won't. Aunt Belinda said she wouldn't, too, he went on in wheedling tones. But she did. Everybody does what I asked them to. Except me.

she replied pointedly those people have spoiled you their life revolves about you as the earth about the sun am i not in a way the sun of their household shouldn't life revolve about such as i it shouldn't put in judith but it does and not only at warners either without being asked she went to her harp in the corner of the big room swept the strings idly then sat down to play they were in the big living-room upstairs where Miss Cynthia spent most of her time. Breakfast and luncheon were served to her there, but at night she insisted upon going down to dinner, dressed as though for guests. A screen concealed the cavernous fireplace at the end of the long room,

but the candles on the mantle brought into vivid relief the stag's head upon the chimney-piece, moth-eaten, like many other things about the house. The floor was bare with only a few small rugs scattered upon it. Fond of marine metaphors, Miss Cynthia alluded to it as a sea of floor, dotted with islands of rug. A cabinet in the corner held a few bits of bric-a-brac,

but one whole side of the room was devoted to books. Opposite the books, four large windows with a glass door between them, opened out upon the balcony that ran along the side of the house and overlooked the garden. The door opposite the fireplace opened into Miss Cynthia's bedroom, which in turn opened out upon the front balcony by another door. Judas's two rooms were across the hall.

Carter drew a long breath of delight as Judith began to play. She was near the window, and the moonlight shone full upon her face. The rest of the room was in shadow, save for the two candles that burned fitfully upon the mantle, flickering in the scented breeze that floated in from the garden. Deep, vibrant cords broke out upon the stillness, full-toned harmonies that appealed to the soul of the man as Judith herself appealed. She wore white, as she usually chose. to do, but there were crimson roses

in her hair and at her belt, and now and then, for an instant, the moonlight won an answering glow from the heart of the ruby that blazed in her betrothal ring. For the thousandth time the man wondered how it happened that she loved him. During the year and more of their engagement

the miracle of it had not quite vanished. Continually she stirred him to new allegiance. She kept his blood on fire with ambition. To do, to achieve, to fight, to struggle, and to go on with fresh courage after every failure, these aspirations came to him subtly, but nonetheless surely from the woman he loved.

The last full cord sounded through the room, then at length even the echo ceased. Judith still had one hand upon her harp-strings, the other had fallen at her side. She had turned her face away from the room and toward the moonlight. Exquisitely remote as some far star, she seemed to have entered some fastness of her own soul, Where no man might ever hope to follow.

Judith, his voice broke upon her name. She did not answer and he called again. Judith? She turned with a soft laugh. Look, dear, she whispered. Aunt Cynthia is asleep. Under the nodding plumes, indeed, the little figure was still. Judith went to her and touched her gently.

Come, dear, come. Take it off, murmured Miss Cynthia a little fretfully. Yes, I will. will, come. With her newly acquired splendor almost hiding her face, Miss Cynthia sleepily bad, Carter good night. He had the grace not to remind her that she had threatened to sit up until very late. Presently Judith came back. Let's go out on the balcony, she said in a low tone. Then we shan't disturb her. They tiptoed out and closed the door quietly. Oh, the night, breathed Judith. The lovely, lovely night.

Darling, said Carter, have we pillows? Pillows, repeated Judith in amazement. For what? For us, for the house, you know. Does the bride buy them, and have you? She laughed, but the full deep tenderness of the undertone thrilled him. Of course, long ago. Feathers, he queried. Indeed not, she rejoined scornfully. What then? Eiderdown.

Six from Aunt Cynthia. It was her last extravagance but one. Why? I'm sorry in a way, he answered, taking her into his arms. I'm going to have feathers, and I wanted to give him to you. Dear, murmured Judith to his coat-collar, You haven't the faintest idea how funny you are, nor how lovable. Come over here and tell me.

He led her to the swinging seat at the end of the balcony, and they sat there, repeating the lover's litany with all its adorable nonsense until, as Miss Cynthia said, the moon got tired and went to bed, thus shaming them to the sweet sorrow of parting. End of Chapter 5. Chapter 6 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 6. The House of Hearts In the peace and quiet of Sunday afternoon, Chandler was reading aloud to Marjorie from the book Miss Cynthia had sent him. Suddenly, his deep voice lured unsuspected harmonies from our prosaic English,

and gave to the spoken word a melody wholly distinct from its meaning. It is we who do not understand, for that we never rise above the earth level of our intellect. Let us but ascend to the first snows of the mountain, and all inequalities are leveled by the purifying hand of our intellect. the horizon that opens before us. What difference, then, between a pronouncement of Marcus Aurelius and the words of a child complaining of the cold?

Let us be humble and learn to distinguish between accident and essence. Let not sticks that float cause us to forget the prodigies of the Gulf. The most glorious thoughts and the most degraded ideas can no more ruffle the eternal surface of our soul than, amidst the stars

of heaven, Himalaya or precipice can alter the surface of the earth. a look a kiss and the certainty of a great invisible presence all is said and i know that she who is by my side is my equal he paused and looked eagerly at marjorie expecting to find her face alight with response but her blue eyes had a far-away look that chilled his own enthusiasm she did not seem to notice that his voice had ceased pressing the tip of a rosy forefinger to her short upper lip she politely but ineffectually endeavored to smother a yawn then she turned surely that isn't the end of it yes lied chandler tactfully what more is there to be said marjorie didn't know and said so with a dreamy lack of interest or comprehension bees and yellow butterflies hovered above the drifts of clover across the road an exquisite hint of honeysuckle came from afar the new growth upon the cedars was vividly green by contrast with the rest and that too brought fragrance though of another sort when the wind came from the proper direction the little blue sailor on the weather-vane at the cross-road spun around giddily that afternoon perched above his giddly golden arrow. Whether his seas of air were calm or tempestuous, whether the day brought warm

rain or biting sleet, the jaunty tar faced fortune and misfortune alike with the same serene smile. Chandler had purposely chosen the sailor, though he wondered at the time if the parallel was not somewhat too obvious. However, only Judith had seen the likeness between the mariner, far inland, destined to abide where fate had placed him until Decay claimed him for its own, and Chandler, longing for life as may only those who are not in the thick of it, anchored by his wheelchair. She forbore to speak of it, though sometimes the mist softened her dark eyes when she saw Chandler watching the weather-vane, with wistful pain plainly mirrored upon his face. She guessed, too, that now and then, when the wind

blew straight from the north and the figure faced the house, that the cheery smile brought a bit of comfort, painted though it was. Just now the sailor's profile was turned toward the veranda where the two sat. One foot was upon the edge of the arrow, the other was poised in mid-air as though, with a brisk, I, aye, sir, in answer to a command, the little man had started forward, and had upon the instant been overtaken by his destiny. Where did you get him? asked Marjorie.

I had him made. He's cunning. I should think his clothes would wear out, though, being outdoors all the time. They do, but he's more fortunate than the rest of us. All he requires is a fresh coat of paint once in two years. I'm glad I can have more than that,

she laughed. I love clothes. That is, pretty ones. So do I, Marjorie. I like to look at yours. And to button them. And to button them? Everything I've got either hooks or buttons down the back,

so you'll have plenty to do. Father used to say once in a while that he understood how the old man felt who committed suicide because he got so blaming tired of the eternal buttonin' and unbuttonin. One might for oneself, remarked Chandler thoughtfully.

But the happiest people in the world are those who serve others rather than themselves. The more you give, the more you have. The more you take, without giving, the less you have that you can keep. Marjorie was silent. Presently, she put her finger to her lip again, then crimsoned with embarrassment

at Chandler's comprehending smile. It's a sleepy day, he said kindly. I have often wondered whether Sundays were really longer than other days or whether they only seem so. I guess they're longer, she murmured. I think so. If I didn't have you to look at, I believe I'd go to sleep. I can go upstairs, she suggested, or out for a walk.

Better take a walk. Algernan must need exercise. Would you mind getting me a pillow? When she had brought it, Chandler leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, simulating slumber until Marjorie had turned the corner at the crossroads. and the beaming little sailor had swiftly spun around on his high perch to follow her with his eyes. I don't blame you, old man, muttered Chandler, but she's free, and you and I are fixtures. Child hunger burned in his blood for an instant, then mercifully died out. Marjorie's mere

presence in his house brought to him with poignant pain that yet had in it a hint of sweetness, the realization of all he had missed. The sound of her step upon the stair, the turn of her rounded arm, the rustle of her skirts, the dimple at her bare elbow, the music of her rare laughter, the indefinable fragrance that surrounded her like an invisible garment, all these meant to him, not Marjorie, but a woman incarnate. To bear man in agony, he thought, to nourish him at her breast, to teach him most of the good that he ever learns, to give herself to him through love of him, to wait, to pray, to beckon him upward, forever giving, sacrificing yielding, and what under high heaven do we ever give her back?

Restlessly he turned to the book again. Dear little Marjorie, of course she could not understand. Of the true predestined love alone, he read, do I speak here? When fate sends forth the woman it has chosen for us, sends her forth from the fastnesses of the great spiritual cities in which we all ungodiously dwell, and she awaits us at the crossing of the road.

we have to traverse when the hour is come we are warned at the first glance some there are who attempt to force the hand of fate wildly pressing down their eyelids so as not to see that which had to be seen struggling with all their puny strength against the eternal forces they will contrive perhaps to cross the road and go toward another sent thither but not for them miss cynthia had not marked the passage but chandler enclosed it in pencilled brackets later on he heavily underlined this may it not be during one of those profound moments when his head is pillowed on a woman's breast that the hero learns to know the strength and steadfastness of his star instantly the hour came back vividly alive as though it were yesterday across the gray web of the intervening years it moved majestically as upon wings of flame pierced through and through with torture as it had been when his every sense had been exquisitely alive to its own hurt the hour had yet brought him a certain divine ecstasy it thrilled his soul even now mysteriously it summoned like a bugle call the heights to which it bade him were shrouded in mist and inaccessible but the dweller in the valley whose spiritual vision has for a moment of rapture encompassed the region of the high gods must forever keep his face turned upward waiting and even praying for the blinding light marjorie had gone down the road that led to the river humming to herself the fragment of an old song algernan gambled after her keeping his balance as well as he might upon unsteady feet that were too large for the rest of him with his nose to the warm earth he sniffed appreciatively at the tempting trail of chimp monk and squirrel but did not fail to follow faithfully the small heels of the adorable one in blue she carried no parasol yet dragged her hat carelessly by its flopping brim not in the least annoyed by the fact that its wreath of pink and white clover had become loosened and was perilously near the dust it bobbed fantastically in front of algernon but he never managed to overtake it though it seemed as if it might be a pleasant thing for a puppy to chew upon

At the riverbank, Marjorie paused. One path led along the stream, the other wound around the foot of the fateful hill. The mere memory of that fence made her shudder. Alginan having an inquiring disposition, investigated a clover blossom to which a bumblebee was clinging, then swiftly repented in piercing whales. Oh, said Marjorie softly. Poor little doggie, come here. Digging her heels into the soft earth, she descended the riverbank. with the whining puppy following her, scooped up a handful of soft mud, and plastered it over the injured nose.

There. Just breathe through your mouth a little while, and you'll be all right. Algernan proceeded to breathe through his mouth as requested. Indeed, he had to, if he breathed at all, for Marjorie had been generous with her mother earth. She washed her hands, and in the carefree manner of the young, wiped them upon her lace-trimmed petticoat.

She sat down under a tree, thinking as she did, that she was just with, where she had been a little over a week ago with Judith. As she walked the placid river, rippling peacefully toward the lake below, she remembered the rose petals and began to wonder about the prince. She's found hers, she mused idly, remembering what Chandler had said about Judas's approaching marriage.

It was Mr. Keith who had given her the dog. He had seemed so much taller and older than Marjorie that she had been the least bit afraid of him, until he spoke. I suppose that big Ruby is her in front. engagement ring, she thought. I wonder why he didn't give her a diamond. Then she added to herself with sudden feminine perception. I guess she'd rather have the ruby. It's more like her some way. Algernon was sitting close to Marjorie with his tongue hanging out. He was breathing painfully,

but he had ceased to whine. Bad boy, she said reprovingly. That's what you get for being curious. Come along now and forget about it. Much chastened in manner he totaled after her along the road which led around the base of the hill. Presently she came to a bit of level ground. Upon my word, said Marjorie to herself, if there isn't a new house. Who'd think anyone would be building here? We'll investigate it, Algernan.

I love new houses, don't you? Evidently, Algernan did, though he had to be assisted up the four or five rude steps which led into the bungalow. It was made of cement with a green-tiled roof and all the outside woodwork painted the same soft green. The plastering was done and the floors were laid, so she could easily imagine what the house would be like when it was finished. There was a large living room which

opened out upon the veranda, and a small room off the living room which she shrewdly supposed would be someone's den. A big stone fireplace took up almost the entire end of the largest room, and a space was marked off at either side for seats to make an ingle-knock. I suppose the lids of the seats will come up, she thought, and they'll keep the co-es. and wood for the fire in him. That's what I'd do. Separated from the rest of the house by a narrow hall was a suite, which was evidently a bedroom and two dressing-rooms. Each of the dressing-rooms had a bath opening from it, and the larger and sunnier of the two dressing-rooms had a huge closet in it. Oh, my, said Marjorie to herself. That'll be her closet, whoever she is. Lucky woman.

Come on, Algernan. Let's find the dining-room and kitchen. Absorbed in the dining-room, sweet which was evidently for a guest being connected with the den by another hall, and mildly interested in the kitchen and pantry, Marjorie did not hear the purr of an approaching automobile that, with a final wheeze, paused at the entrance. When she heard voices in the house, she was at first frightened, then confused. Of course it would be the people who owned the house or curious passers-by like herself. Rather awkward, she thought, even at the best, I'll have to go through the living-room and they're right in it. remembering her unhappy experience upon the hill,

she did not attempt the jump that would have landed her in the sand outside the kitchen door, where as yet there were no steps. I'd break my ankle if I did it, she continued to herself, and have to be carried home. Come on, doggie. The voices had ceased in the living room. Carter had taken Judith into his arms with a half-whispered, Please, princess, kiss me. And Judith had yielded an impassioned answer.

never guessing that this one supreme moment was to mark the end of her absolute faith in him. How seldom do we recognize the last things as they confront us? Could we know, as we nod carelessly to a passing friend, that our eyes are never to look into his again, would we not pause for an instant to say farewell? That final hand-clasp? Would it not be closer? That last letter?

Would it not be less hastily written? That last embrace? that last kiss. O ye who love us, how the tears would choke us as we tried to say goodbye. Judith broke away from him her face flaming.

Marjorie stood in the open door smiling because she saw friends instead of strangers. Carter turned, laughed a little awkwardly. Then Judith, with her shamed eyes seeking his, saw a look there that she had never seen before. His face seemed subtly to change.

It was not Carter, but another man whom she did not know, and never would know. As quickly as it had come, it passed. Judith was the first to speak. We came over to measure for curtains, she said in her cool, high-bred voice. Oh, returned Marjorie. Is it your house? Yes, answered Carter, clearing his throat. Our house. He smiled at Judith as he spoke, but her heart was still cold with the prescience of impending catastrophe. It's lovely to find you here. She went on striving valiantly for self-possession. You're our first visitor, isn't she Carter?

He nodded and turned away toward the fireplace. Come, said Judith. Let me show it to you. Trembling a little, she pointed out the door leading to the veranda, explained the plan for the Inglnook, indicated Carter's den, then took her back through the hall to the sunny side of the house. This is—she hesitated, and her high color came back. Our room! We each have a dress. We each have a dress. room and bath, and I have a perfectly tremendous closet, big enough for two trunks. One dressing room will be pink and the other blue, but this room is to be as white as the driven snow. Furniture, woodwork, wall, draperies, rugs, everything. Not even a hint of color nor a picture,

only a few casts and perhaps a plaster by relief. I have retinted for contrast. I've wanted a white floor waxed, but it doesn't seem practical, and tile is too cold, and too much like a hospital, so I'm going to cover it with white rugs. It will be lovely, said Marjorie politely but without enthusiasm. I think so. Did you see the dining room? Yes, I've been all through the house. Then will you excuse me while I measure these windows? It won't take long. Certainly.

Marjorie went back into the living room where Carter still stood, moodily looking into the empty fireplace. Your dog's nose is, well soiled, he said without looking around. A bee stung him, and so I put mud on his nose. Perhaps the sting is still there. If so, it will have to be taken out. Mr. Chandler will take it out. I think he can.

If he can't, I will. You're very kind, returned Marjorie politely. She sauntered out upon the veranda. Carter followed her at a respectful distance. Do you still call him Algernon? Yes, Nanny for short. That's better. I don't like Algernon.

I didn't either. "'That's why I named him that. "'He was such an abominable little beast at first. "'But since I've grown fond of him, the name seems nice, too.' "'Marjorie smiled as she spoke, a little girlish smile, "'full of the winsome innocence of youth. "'Just then, Judith appeared. "'We were talking about the dog's name,' Marjorie continued.

"'He's still Algernon, and it seems as though it were going to stay by him "'until the bitter,' queried Carter. A dog's life is a phrase that implies bitterness, Judas suggested. Have you named your house? asked Marjorie. Yes. Judas's dark eyes kindled an answer to some inner flame. We call it the House of Hearts. It's cunning, but why? From a bit of verse we happened to read together the day we began to plan it. Little Sunset House of Hearts standing all alone, I could come and sweep the leaves from your stepping stone.

Her full, deep contralto lingered lovingly upon the words. Her voice had a peculiar throaty quality that sometimes reminded Carter of a cello. Shall we go now? He asked of Judith. Yes.

Won't you come with us, Marjorie, and stay to tea? We'd love to have you. Thank you, but I mustn't. Mr. Chandler will be lonely without me. So shall we, responded Carter, consciously gallant. Yes, but he's lame. If it isn't out of your way, will you take me home?

With pleasure Judith and Marjorie took the back seat and talked commonplaces until they came to the little house at the crossroads. When Marjorie got out, Judith followed her and took the front seat beside Carter. They waved a goodbye to Marjorie, then Carter turned to Judith with the old loving smile

as they started off. Apparently all was as before, yet Judas spent a wakeful night in wonder and fear. She had the sense of impending change. Carter slept soundly as was his wont, but he dreamed of the House of Hearts for the first time, with no Judith in it. Instead, it was full of marjories,

in blue gowns and clover-trimmed hats, smiling at him from every room, framed in every doorway, bidding his reluctant feet to follow wherever they chose to lead. When he woke, the sun was shining, but it took the splash of cool water upon his face to banish the phantoms of the night and bring back the clear, sane facts of every day.

End of Chapter 6 Chapter 7 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 7. Woman's Work What were you laying out to do today, Father? Nothing. I thought maybe after a while I'd tinker a spell, but I don't feel to do nothing right now. Aunt Belinda's smooth forehead contracted into a frown.

she came out on the porch with a pan full of peas, sat down in her low rocker and began to sell them. Why? demanded Uncle Henry and swift defense against the implied reproach. Seems to me you might be doing something. I work all day, weekdays and Sundays, and you set and set. I don't, neither.

Don't I milk the cow and take care of the horse and feed the pigs and keep his automobile shined up? If you think that ain't work, You'd better try it. I will, rejoined Aunt Belinda with ill-concealed sarcasm. After I get the beds made and the dishes washed and the house swept and dusted and his litter picked up from all over upstairs, and the rabbits and pigeons and chickens and dogs fed and the wash counted, I'll shine up the automobile.

I'd admire to do it. Shah, grunted the old man. You ain't got nothing to do. That is, he added hasty to. nothing much. Let me change places with you, she suggested. Mornings I'll wake you up and ask you if it ain't most time for breakfast. After you get up, I'll have another nap.

Then I'll dress myself and come out and eat. If I want more sausages or more pancakes, you'll fry them for me, and after him and me get through with our breakfast, you can set down and have yours will I look at the paper. Then I'll go out and walk round in the sun for a spell. sat down and milk the cow, brush up the horse, and get him some oats, then come back and set on the porch. Meanwhile, you'll be clearing off the table and washing the dishes and straightening up the kitchen.

Then, after you've made the beds and swept and dusted the house, you can come out and set on the porch till I've got rested enough from combing the horse to eat again. You can get me a nice dinner, and after I've edd it, I'll go in the setting room and lie down and take a little nap while you're washing up. the dishes and setting the table for supper. After you get through and ready to rest an hour or so, I'll go down to the post office and talk politics with the lazy loafers sitting around on soapboxes and explaining how the country is going to the dogs and the President Ait never done nothing that's right. After I've come back and rested from my walk, I'll look at the automobile and if it needs

wiping, I'll wipe it. By that time I'll be hungry again, and you'll can have my supper ready. After I've edded, I'll set on the porch while you wash the dishes and after you get them done, it'll be time for me to go to bed. La sakes, mother, how you do take on. Oh, that ain't nothing but woman's work. It doesn't amount to shocks. Women's work, snorted Aunt Belinda. The dull color rose to the roots of her hair. Who made it woman's work? God did, returned Uncle Henry piously. He had the air of one imparting information to an inquiring child. Hump, you'd better say the evil one did it and not be laying it to Providence.

You'd come a heap sight nearer the truth. Men works outside the house and women works inside it, resumed Uncle Henry after a thoughtful interval. Things is divided up equal. I ain't seen it so, she retorted. I ain't never seen a man yet that was willing to do what a woman would call a good day's work. "'Ain't I lived on a farm? "'Don't I know?' "'But the harvest in Belinda.

"'Don't you recall that?' "'Yes,' she returned pointedly. "'I recall it. "'I recall getting up at four in the morning "'and getting breakfast for the hands. "'I recall spending the morning "'getting dinner for the hands, "'the afternoon washing up and getting supper for the hands,

"'and the evening washing up while the hand "'sets outside and tells how hard they've worked. i recall the big kettle full of pancake batter the preservant kettle full of doughnuts and the barrel of cider on the porch some being carried to the hands about ten in the morning as they toiled in the fields i recall the whole hams and the loaves of bread and the wash boiler full of potatoes i've peeled so many potatoes in my time that it's a wonder i ain't ashamed to look one of em in the eye uncle henry laughed with the assumption of heartiness but she refused to be mollified you can't tell me nothin about the harvestin for i know it all backwards and forwards a man'll set on a plough and let a horse drag him around a field all day and come back and tell the women folks how hard he's worked and the reapin and the makin hay i've seen a man pile up just enough hay to make a nice bed for himself and pull his hat over his hat over his eyes and lay down and go to sleep till it's time for the next meal. I was sick that day, Belinda, and besides, I hadn't been laying down more in a minute or two

when you came and woke me up. If I hadn't woke you up, we wouldn't have had any hay that year. There was a black cloud the size of the Baptist Church coming as fast as it could. But it didn't rain, Belinda, he returned plaintively. It wasn't my fault it passed. It wasn't my fault. It over. No, he said earnestly, I reckon not. It was more than fifteen years ago that I laid down in my own hayfield to rest for a spell because I was sick, and you ain't through reminding me of it yet. Tain't no crime as I see, and if you could have made it rain, you would have. We'd had a terrible dry spell, she said half to herself. I reckon I know the weather as well as anybody does, and if it had been going to rain,

I wouldn't have laid down sick as I was. Having a wife to take care of, I'd have kept up. Aunt Belinda emptied the shelled peas out of her apron into the pan at her side. She stared at him over the steel rim of her spectacles. Her jaw had dropped and her mouth was wide open, but no speech came forth, undoubtedly because no speech at her command seemed adequate.

What about him? demanded Uncle Henry hastily changing the subject. I ain't heard you criticize him for not working, and he's got the easiest time of anybody I ever knew. I've been in his office, and there ain't nothing in it but a bookcase and a couple of desks and one of them machines that writes letters. He's even got a woman to run that for him. Mornings he sets there and tells her what to write and she writes it, and afternoons he just talks to people. Do you call that working? He ain't my own flesh and blood.

neither am i i'm nothing but a relative by marriage relatives by marriage are the most trying of any of em she observed and that's sayin a pile if there's anything on earth that can be more trying than any kind of a relative i don't know what it is but relatives by marriage comes first easy uncle henry cleared his throat and turned restlessly in his chair then he began to twirl his thumbs a sure sign of mental agitation the wife of his bosom sat very erect with a spot of bright color upon either cheek she bristled as it were with resentment as i was sayin she went on he ain't my own flesh and blood nor even a relative by marriage as long as he pays his board regular taint none of my business so long as i have reason to believe he come by it honest except for combing the horse and milking the cow he ain't got it no easier than you have la me she sighed i wish i didn't have nothing to do but to go down town into a nice office every day and put my feet up on a deck and say, Belinda, interrupted Uncle Henry in amazement. I was just quoting, that is, I was just going to quote from you and from him. Don't you remember the day you and him was building the pigeon house and kept hitting your thumbs instead of the nails he was driving at?

And the day his puppy fell off a chair into a pail of milk and drowned it itself and ruined the milk so it had to be fed to the pigs. I was privileged to be sitting down in the kitchen for a few minutes while I was pitting cherries for a pie and to hear the language that was spoke on my porch by both of you. I ain't making no remarks about your quotations. I was wondering how any modest, decent woman could want to put her feet on a man's desk.

I didn't say I wanted to. I said I wish I didn't have nothing to do but that. Can't you hear straight? If you can't, you'd better buy yourself an ear trumpet. Don't want no ear trumpet, murmured Uncle Henry sadly. I hear enough as tis. Morn enough sometimes. The peas rattled into the pan.

The fresh, pungent odor of the pods came gratefully to his nostrils. A blue pigeon, its iridescent neck gleaming in the sun, flooded down to the sunken tile for a drink of cool water. In the distance, the chickens clucked cheerfully. speaking of relatives, resumed Aunt Belinda with a sigh, and more especially of relatives by marriage, there ain't nothing that can be as exasperating as a husband without half-trying. Tain't no trouble to him at all,

and likewise taint no trouble to him to be decent. The shaft glanced aside harmlessly. Uncle Henry was watching the pigeon. If there's any prettier sight on earth than a bird drinking, he mused. I don't know what it is. I mind me of the time you and me was driving to Jonesville in the spring

when all the fruit trees wasn't blossom, and there was a pair of red birds building their nest in a crab tree by the road. I can see their wings now in the green and the white and smell the apple blossoms and hear them making love to each other.

Not singing much, but just chirping. We couldn't understand what they was saying, they could. I reckon it all means the same thing as a man taking a woman into his arms and whispering to her that he loves her. I reckon it does, replied Aunt Belinda softly. And when we was coming back there was the same two birds. She was sitting on a stone in the brook drinking and throwing her pretty head back, like she was given thanks for every drop of the cool water. And he was

setting up in the apple blossoms with his head on one side singing to her. And while we was watching, she come back to him and they went into the apple blossoms together. Seems almost as if it was yesterday. Yes, sighed the old wife.

It does. There was a long silence. The pigeon flew away and a pair of white ones came to the deep, cool pool in the grass, cooing to one another while they drank, shy, half-murmured notes of the world's great love-song that sounded through the hills and valleys, and to which even the worms in the earth must answer, because it was June. If you want me to work, resumed Uncle Henry with an air of patient resignation,

I can take the kitchen clock apart and put it together again. I ain't done it for quite a spell now, and it don't seem to me it strikes as brisk as it did. No, Henry, the clock strikes as hard. plenty brisk enough for me. You can carry these pots to the chickens, if you like, and then feed the pigeons, and I'll get dinner. After you've had your afternoon nap, if you don't mind, I wish you'd hitch up and take me over to Miss Bankrofts.

I want her receipt for putting up strawberries and that pudding he had there the other night that he was telling me about. All right, Belinda. Then he asked with fresh interest, what are we going to have for dinner? salt pork with cream gravy and boiled potatoes and these peas. I thought, maybe I might stir up a few pancakes and put them together with gel and sprinkle some powdered sugar on top.

I ain't used up all of last year's gel yet. A pleased expression settled down upon Uncle Henry's face, destined to abide there until it was time to hitch up the horse. Obediently he took the pan of pods and started toward the chicken yard. At Belinda took off her spectacly. and wiped her eyes. He is trying, she thought. But I reckon the Lord meant for us to have our trials mixed up in everything

instead of coming separate. Anyway, I ain't heathen enough to think any of us gets things that ain't meant. When he returned with the empty pan, she was singing, Rock of Ages, in a quavering soprano which scarcely made the composer's intention evident, but had a cheery sound, nevertheless. Uncle Henry filled the pan with the corn which Carter bought already to save trouble and dragged his chair to the edge of the porch. When the first handful of corn struck the brown earth around the steps,

a cloud of pigeons descended with a pleasant rush and flutter. They conversed loudly in their own language as they ate, and Uncle Henry shrewdly surmised that they were expressing gratitude for the kindness that provided corn so generously at regular hours. That's about all they could be saying, he thought, except that it's a nice day and that they're much obliged for the water. The carrier pigeon held himself a little apart from the rest. He ate less greedily and seemed scarcely to notice the varied murmur around him. As a great man in a crowd, he chose to be

solitary in spite of it, and to commune with his inner self rather than with his fellows. He was a young bird, but he was learning that at sunrise he must go to his master's window and wait, cooing upon the sill, till the window was opened and a message tied under his wing. Then he must go east as the morning itself went, over the dusty road where the ferns and wild roses were thickest, across the river, through the valley, and above a field of clover to the big white house surrounded by a box hedge that breathed pungent odors afar. The other window was upon the shady side of the house. Here too he must coo and tap upon the screen with his bill until a woman's hand upon which a ruby glowed reached out from a filmy mass of lace and

brought him corn. When the message had been taken from him, him and another put in its place, he must retrace his flight to the window from whence he started, where again there would be corn. Having these things to muse upon, should not a bird separate himself from the common flock to consider the mysterious workings of destiny, and to observe the precise payment that followed labor well done. He was the first to fly away after he had eaten and drunk to his satisfaction. The others followed shortly, though corn was still sprinkled upon the ground. Not even a pigeon went hungry from uncle. Uncle Henry's door.

Dinner! Called Belinda from the savory recesses of the kitchen, and Uncle Henry went in, his face wreathed in smiles, to greet her with the fond look which men bestow upon women about to offer them food.

Filled with the same sort of content that diffused itself among the pigeons, he lay down after dinner for his forty winks, while she washed the dishes, and put the kitchen into the perfect order which secretly delighted her housewifely soul. While he was hitching the old sorrel horse to the dilapidated buggy, she changed her blue calico gown for a fresh black

and white percale, and locked up the house as carefully as if they were going to Europe for six months. You hadn't intended me to go to Miss Bankrofts with you, had you, mother? he asked as they started. No, you can drive back to the post office and get my magazine and a couple of stamps. I've been meaning to write some letters all the week, but I've been so driven I got around to it. "'You come back for me in an hour, and mebbe will drive a spell. "'It's such a pretty day.' "'All right, mother.' "'He was so glad that he was not to be taken to Miss Bankrofts,

that his burden seemed light indeed. He was not as he now and then remarked, "'A visiting man.' "'It's a comfort to go and see lame folks,' "'Aunt Belinda said as they stopped in front of the big white house. "'You know, before you go in that they're home, they ain't Gaden. nonetheless she politely made the usual inquiry of the maid who opened the door. Yes, Miss Judith is home, too. I guess they'd want you to go right up.

The two were in the shady corner of the upper balcony. Judith was embroidering her wedding gown, and Miss Cynthia was reading aloud from a book which she instantly dropped when Mrs. Warner appeared. "'This is lovely of you,' said Miss Cynthia, kindly offering her hand. "'You'll excuse my not rising.' "'Certainly. How do you do?' With a bow to Judith, she sank into the offered chair. Henry had some errands to the post office,

so I said I'd come here for a spell. I wanted to see you both and find out how you make your strawberry jam and that puddin you had the other Sunday for dinner. He ain't got through talking about that pudding. You're spoiling him, Mrs. Warner, laughed Judith. I'm afraid I won't be able to live with him. "'Any time you can't,' rejoined Aunt Belinda meaningly. "'You can just send him back to us.

"'Me and Henry can live with him all right.' "'Sufficiently rebuked, Judith disappeared in search of the desired recipe. "'As for the strawberries,' said Miss Cynthia, "'all you have to do is to measure the berries, "'cover them with an equal measure of sugar, "'and let them stand overnight in a cool place. "'In the morning let them cook very slowly "'until the syrup is thin.

and the berries are plump, then seal as usual. That sounds easy. I reckon I can remember that. He says he never at such preserves. He, returned Miss Cynthia with slightly sarcastic emphasis. His very kind to praise. Aunt Billinda bristled inwardly for a moment, waiting to pounce upon Miss Cynthia

should reflections be made upon Carter, but nothing more was said until Judith came back with a neat copy of the receipt. Thank you. I'll just put it in my bag and he can have it for his supper tomorrow night. Don't say nothing to him about it. I want him to be surprised. Surprise, said Miss Cynthia philosophically, is the essential weapon of the feminine equipment. After a man has learned to love a woman, all she needs to do is to keep him surprised. She need not be unpleasant, but she must be unexpected.

This was too deep for the visitor, but Judith smiled. approvingly. Not to be left at the post and to get safely back on familiar ground, Aunt Belinda harked back to the earlier hours of the day. Me and Henry was having a discussion this morning about women's work. What it is and what it ought to be. Woman's work, commented Miss Cynthia. Is anything a man can make her do? Oh, Aunt Cynthia, laughed Judith. Don't be so cynical. I'm not. Have you ever seen a man carry a burden when there were woman's shoulders near enough to shift it to. Henry brings in the wood, murmured Aunt Belinda, and the milk, and before we got the sink put in the

kitchen, he always brought in the water. I'm not speaking of material things, Miss Cynthia explained. Man's strength is physical and woman's moral. The superiority of each has come through constant use. Henry is moral, observed Aunt Belinda somewhat resentful. and so is he. He, meaning Carter, asked Miss Cynthia with her dark eyes flashing wickedly. Aunt Belinda nodded. I haven't a doubt of it. Of course I don't know Mr. Warner very well, but I do know Carter,

and I can assure you that he is absolutely moral and upright, a person to be respected. In fact, he's almost too good to be true. When the visitor had driven away, Judith came to me. Miss Cynthia's chair and knelt by it. Dear, she said softly, aren't you ashamed? Of what?

Tormenting that dear innocent old lady. Aren't you sorry? Miss Cynthia softened. Perhaps a little, but I haven't much amusement, you know. Save your sharp arrows for Carter and me. Don't waste them on her. She's as devoted to him as his own mother might be,

and you only hurt her. He's like an only child-time. to her. Yes, returned Miss Cynthia with a vigorous nod of assent. You just wait until you get to living with that only child, and you'll see what vicarious maternal devotion has done for him. I've often wondered if the mothers of only sons don't smile a little bit when girls take him away from them.

They know what they've let the girls in for. Dearest, you're awfully crossed this afternoon. Won't you have a cup of tea? I believe I will. Have it made very strong. please, and tonight I'll sit up with you and the one godlike human being in whom there is no flaw. Sustained by the cup that cheers, Miss Cynthia was soon in a happier mood, and talked clothes with Judith in the normal feminine manner until almost dinner-time. End of Chapter 7. Chapter 8 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain.

8 The lure of the city Gradually Marjorie became restless and unhappy The novelty of her surroundings had worn off And the day hung heavily upon her hands Her eyes drooped from oversleeping For frankly bored she added to her long night slumber a daily nap Chandler was troubled

Seeing that his pretty butterfly was beating her wings in vain Upon the bars of circumstance Wisely he would have offered her freedom but it seemed impossible in a way, and moreover, she had no other place to go. Marjorie's mother had died in giving birth to her only child, so, never having had a mother she had not felt the lack. Her father had striven manfully to fulfill a double duty, but dying at 45, he had left his little girl just as she would need him most. In his last hours he had remembered Chandler, the friend of his youth. The two had not met for many

years, though they had kept up a correspondence of the desultor resort. At long intervals, since the accident that had crippled Chandler, Gordon had gone to spend a day or two with him, but as it happened he had never taken Marjorie along. The pathetic droop of Marjorie's shoulders, the wistfulness of her eyes, and the sadness of her mouth went straight to Chandler's heart. In vain had he offered her the treasures of his library, for Marjorie was not particularly interested in books. He played to her, but without accompaniment, for Marjorie, her's fond parent had spared her the arduous hours at the piano, which seemed to be considered a necessary part of a girl's equipment.

No, she had answered when Chandler asked her if she played. I never cared to learn so Father didn't make me. He said that it was very common for a woman not to be able to play the piano, but it was a mark of distinction for her to know that she couldn't. It sounds just like him, Chandler mused, smiling to himself. Father said he didn't know why everybody had to have a piano. Marjorie continued. He said cornettes were cheaper and made more noise, and if anything annoyed the neighbors more terribly. He said he thought that except in the case

of very great artists, the pleasure of music was all for the one who did it, and that he and I must be unselfish if we would seem distinguished in a selfish world. Apparently he wasn't musical. He said he was. We always used to go to the opera and good concerts. He told me once that the more musical people were, the less they would play themselves. Billy Gordon's calm blue eyes looked up at Chandler from Marjorie's winsome face. Sometimes, during wakeful hours of the night, Chandler tried to imagine Marjorie's mother, to reconstruct, as it were, from father and daughter, the third member of the group. He supposed Marjorie had a picture somewhere, but he had not asked to see it.

Gordon had seldom spoken of his dead wife, even to Chandler. Once, when he had dwelt humorously and at some length upon the difficulty, that beset the path of a man with a small daughter, with nothing to guide him except a few books upon child training, written in most cases by the childless, Chandler had asked idly, Why don't you marry again? Mary again? Gordon had repeated incredulously. Why, man, you don't know what you're talking about. How could I want to marry again?

And how could I do it if I did? To this there seemed no answer, though Chandler had trembled for a moment upon the verge of a confidence. No one knew of his one brief splendid hour save the woman who had shared it with him, and she... From the fact that she must still exist somewhere, Chandler took a melancholy sort of comfort. The beautiful body of her might have gone back to the earth from which it was made,

that which once housed her might be wind or grass or sea, but the divine essence which was herself, having taken on the immortality of love, abided with him still. Some people, Gordon had... said later in the conversation, never grow emotionally. If a man's body stops growing, he's a dwarf. If his mind ceases to expand, he's a simpleton, but we never take account of his soul. I have a friend physically magnificent, who combines within himself the intellect of a

philosopher, the diplomacy of a statesman, the executive ability of the general of an army, the courtesy of a Chesterfield, and the emotions of a rabbit. Chandler reminded him that Darwin had observed and classified some 60 canine emotions expressed by the bark, and Billy Gordon had looked at him just as Marjorie was looking at him that minute, nodded and replied. Precisely, just so. Marjorie, said Chandler suddenly. Has Algern in a soul? The girl came to herself with a start. Her thoughts, too, had been far away. What? I didn't understand. Has Algin in a soul? Of course, doesn't he love?

me? Unquestionably. But does love prove the existence of a soul? Doesn't it? Quiried Marjorie chiefly because she could think of nothing else to say. Chandler was silent for a few moments, then he asked again, does Algernon reason or does a given condition, acting upon an inherited structure, produce? Marjorie turned pained eyes to his. I beg your pardon, he laughed. I was merely thinking aloud. I don't know, she murmured. Father said I shouldn't learn anything I didn't want to learn, and so I haven't.

Exactly. It would have been, like Billy Gordon, to let his daughter educate herself as she chose. He had theories, indeed, about the mind choosing the food it required and discarding the rest. I'm sorry, Marjorie resumed. Father used to say that a woman should be lovable rather than intelligent. But you're both, dear child, just because you haven't burdened yourself with a set of useless facts is no sign you couldn't if you wanted to. Somewhat mollified, Marjorie smiled at him winningly.

It brought Chandler a new respect for his dead friend's discernment. Gifted with a smile like that, Marjorie would not need to know where the moon rose, the binomial theorem, or what made the tide come in, only to go out again. She tapped the veranda restlessly with a small foot, and though it was not yet noon, yawned, unmistakably and openly. Why don't you go to town? He asked after a pause. What for?

She asked, but she brightened nevertheless. Oh, to shop? Haven't women always shopping to do? The suggestion appealed to Marjorie instantly. It had not occurred to her since she came that an hour on the train would take her back into familiar haunts. She rose to the lure of shop windows, of long counters laden with fabrics from all over the world,

streams of ribbons rows upon rows of perfumes a wilderness of hats yes, Marjorie would go to town Is there anything you want? Can I get anything for you? Surely, I always want books but Judith or Carter usually buy them for me.

I have a list, though, and if it isn't too much trouble to have them charged and sent out. No trouble at all, and if there's anything else? There isn't. His answer was unheeded, for Marjorie was already halfway upstairs, wondering where she put her timetable,

and what hat would look best with the pongy-tailored gown she had not had an opportunity to wear. When she came down, flushed, eager and smiling under the clover wreath that nodded upon her hat, she had only time to take the list from Chandler's outstretched hand and hurry to the station, as she had not hurried since she left town. The noise of the train was refreshing and the pungent smell of smoke came not ungratefully to the small nose accustomed now to clover blossoms, cedar breaths, and the dim far fragrance of the hayfields. The smooth pavement enticed her feet,

and the sun, flashing upon the many windowed cliffs along the street, brought an answering light into her face. The elbows that jostled against hers seemed friendly, strange though they were. She beamed at her reflection when an occasional mirror offered it, and smiled happily at other girls who only stared at her. First, she bought the books upon Chandler's list, all but one which would be sent later. Then, like a gypsy of the town back at last on well-known roads,

threaded the mazes of shop and street with an unerring instinct toward the prettiest and most expensive things. Impatient of slow deliveries she annexed one small parcel after another, saying mechanically at the time of each purchase, No, thank you, I'll take it. Finding herself hungry, she went to a tea room for some. salad and ice cream, the usual luncheon of the woman who pauses in the midst of a hard day's work in shops.

All the afternoon she drifted from one thing to another, now and then acquiring another bundle. At five o'clock she betook herself to the station and sat down to wait for the next train, having just missed one. Patent leathers are hot, she

thought. Wonder if anybody would see me if I took him off. She slipped her small feet out of her pumps, carefully spreading her skirts around them. Just as she had settled herself comfortably to rest, a friendly voice sounded beside her saying, Well, upon my word, what are you doing here? Marjorie started to her feet amid a shower of bundles. Why, Mr. Keith, how you frightened me. Did I? I'm sorry. I thought I recognized your hat and I came over to see. I suppose you've missed the train, too. Yes, murmured Marjorie. He was

picking up her parcels as he spoke. She had one foot safely in its shoe and was desperately searching for the other. We have almost half an hour to wait. Won't you come and have some ice cream or something? No, thank you, she stammered. Very kind. She added absently.

Why not? I can't. I've... Then crimson with embarrassment, Marjorie whispered. I've lost my shoe. It's back under this seat, I guess. I'm not. must have kicked it back. I was so

tired, she concluded irrelevantly. Carter was already upon his knees. Presently he emerged from the stuffy darkness triumphant. Sit down and I'll put it on for you. It's such a bit of a shoe. It's no wonder you lost it. Even Cinderella couldn't have got it on. I'm sure of that. Now then, you're all right.

Marjorie's high color receded gradually. Thank you so much. Then she added half shyly. Did you miss the train? I did, he responded, by just half a minute. Judith would never have asked such a foolish question. Indeed, she seldom dealt with the obvious, and more than once he had told her that a man would need to be a mental kangaroo in order to keep up with her. I see you didn't have your parcel sent, he went on.

He would not have said that to Judith, nor even asked her why she had not done so. If she had appeared at the station on a blistering July day with her arms full of small packages, he would have known without asking that she had some very good reason. No, said Marjorie with a smile. She had a dimple in her chin and another at the corner of her rosy mouth. Carter noted them approvingly

and thought it rather odd that he had never noticed them before. Judith had no dimples. She wasn't the dimpled sort. Where did you get the dimples? queried Carter dreamily. Do they sell them in the shops? She laughed outright then.

"'No, of course not. How funny of you to ask.' Carter laughed too. He found the obvious mysteriously refreshing. His mind relaxed. He had a pleasant sense of being in command. "'What's this?' he asked, indicating one of the small parcels. "'Tan ribbon for shoelaces. Oh, and this?' "'An nailbrush, a lovely white one. And this?' Marjorie was doubtful for a moment, then peeped inside. A pair of silk stockings, pale blue ones. A dollar and 29 cents marked down from a dollar and a half for today only. I see. And this? Marjorie's eyes sparkled. A veil, an automobile one. White, shading into turquoise blue. Two yards and a half long, with fringe on it.

Want to see it? Not here, not now, he temporized. I'll see it someday. You'll wear it the next time. you come out in the car with me, won't you? And Judith? Yes, that's why I got it. I've had lots of veils, but never an automobile one before. Father said automobiles were inventions of the devil, and he would never go in one himself, nor let me. You're not afraid, though? Oh, my goodness, no, she responded with her blue eyes wide open. How could I be, with you running it? This again was very different from Judith, who had stubbornly refused to go with him until he he had learned to run the car. Here's another one, Marjorie continued.

White, shading into pink and serise. Fringe, too. Ceres French. Want to see it? Sometimes, surely, but not now. Let's go down to the train. The car will be open by this time and will be sure of getting a good seat. Let me take your things.

I can put most of them into my pockets. There's lots of things you haven't asked about, said Marjorie as she went downstairs beside him. but I haven't given you anything that will break. What do you suppose this is? She swung a large paper bag out in front of him. That's easy. No, it isn't.

I'll give you three guesses. Hat, he answered. Oh, she said openly disappointed. You must have looked in or felt of it. Some hats are felt, aren't they? Marjorie laughed gleefully. A joyous little ripple of mirth that seemed to bring the cool freshness

of a mountain stream into the hot and dusty station. They had reached the train by this time. Go on back, he said as they entered the last car. We can open the windows and the back door and get whatever breeze there happens to be. He turned a seat and sat down, facing Marjorie who was still intent upon the subject of hats. Look, she said, opening the bag.

Isn't it lovely? Yes, he agreed. It is. What do you call this? It's only tool. "'I know what this is.' "'Velvet.' "'You know a lot of things,' she returned in affected wonder.

"'What color is it? Pink.' "'No, it isn't. It's Cerise, a white-tool hat with a big bow of Cerise velvet on it and a buckle of brilliance. "'Nothing could be more simple, or more expensive,' she concluded with a frown. "'But isn't it beautiful?' She took off the clover-trimmed hat as the train pulled out of the station, and poised the new one airily upon her yellow curls. The sun streamed through the open window and alighted upon the buckle, dazzling the eyes of the beholder.

It is, he answered and added truthfully. And so are you? Marjorie blushed divinely. Are I? I mean, am I? I always used to say are I to father. He liked it. So do I.

Say it to me sometimes, won't you? The veil is to go with it, she responded irrelevantly. The blue one. Gracious, no, the pink one shading into serese. The ends of it matched the bow on the hat. It's an automobile hat, she concluded. Will it look well with a red automobile? Marjorie's face fell.

No, she said sadly. It won't. I never thought of that. Never mind, he answered quickly, strangely moved by the spectacle of beauty and distress. I can have the car painted any other color you like. That isn't necessary. She was dignified now and a little cool.

I know it. Nobody would ever think of looking at the car while you were in it. This airy perciflage occupied the time so pleasantly that Carter was surprised when they reached their destination. A breath from the clover fields welcomed them when the smoke of the departing engine finally cleared away. You can't walk home with all those parcels and those tired little feet, Carter was saying.

If you don't mind waiting here about twenty minutes, I'll go and get the car and take you home, bag and baggage. That would be lovely. I am tired. When he came back, she was wearing the new hat and had the pink veil tied over it. Carter mentally approved of it very much, but said nothing.

Marjorie sat beside him, silent and shy as they went home. She answered him in monosyllables when he spoke. Secretly to her, he was. appeared as the incarnate hero of all the novels she had ever read. Judith in her eyes was veiled with wonder, being engaged to him. I am a thousand times obliged, she said as she stopped at the gate. You're a thousand times welcome. Here, don't forget your parcels. Have you got everything? Yes, I think so. Thank you again and good-bye. Remember me to Judith, won't you?

"'Surely. Good-bye.' An empty envelope and a yellow sail slip blew toward the crossroads, but neither of them noticed it. The car purred away in a cloud of dust, and Marjorie, weary, heavy-laden but very happy went into the house, where the lonely man had been waiting for her ever since she went away. End of Chapter 8 Chapter 9 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed.

This Librevox recording is in the public domain. "'None. Blue stockings.' "'Of course there for me,' Miss Cynthia was saying. "'Don't they fit me perfectly? Is everything yours that fits you?' queried Judith, mildly amused. "'It ought to be if I want it. Who's are they if they're not mine?' "'I don't know. Anyhow, they're damp and you're to take them off this minute.' Going out upon the upper veranda early in the morning, Miss Cynthia had found a pair of pale blue silk stockings, wet with the heavy dew of the preceding night.

With childish delight she sat down to put them on, and was even now contemplating with pleasure, one small foot in a damp but undeniably becoming stalking. They say women can't reason, Miss Cynthia continued as she meekly obeyed Judith. But I was gifted at my birth with logic. Here are stockings, where stockings are not want to be. The evidence of our senses does not permit us to deny the existence of stockings.

The question is, how did they come here. Not having wings, they were put here by some outward agency, natural, or supernatural. We dismissed the latter at once. Nobody has been on this veranda since yesterday afternoon when there were no stockings, but you and I and Carter. You and I drop out by elimination. Consequently, Carter brought them either for you or for me, and they're not yours because they're too small. QED, she concluded with a laugh. But, Judith objected. But, Judith objectioned, Why should Carter bring you stockings? Why should Carter not?

challenged Miss Cynthia. Is it not perfectly proper? Is not Carter a perfectly proper young man? If it had not been proper, would not Carter have at once made it so by doing it? I didn't mean that. Why should he bring you stockings and forget to give them to you? If he'd done it, he'd have had them wrapped in tissue paper.

Besides, he never forgets things. judith was somewhat perplexed for though miss cynthia's explanation seemed to be the only one possible nothing could have been more unlike carter than to buy stockings for anybody and as for leaving them unwrapped upon the veranda she shook her head it was either carter or fairies miss cynthia went on hanging the stockings upon the railing of the balcony to dry in the morning sun it's a matter of extremes for carter isn't what you might call fairy-like shall we have breakfast ever after "'If you like,' Judith answered as the maid appeared with the tray. "'Tonight,' Miss Cynthia said while she was pouring the coffee, "'I shall thank him for them in my prettiest manner.' "'You can't to-night, for he isn't coming. Don't you remember?' He told us last night that he had to go out of town this morning

and wouldn't be back until to-morrow, or at the best the last train to-night. We shan't see him again until Friday night. "'How terrible!' Miss Cynthia murmured. "'I wonder how we shall bear it.' She smiled mockingly at Judith and was rewarded by a bit of scarlet that signalled from either cheek. "'Don't tease,' Judith pleaded. "'Have a muffin.' "'Two muffins, but consecutively rather than simultaneously.

"'Aren't you sleepy after having been up last night until almost one o'clock? "'It wasn't one. It was only half-past twelve. "'You mistook the striking of the clock. "'It struck one just to—' before you began on the last installment of farewells. Then it struck one about a moment after you stepped on the squeaky board in front of your door, and before your light was out it had struck one again, so don't blame the clock. I'm not sure, the old lady continued, that an unmarried woman of any age is a proper chaperone.

On the face of it, it's ridiculous, but most of the conventionalities are based upon the sheerest nonsense. If your little friend Miss Marjorie were married, she could chaperone both of us when Carter called. And we're both older, and even you know more than she'll have packed away inside her pretty head thirty years from now. Modesty forbids my making any comparisons with myself. Aunt Cynthia, said Judith suddenly. Why did you never marry? The mocking light died out of the old lady's eyes and her face failed, though almost imperceptibly. A pathetic droop came upon her shoulders that but a moment before had been bravely straight.

The morning sun brought into cruel relief grim, unsuspected lines about her mouth. In an instant she had crossed an intangible line of division. She was old and broken now, she who had always been young. With downcast eyes, she stirred her coffee furiously, then cleared her throat. Everybody marries, she said in a tone new to Judith, when the right person comes along, unless there is some barrier which makes it impossible. And you, murmured Judith with dreamy eyes far out upon the garden, did the right one come? Yes, returned Miss Cynthia in a whisper. Then there was a barrier between you? No.

Judith turned astonished eyes to Miss Cynthia. Then why? My dear, the old lady answered irrelevantly. A fool can ask more questions in a minute than a wise man can answer in a week. Why does old cheese lie still in winter and promenade all around the kitchen in summer? Why does the kind grocer always put the large fruit on the top of the basket, instead of leaving it at the bottom to surprise the happy purchaser? Why does the young moon rise in one place and the old moon in another? And why, when relatives are perfectly sincere and friends more or less deceitful, do more or Most of us prefer friends.

Because none of us likes to be told the truth. Is that the answer? There are two sides to the truth, Miss Cynthia said quite herself again, just as there is to everything else. When there isn't a back and front, there's an inside and an outside. You may say that a woman is cross, disorderly, idle and given to unkind gossip, also that she is unselfish and would do anything in the world for those she loves. both statements may be absolutely true a relative would naturally choose one to talk about and a friend the other are you going to take a nap this afternoon no it's thursday i go to mr chandler's you know what shall i tell him for you do you want to send him anything

i don't know that it's proper for an unmarried woman to be sending things to an unmarried man whom she's never met i hope it isn't for i have so little opportunity to you yield to the allurements of sin. You may take him a pod of that preserved ginger. And a note. Miss Cynthia shook her head decidedly. No, no note. Ask him why cheese walks in the summer, and if it is immoral to cheat at Solitaire.

When Judith delivered her message that afternoon, Chandler laughed heartily, and even Marjorie dimpled into a smile. Miss Cynthia never forgot. When Judith came, she always had some sort of message. though it might be only a joke clipped from a stray newspaper.

I'm a thousand times obliged for the ginger, he said, and cheese walks in summer because the heat develops the activity of its hibernating population, and it is not immoral to cheat at solitaire. How is the dear lady? She's well, thank you.

We were much exercised this morning over stockings that came from nowhere. Apparently they dropped out of the heavens in the night to our veranda. They're just the color of sky today, a lovely pale blue, silk and very small. Why, said Marjorie doubtfully, they must be mine, the ones I lost yesterday. I have hunted for them high and low, all through the house and down the road and everywhere. I never thought of asking him.

Him, repeated Judith, turning to Marjorie in astonishment. Why, yes, Mr. Keith, you know. We came out together yesterday. I met him at the station, and when we got here he went and got the car to bring me home in it because I was tired and had so many things to carry. He said he'd remember me to you, didn't he? Of course, lied Judith. I'd forgotten.

Marjorie's childlike eyes perceived no change in that beautiful serene face. Chandler, happening to observe her more closely, saw the merest suggestion of perplexity or annoyance, nothing more. It was like the momentary reflection in a brook of the cloud that passes far above it, scurrying upon some celestial errand at the bidding of the four winds. And the stockings? Judith was saying in her cool, deep voice, did he forget to give them to you?

He must have. He had all my little parcels in his pockets, and I didn't miss it at first. I had so many. The nail-brush and the tan ribbon and the two veils and my hat, and—I'm sorry, Judith said kindly, interrupting the recapitulation. I'll see that you get them. It is nothing, Judith.

was saying to herself sternly, Absolutely nothing. He forgot to speak of it, that's all. Then her reason added in gallant defense of him. Why should he speak of it? Am I a child or a fool that I must be told everything? Need he account to me for every minute we're not together? The memory of last night's last hour

stirred in her heart like a living thing. All the tenderness, the dear foolishness, the strong clasp of his arms around her, the touch of his lips upon her hair. the music of his deep voice sang over and over again, I love you, I love you, I love you. She answered to it as though it were now instead of yesterday. And still, into her joy had come the element of pain

that forever is inextricably mingled with woman's love. Primitive woman, part and parcel of Judas' being, yet until now, asleep, moved uneasily, then awoke with a start and rubbed her eyes, vengefully on guard to watch over her own. "'Are you rested?' Chandler asked. "'Shall we play now?' "'Surely.' With an effort, Judith separated herself

from her secret confusion. All this could be put aside and shut away to be considered later. Chandler's man wheeled his chair into the corner by the piano where he usually sat, with the sunlight on his music rack, but out of his eyes.

Judith, rather pale but outwardly self-possessed, struck a few preliminary chords. "'The piano needs tuning,' she said. "'I know it. I've been meaning to have it done.' "'I think we need tuning ourselves sometimes,' Judith went on. "'But there's never anybody to do it.' "'Except ourselves.' Judith turned to look at him.

"'Can we always do it?' "'Why not.' "'You're so like Aunt Cynthia,' she murmured. "'She always answers questions with other questions, "'unless she deals in epigrams which are infinitely worse. "'Sometimes it seems as if she must sit up half the night absorbing the output from an epigram factory. I wish I knew her, Chandler said, tuning his violin.

I wish you did. Do you want to try this? Yes. They played a gay little dance, but beneath it in Judas's thought, a single phrase suited itself to the rhythm. He didn't tell me, he didn't tell me, he didn't tell me, he didn't tell me. It seemed as though the words sang themselves loudly enough for all the world to here. Long before they reached the end, it had become unbearable, and Judas stopped with a broken chord. I'm not in the mood for this today. Let's try something else. Very well. She sorted over their music, her hands trembling a little, then she chanced upon a book containing parts of Lowengrin, arranged for violin and piano. They began with the wedding march

than played other selections less familiar. Let's try this, Judith suggested. It's love It's the part where she asks him his name. Chandler's violin crashed to the floor. No, he cried. Not that. She turned in amazement stooping mechanically to pick up the violin. Marjorie humming to herself, idly past the window, pausing at the apple tree to pick up a fallen twig and toss it to the puppy,

gambling at her heels. What is it? asked Judas softly. Nothing, sighed Chandler, taking the violin which fortunately was not broken. It was only a ghost, that's all. Ghost seemed to be haunting us both this afternoon. I'm in a wretched mood. So am I, he answered, putting his violin back into its case.

Let's not play any more today. Judith went home an hour earlier than usual. Miss Cynthia was on the upper balcony, amusing herself with a pack of cards. Is it immoral to cheat at Solitaire? She asked, looking up when Judith spoke to her. "'No, he says not.' "'I'm so sorry,' sighed Miss Cynthia.

"'I hoped it was, and I just did it.' "'I found out about the stockings,' Judith said, keeping her voice even with an effort. "'They're Marjorie's.' "'How did Marjorie's stockings come on my porch?' The old lady queried, putting away the cards. Carter met her at the station yesterday accidentally and put her small parcels into his pockets.

She was so tired from a day shopping that he went after his car and took her home. This happened to be left in his pocket, and not knowing it, he can't have missed it. When he took off his coat and laid it on the arm of that big chair, they must have slipped out. I see. I told you it was Carter. Wasn't it nice of him? demanded Judith. What, to leave her stockings on my porch? I should say not. He disappointed both of us.

I didn't mean that. Wasn't it nice of him to go and get his car when she was so tired and take her home? Miss Cynthia observed Judith narrowly before she spoke. Very nice, but then, Carter is always doing nice things. Yes, Judith echoed loyally. Carter is always doing nice things.

Pleading weariness, Judith went to bed very early, but she could not sleep. In vain did she reason with the primitive woman within her. Scornfully did she accuse herself of disloyalty. Woman like at the first she had prayed that her love of him might be tested. Woman like now, she shrank from even the thought of a test. Toward dawn she went into Miss Cynthia's room. What is it? murmured the old lady drowsily. Is anybody ill?

No, I just want to talk. Talk then. I won't hinder you. Aunt Cynthia, cried Judith in a rush of doubt pain. He didn't tell me. Who didn't tell you what? Carter. He didn't tell me that he met Marjorie in town and took her home in his car. Miss Cynthia sat up in bed, rubbed her eyes, then lighted the candle on the little table at her bedside. Judas Scarlet Camona only emphasized the whiteness of her face, veiled in the night of her hair

and the pitiful questioning in her eyes. Is it a crime? asked the old lady. Is he in danger of being hung for it? Judith laughed hysterically. No, but why didn't he tell me? Once, said Miss Cynthia dreamily, there was a man who was capable of lifelong devotion to one woman, but he died before he was out of knickerbockers.

Aunt Cynthia, you shan't accuse him of, of, of what, of anything? The old lady leaned back among her pillows. Gracefully, with a small, ringless hand she concealed a yawn, the whiteness of her gown made her face slightly pink by contrast but the mass of hair that was spread out upon her pillow was as white as the pillow itself the candlelight lay lovingly upon her hair bringing forth fitful gleams of silver all right said miss cynthia politely i won't accuse him of anything sometimes i forget however that the king can do no wrong he probably forgot to speak of it remarked judith half to herself it It was such a little, little thing. Probably, assented Miss Cynthia with the merest suggestion of sarcasm. If he doesn't, would you ask?

If he doesn't what? If he doesn't speak of it, would you ask him about it? Judith, dear, twenty-six, and seriously considering asking a man questions? Why not? she demanded. Miss Cynthia fixed her wonderful eyes upon the unhappy figure in Scarlet, sitting upon the foot of her bed, but only for an instant. Leaning over, she blew out the light. Some women, she observed, want to ask a man questions.

Others prefer not to be lied to. There was an interval of silence. Good night, said Judith. Good night, returned Miss Cynthia, and added softly, dear. Musing upon the mysterious way of a man with a woman, Miss Cynthia fell asleep again almost immediately. The younger woman, more unhappy than before, deeply regretted the attempt to take Miss Cynthia into her confidence.

At sunrise there was a rush of wings past her window, then a coup and a flutter as the messenger alighted upon the sill. Oh, breathed Judith, with her troubled heart mercifully eased. She took the note out of the aluminum case. It was only three words. I love you, signed with a star for a kiss. She sprinkled a few grains of corn upon the window-sill for the pigeon, and while he pecked at it, wrote her answer,

And I love you. She was radiant as from some inner light when she closed the screen and set the pigeon free. The phantoms of the night and of the day before were swept away by an overwhelming surge of loyalty and love. What more could there ever be to say? What more could there ever be to know, aside from those three words? primitive woman with a deep sigh settled herself to sleep once more until she should be called, and presently Judith slept also.

End of Chapter 9. Chapter 10 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Lieberbox recording is in the public domain. 10. A woman's hair. It was past noon when Judith came down rather dreading the awkward moment of meeting. By day we may deal with the airy side. superstructure of our emotions, but at three in the morning we get down to the foundation. At night, the soul claims the right to stand face to face with itself, as before some mirror placed in a pitiless light and, with unsparing eyes, seek the truth.

Miss Cynthia, with Crutch and Cain, had just returned from a tour of the garden. Did you have a bad night? she queried lightly, or were you merely making up lost sleep? I had rather a bad night, Judith returned truthfully. I'm very sorry I woke you. Woke me, repeated Miss Cynthia. Why, my dear, you didn't wake me. Yes, I did. Don't you remember? When I came into your room to talk.

You weren't in my room, Judith. It was only a dream. Perhaps, the young woman returned gratefully. Sometimes we sleep more than we think we do. Nearly always, I imagine. You must be hungry. Will you have breakfast or luncheon? breakfast please but i'm ashamed to ask for it at this hour you needn't be home is a place where we all do as we please usually regardless of the others

completely deceived by miss cynthia's ready tact judith was at ease again during the afternoon while the old lady read aloud in her high sweet voice judith put the last stitches into the embroidered panel that was to be the front of her wedding gown it's lovely said miss cynthia leave leaning forward to examine it. I've often wondered, though, why you chose linen to be married in? Because, the young woman returned with a scarlet signal upon either cheek. I was wearing a white linen gown the day he, the day Carter,

she paused in lovely confusion. Don't go on, teased Miss Cynthia with a wicked flash in her eyes. All proposals are alike. Someone once said, Judith continued hastily, that men were different, but husbands were all alike. Tisn't so dearest. If it were, no woman would marry twice.

Aunt Cynthia. Yes, dear, I'm listening. Don't be so cynical. I'm not. Never having had a husband, may I not observe the creature from a respectful distance. A man says, I love you, will you marry me? What he really means is, will you come to look after my house, do my mending, bear my children, bring them up, cook for me when necessary, and see that the plumbing is in perfect order? I shall give you board and clothes, though you may have to speak several times about the clothes, and an occasional pat on the cheek. Love is service, murmured Judith. It's giving, not receiving. Woman's love is, yes. Man's love is, well, something entirely different. "'Carter may be running around backwards on your account now, "'but after you're married, "'he'll have forgotten all the fancy steps in a very short time.

"'He'll go straight ahead "'and may not even look behind to see whether you're coming or not. "'The whole business reminds me of the old farmer "'who started in to see all the side-shows at the exposition. "'He said he went into exit first, "'and it was such a miserable fake "'that he didn't care to go any farther.' Judith sighed and turned her face away.

The clear olive skin was pale now, and the scarlet mouth had settled into lines of unwanted sadness. Repentantly, Miss Cynthia leaned forward to pat Judith's hand and pick up the embroidery that had slipped to the floor unheeded. Don't mind me, dear, she said humbly. Naturally, I disdained the side shows. I got into exit, too. Judith answered with a kiss.

I wasn't minding. I was just thinking. Thinking is unprofitable. I never do it personally. Go and call up Carter and ask him to come here to dinner. I'd like to see the boy myself. If you think it's unmaidenly to tell him you're lonely without him, you may say that I am literally suffering for even a glimpse of him.

That my world is as night without the sun. Judith came back from the telephone, laughing. I infer he's coming, asked Miss Sincolns. Cynthia with a slight elevation of her eyebrows. Yes, he asked me to tell you that while he would love to be your son, he can only be your nephew-in-law. Clever child, Carter. What shall we give him for dinner? I'll leave that to you. So the old lady planned the indigestible feast which she knew would please her guest. Carter came at six with white roses for Judith and pink ones for Miss Cynthia, who had chosen to linger upon the upper balcony until the rapturous moments of meeting had

subsided. At times when the lover sat together in the twilight, happily oblivious of her, a long-closed door in Miss Cynthia's heart swung open upon its rusty hinges, and a troop of ghost came forth to trouble and to beckon. She too had known her perfect hour. Who shall write of the heart of a woman, the long, winding passages, thick with swaying cobwebs, the cold hearths, deep with dust? Who shall tell of its desolate altars, deserted by him for whom the candles were lighted, while shadows creep steadily toward the flickering lights, and the fragrance of the incense dies away in the dark. Hidden in many a secret chamber, behind doors that are closed and barred, the lost faiths mourn. The broken illusions lie helpless, and the dead dreams

wait for resurrection. Ready to trust, eager to believe, and desperately hungry for love, the woman waits forever behind her closed door. She dare not open it and bed in bedire. She dare not open it and beckon, lest love pass on unheeding. She must wait until his voice sounds outside, pleading for entrance, and even then, she fears to answer his first summons. Tortured by woman's burning need to give, she must yet withhold, if she would have love stay. After long waiting, she must affect to be taken by surprise. She must wake long, sombering echoes with light laughter, reaching even to the mournful solitude where the dead dreams lie. And, and, you must wake, if, eagerly searching his eyes, she reads therein even a word of the message her soul craves,

she will beckon him mysteriously into the inmost recesses of her heart. When he hesitates before a closed door, she will say with a smile, Nay, not there. When he pauses at a desolated altar, enshrouded in a wonderful silken fabric that has lain long among roses, she will lead him away swiftly, lest he guess what lies hidden beneath. If he turns at the sound of a ghostly footfall in the corridor behind him, she will answer his thoughts, saying, "'Tis merely the sound of thine own steps. Come.' By devious path, she brings him at last to her holy of holies, pausing for an instant, to question him with her eyes before she opens wide the door.

Having brought him face to face with her love of her own whiteness, she shrinks back into the shadow, praying that he may understand. But too often, The man's eyes, fogged by the mists of passion, turn burning to her as if to say, "'What is this to which you have brought me? I want you.' Then, if she has the strength and the courage, she will close the door quickly, murmuring, "'Nay, nay, it is nothing. Come, we will hasten back.' Thus she leads him to the entrance again, and graciously bids him farewell. Once in a lifetime, perhaps, seldom more, the man's eyes see clearly.

into the sanctuary, and the woman starts toward him out of the shadow with a cry of gladness that rings through the desolation like the peel of a silver trumpet. There is nothing there but whiteness, bareness, yet, to him who understands, the place is holy. He has only to reach out his hand to the woman and say, Come, let us kneel and worship together. Then, as by magic, all the barriers crumble into dust, the cobwebs vanish, and the dead dreams rise again, radiant, having put on the garments of immortality. Night after night, when the tasks of the day are done, the woman will lead him to her heart

and show him all. With her, he will restore the broken illusions and comfort the lost face until they cease to mourn. The desolated altars will be made fair again, and the enshrouding tapestries folded and put away. At the last, with laughter which has in it no hint of sadness, she will show him the room in which she has endeavored to reshape her ideals in accordance with her realities, and has failed. He too may laugh, though his eyes soften with pity. Swiftly she will understand that hereafter in that same room they are to labor together, shaping, molding, and lifting their realities to the ideal, but they will not speak of this, because love has no need of words. When Miss Cynthia went down, Judith and Carter were sitting decor.

"'inorously opposite each other on the lower veranda. "'Only the light in the young man's eyes, "'and Judas's loosened hair betrayed them. "'I've missed you,' said Miss Cynthia. "'And I, you? "'I was very lonely last evening "'with no one to abuse me and tell me of my faults. "'Who should tell you of your faults, if not I?

"'Am I not soon to be a relative?' "'What do you call soon?' "'Perryed Carter. "'It's a relative term, merely. "'Can your legal... mind grasped the subtlety of that? With an effort, yes. Then with a quick change of tone, he went on.

Can you be serious for a few minutes? If it's absolutely necessary. Well, what are you going to do when Judith and I are married? Give you a present, of course. You expect it, don't you? Have you decided upon what you want? You promised to be serious, Carter said reproachfully. Will you come to live with us?

We both want you. really miss cynthia wiped away a hasty tear we do said judith oh dear aunt cynthia won't you come the old lady was deeply touched yet she hid it with a smile you may think you want me she murmured but you don't besides you annoy me terribly with your love-making we won't take no for an answer carter said firmly if you won't come of your own accord we'll kidnap you in the most modern fashion by automobile "'Perhaps,' said Miss Cynthia. "'Is that a promise?' "'No. I won't promise, but I'll think about it. Come in to dinner.' That evening, while Miss Cynthia sat a little apart from them, they talked House. In their thoughts, the word always began with the capital.

When she slipped away to bed, she was unobserved. Some little time afterward, when they noted her absence, they left the subject of House and took up personalities. It was later than usual when Carter began to go home. Wait a minute, said Judith. I forgot something. She came back presently with a small parcel wrapped in tissue paper. It's Marjorie Gordon's stockings, she said.

You forgot to give them to her. Oh, said Carter awkwardly, did I? He took the parcel, put it into his pocket, then there was silence, but not of the intimate sort, which does not require speech. Carter stood for. first upon one foot, then upon the other, trying desperately to think of something to say. Then Judith lifted her face to his. Good night, dear.

It's very late. Good night, darling. Conflicting emotions swayed him as he went down the road. Surely there is nothing more exasperating to a man than to feel himself under the necessity of making an explanation to a woman who has not asked for it. By some subtle feminine method, he had been put in the wrong and he squirmed under the awkwardness of it. Then, by a heroic effort, he dismissed it as a thing of no moment. Almost immediately it was back, confronting him from new angles and offering unsuspected points

of view. Resentment against Judith smoldered, then burst into flame. Yet, after all, what had she done? What else could she have done? Of course he had dropped the stockings, but how had she known to whom they belonged? Had Marjorie told her, or by the uncanny cleverness which is the birthright of every woman, had she divined it. I should have spoken of it, he muttered. I forgot. That's all. But as the night waned, Carter's conscience actively reminded him that he hadn't forgotten it. Indeed, that he had purposely avoided all the easy conversational past that might have led to Marjorie and the car. He was conscious of the parcel upon his dresser. It seemed that the stockings might speak to him if they wanted to. Miserably, he hoped

that they wouldn't, then laughed a little at his. own disordered fancy. Why in thunder couldn't Judith take them back herself, or send them back, or mail them, or write a note to Marjorie and ask her to come and get her infernal parcel? Why should a young and promising lawyer be kept awake by a pair of blue silk stockings? Hitherto he had never known Judith to fail intact. Why did she speak of it when she knew how the stockings had happened to be there and to whom they belonged? A more gracious, kindly woman would not have brought the matter to his notice. Judith must have known that it would annoy him.

Perhaps, the thought-made Carter sit up in bed wide awake, perhaps that was why she had done it. He knew that Judith went to Chandler's on Monday and Thursday afternoons. What would have been easier than for her to put the things in her pocket, if she had one, next Monday, and give them to the owner with some graceful and appropriate remark such as, well, such as, Here, Marjorie, here's your socks.

"'She could say it just as well as not,' he thought wretchedly, "'but she expects me to.' He was aroused from an uneasy slumber by the carrier pigeon cooing at his window. "'Go away,' murmured Carter, turning his back to the window, but the persistent bird lingered, even after he had received his morning ration of corn. It occurred to him that he might send the stockings back to Judith by the pigeon. But no, that wouldn't do. even if he fastened one firmly to each leg,

the bird would never get there with them. And how the whole village would gape at the apparition in the skies, a pigeon with a pair of long silk stockings dangling from his hampered body. As the messenger was still waiting, Carter wrote a note. It was brief, but to the point, being merely, I'm sorry I didn't tell you, Carter. He was asleep when the answer came, but went eagerly to the window to get it. That too was brief.

It doesn't matter, Judith. By all the dictates of reason, he should have felt better, but he didn't. That day he chanced to see in a jeweller's window a silver chain from which hung a single abalone pearl set in dull silver. He took it to Judith that night and presented it to her with careless grace. She was delighted, and even Miss Cynthia thought it was lovely. Nothing was said of the stockings, nor did Judith seem to avoid the topic. She made no allusion to the message the pigeon had brought, knowing doubtless, that for a man to say he is sorry or to stammer out the words, forgive me, indicates unsounded depths of abasement and devotion. Sunday morning the stalking still confronted him from his chiffonier. Desiring to get the

thing over with as soon as possible, he determined to go to Chandler's that afternoon for perhaps 15 minutes, take him a book or a magazine, and when he was leaving apparently as a careless afterthought, give Marjorie her troublesome personal property. When he stopped the car at the gate, the place seemed deserted. Inside, having passed a wakeful night, Chandler slept soundly in his chair. Carter went around to the back door in search of a servant, and at the apple tree came upon Marjorie who did not see him at first. She sat upon a low stool with her white skirts heaped around her,

a mass of lace and frills. Around her gleaming in the sun fell a mass of golden hair rippling to the ground and veiling her face. Carter caught his breath. Copper and burnished gold, yet having the texture of silk. Sinuous, alive, wonderful. The color of a sunset gleaming upon polished brass.

Faint hints of iridescence here and there. Hair to blind men's eyes and weave itself into a sorcery from whence there was no escape. Marjorie stood up, her back toward him, humming the merest fragment of a song. it bore no relation whatever to any tune he had ever heard she put her hands up to the back of her neck divided her hair spread it out to arm's length then that it fall slowly a cloud of golden mist marjorie the man breathed huskily she turned quickly with a rush of color staining her face oh she gasped how you frightened me did i i'm sorry i just came to bring these back He offered her the parcel.

Thank you. It's more than kind of you. I was very stupid to forget. Not at all. They stood looking at each other for an awkward moment. Then Marjorie turned toward the house, murmuring the time-worn phrase which the girl child probably learns just after she has been taught to say Mama and Papa. I've just washed my hair and I can't do a thing with it. It's beautiful, Carter said in all sincerity.

"'Are it?' queried Marjorie, with a sidelong glance that set his heart to thumping wildly. "'It are,' he rejoined solemnly. Subconsciously he reflected that no man could say it are to Judith. They had reached the veranda now. "'Will you come in?' Marjorie asked politely. "'I'll wake Mr. Chandler and go up to put myself in order. "'Thank you, no. "'Just give him this little book and say that I called.

"'I have an engagement and I'm late now.' Then goodbye, and thank you. You're welcome. Goodbye. The blood beat hard in his pulses as he climbed into the car. As he had said, he had an engagement and was late, but he drove the car at top speed through the dust for nearly two hours before he stopped at Miss Cynthia's gate, weary and travel-stained,

but at peace with himself. End of Chapter X. Chapter 11 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertil Reed. This Librevox recording is. in the public domain. Eleven. Parliamentary Law The Sorrel Mayor

brushed away the flies vigorously. For more than half an hour she had stood in front of a yellow house with green blinds, pleasantly set in the midst of a garden, somewhat back from the village street. The garden seemed to be cool, but the road was very hot and dusty.

Everything was quiet, but the flies. Even the old man who sat in the buggy, loosely holding the reins, was apparently asleep. From the house, a low, murmurous sound to be compared only to that made by a hive of bees. Now and then, a sharp, penetrating voice, a little higher in pitch than the rest,

rose above the clamor for an instant, then died away. The bent old figure in the buggy nodded, and the rain slipped from his hand. The mere brushed away more flies, snorted and took a few steps forward. Whoa, Molly! Stand still. That's a good girl. I reckon she'll be coming by by. To guard against further mishap, Uncle Henry tied the reins to the dashboard, made himself a little more comfortable on the wide, low seat, and settled back into the shade. One by one three women came from the house, then a group of four or five. Then, after a brief interval, two more appeared and joined the larger group at the gate. Nobody spoke to Uncle Henry, but they softened

their voices instinctively as they approached him. Another woman, with her hat somewhat askew and her face flushed, came quickly down the walk, looking neither to the right nor to the left. She passed the group at the gate without speaking. They watched her open-mouthed until she had disappeared in a cloud of dust, then two turned and followed at a respectful distance, and the others went around to the back of the house. Molly looked anxiously toward the house and switched valiantly at the tormenting flies. She longed for the shade of the barnyard, the trough of cool water, and the impertinent collie that sometimes snapped at her heels, but only for fun.

She pawed the earth nervously, then sent forth a long whinny that woke Uncle Henry and speedily brought Aunt Belinda to the gate. I didn't know you was here, Henry, the old lady said as she climbed in, Have you been waiting long? Better part of an hour, I reckon. You told me to be here at five o'clock, and I was.

He consulted his worn silver watch. It's nigh on to six now. My sake's alive. cried Aunt Belinda. "'It's a lucky thing. There ain't much to do to supper aside from warming it up. He's not coming home till late. She's gone to town, and they're going to have supper together someplace,

and go to the theatre afterward.' As he meant Carter, she was always Judith. "'I'd have come sooner if I'd known you was waiting.' "'You could have looked,' he suggested. He had passed the time very pleasantly dozing, but his masculine nature instinctively took the opportunity to show how gracefully a superior being could endure annoyance. I didn't know there was going to be so late, Aunt Belinda went on,

or I'd have told you different. I'd never like to be the first one to leave the sewing circle. If there's a talking to be done, I'd rather not be the one it's about, and, by stay until all the others have gone, there ain't likely to be anything said about me. I reckon they won't talk about me today, though. Uncle Henry grunted an unintelligible assent. "'Get up, Molly.' He was hungry, and from preparations he had come upon in the pantry just before

he left home, surmised that there would be hot biscuit for supper. On account of its being the last meeting, there was considerable business to be took up anyway, and Miss Jed Stebbins was there from over to the ridge. She come with her sister-in-law. She's visiting her. Just got here yesterday, and there wasn't a one of us had heard of her coming

till she walked in. There was a brief silence, which was meant to be tantalizing, but was not. Uncle Henry was considering whether or not there might be honey with the biscuits. Well, he said at length in the tone of polite inquiry a husband uses when he means, what of it? Well, as I was saying, resumed Aunt Belinda,

clearing her throat. None of us knew she was here till she come in. There was plenty of business before the meeting as it was. We'd met to decide what to do with all the money there was in the treasury. well said uncle henry again what did you do with it nothing we ain't done nothing with it and ain't like to unless we meet again after miss jed stebbins has gone back where she belongs and i understand she's like to stay until after the cannon and preservant season is over she was telling us about her cousin's wife's mother's raspberry jam she puts almonds in it blanched almonds did you ever hear the like of that it sounds good commented uncle Henry with an accession of interest.

Was you laying out to have honey tonight with them biscuits? Miss Dunlap had to go home to see her supper. Aunt Belinda went on, heedless of the intrusion of an alien topic into the conversation. She told Miss Stebbins that she needn't hurry, that she could come whenever she liked,

and so she stayed, and the rest of us didn't have no chance. What about the money in the treasury? I'm coming to that as fast as I can. Miss Tebans was in the city all last winter with some relatives of her husbands while he was in the hospital having his insides took out and put in different and her cousin's wife's mother took her to what in the city they call a woman's club.

What's that? demanded Uncle Henry with a suggestion of resentment. The phrase was not reassuring. Just the same as a sewing circle as far as I see, only it's a different name. They don't sew none. Who do they club? "'Each other, I reckon.' Miss Debbins was saying that they marked historic spots where battles was fought with brass tablets,

and she said her cousin's wife's mother said one day, right out in Meaton, that charity began at home, and she thought they ought to put a brass tablet by their own front door. Miss Debbins was laughing about it, but nobody else did. Taint good manners to have jokes all to yourself. That's what it says in my magazine, anyway. Go on, said Uncle Henry submissively.

evidently there was a certain amount of conversation to be unloaded from Aunt Belinda's mind before she could be induced to consider the more inspiring subject of biscuits. As I was saying when you interrupted me, as soon as we was all there, Miss Christie being late on account of her youngest boy having fell into the cistern, Miss Marshall says, Well, ladies, what are we going to do with the money we have in the treasury? Before any of us could say a word, Miss Jed Stebbin says like she was terrible astonished.

Why, ladies, don't you conduct your meetings according to parliamentary law? Parliamentary, Uncle Henry corrected. It means the laws made by Parliament over in England. What's that got to do with the Edgerton Ladies Baptist Soen Circle and Missionary Society? demanded Aunt Belinda. I don't know, Uncle Henry murmured pacifically. No more do I? but Miss Stebbins was sitting there like she was a teacher and we was her class

and Miss Marshall says to her very polite how is that and Miss Stebbin says la sakes ain't you got no constitution and bylaws I spoke up then and I says my constitution is fair to Midland in spite of having come from a family what died young but I hadn't any bylaws now that my husband's immediate family was all dead and Miss Dunlap snickered and said, Blessed are them as has no bylaws. I reckon she's had her own troubles with Miss Stebbins.

Miss Stebbin says then that the Constitution and bylaws ain't got nothing to do with our systems and our relations. She says it's the rules the society goes by. Miss Marshall says we ain't never had no rules to go by. We just talk things over and what the most of us approved was done, sometimes peaceful and sometimes not, but it didn't matter as long as it was did. And then she smiled at Miss Stevens,

but us what knew her could see she was getting mad, and she says, Could your city women's club that you're speaking of do any different than that? Oh my, yes, says Miss Stebbins. If you like, I'll conduct this meeting according to Parliamenty law, and everybody but Miss Marshall says,

Yes, do. Miss Tebens bows and smiles and says, I bow to the first. wishes of the majority, though I'd sooner it would be unanimous. This last evidently being meant for Miss Marshall, who was getting more mad every minute. Then Miss Deben says, If you please, I will take the chair, and she makes Miss Marshall move over on the Sophie beside old Miss Harper, though nobody wanted to set by her on account of being expected to yell into her ear trumped everything that was said, and on account of her having had fleas

very recent, and smellin' terrible strong of Penny Royal. Miss Marshall set where she was told, but all the time her mad was rising, you could see that. Everybody but Miss Tebans. She was sitting there in Miss Marshall's chair as peaceful and quiet as could be, and she says.

For the present, we will assume that I am the president of the Edgerton Ladies Baptist So Encircle and Missionary Society. Miss Blake, would you mind yet in me the hammer. Miss Blake went out and come in with the hatchet and the tack hammer. Which'll you have, says she, and Miss Debbins took the tack hammer, which relieved the minds of us all some, and then she pounded three or four times on Miss Blake's best walnut table, leaving marks that'll have to be took out by a hot iron, and says in a loud voice,

the meeting will please come to order. Yes, Henry, just like that, them's her very words. You could have heard a pin drop. And then Miss Harper pushes the end of her ear trumpet over to Miss Marshall and says, What's that? What did she say? And Miss Marshall says, she said the meeting would please come to order. And Miss Harper says, What does she mean by that? And Miss Debbins calls out, Tell her I mean for her to keep still. So Miss Marshall yelled that into the trumpet, and old Miss Harper grunted and took out a peppment lozange and began to munch on it. Then Miss Stebbin says,

The secretary will please read the minutes of the last meeting. Nobody said anything, and then Miss Blake spoke up and says, What do you mean by that? La sakes, says Miss Stebbins. Do you mean to tell me you ain't got no secretary? There's one upstairs, says Miss Blake, but I want never one to keep a writing desk in the parlor. "'If you want a secretary, you'll have to go upstairs where it is.

"'I ain't a-goin to have it brung down here to be hammered on.' "'I mean,' says Miss Stebbins, very soft, "'the woman that keeps the records of the society. "'She writes down at every meeting everything that's said and done, "'and at the next meeting she reads it out loud, "'so as them that wasn't here can know what went on in their absence, "'and them as was here can refresh their memories.' miss marshall spoke up then and says something about it's been no wonder they wanted a battle tablet at the door of the woman's club and miss harper puts her ear trumpet over and miss marshall pushes it away from her every minute she was getting more mad

if there are no objections miss tebans went on the chair will appoint as a committee on constitution and bylaws miss blake miss marshall and miss harper the chair will appoint as a committee on constitution and bylaws miss blake miss marshall and miss harper the committee to be ready with a report and a preliminary draft of the Constitution at the next meeting. And as a committee on nominations, the chair appoints Ms. Dunlap, Miss Christie, and Miss Warner, that's me. Miss Harper, haven't heard her name and being unable to get anything out of Miss Marshall next to her, gets up and comes over and puts the ear trumpet into Miss Deben's face and says, What's that? What was you saying about me?

So Miss Debbins hollers into the ear trumpet, I appointed you a member of the Committee on Constitution and Bylaws with Miss Blake and Miss Marshall. Oh, says Miss Harper, My Constitution ain't been very strong since I lost my hearing, but I'll do the best I can, she says. Would you have a pepment? No, thank you, says Miss Debbins into the trumpet.

Please go back and set down where you was by Miss Miss Miss. Marshall. Maybe you'll enjoy it later on, says Miss Harper, laying the peppment down on the table in front of Miss Debbins. Ms. Marshall had moved away from the Sophie and was sitting on the stool in front of the Melodian, but Miss Harper, haven't been told to set by her, goes out and gets a kitchen chair and drags it in and sets it down close by Miss Marshall, with the ear trumpet good and ante on the Melodian. If there are no minutes, says Miss Tebans, we will proceed with the

unfinished business. What's that? says Miss Blake. Whatever was left over from the last meeting, says Miss Stebbins. Miss Dunlap spoke up then and says, If I recollect it was at my house, and there want nothing left over but a little piece of pound cake and maybe half a cup of tea.

You know, Miss Dunlap is stingy, and Miss Christie spoke out and says, Don't let it disturb you, Miss Dunlap. I'm quite sure nothing will be wasted, And I don't doubt you're still using them tea grounds. Miss Stebbin spouted on the table with the hammer and beat off some more varnish. I don't know as a hot iron'll do it any good, and I reckon Miss Blake will have to have it scraped and done over,

and if I was her, I'd send the bill for it to Miss Stebbins. And Miss Stebbins says again, The meeting will please come to order. I suppose she was mad because her relative was being sassed, even though it was only a relative by marriage. Miss Harper had to be told what was being said and then things got quiet again. Miss Deben says,

If there is no unfinished business before the house, we will proceed with the new business. After this was put into Miss Harper's trumpet, everybody was quiet but Miss Christie. She was putting a patch into the next to the oldest boy's shirt and she leans over and whispers to Miss Blake that she's used up all the patches she had, and has been obliged to cut a piece out in the tail,

and she reckons the shirt is like England's flag, because the sun ain't never gone to set on it. Do you see any sense to that? No, said Uncle Henry, seeing that an answer was expected. Too hot and dusty miles still lay between him and the land of biscuits and honey. No more do I, nor anybody else, but Miss Simmons pounded another neck in the varnish and says,

the meeting will please come to order. What is the new business before the house? But nobody said anything. Then Miss Deben says, Very hot you like. Ladies, I see that the processes of parliamentary law are confusing two beginners. Would one of you mind telling me

just as woman to woman what this meeting is held for? As there is no answer from the floor, did you ever hear anything like that, Henry? I will ask Miss Blake to tell me very briefly why this meeting is held. As it is in her house, I presume she knows. We come, says Miss Blake, to decide what to do with the money in the treasury and to have a cup of tea. Oh, says Miss Debbins,

now I know where I am. We will take up the disposal of the funds in the treasury. Ladies, what is your pleasure? None of us was having any pleasure, as I see. So nobody said anything, and Miss Tebans asked who the treasurer was. Miss Blake said that there want no treasurer, that Mr. Marshall, being the minister, kept the money. Where does he keep it? asked Miss Tebans, and Miss Marshall spoke up and says, I don't know as it's any of your business, but it's in a wallet under the mattress in the spare room.

There's $78.19. Well, says Miss Tebans very patient. What is to be done with? it. What is the pleasure of the meeting? Miss Christie spoke up then, having finished the patch, and she says, I don't know. As my oldest son says, you can search me. This is the most disagreeable meeting I've ever had the misfortune to attend. Me too, says Miss Marshall. Then seeing that Miss Blake had begun to feel bad, she says, very polite, and we all have such good times at Miss Blake's house, too. What's that? Says Miss Harper, poking the ear-trial. trumpet into Miss Marshall's face. I was just saying,

Miss Marshall yells into it, that we all have such good times at Miss Blake's house, and Miss Harper smiles and nods at Miss Blake and says, Yes, just so. Are there any suggestions to be made in regard to the disposal of this money? Asked Miss Stebbins, and nobody says anything. Of course we all had our private ideas, but we want going to explain them to Miss Stebbins.

Miss Dunlap got up and says, I must ask to be excused as I have a guest for dinner. Yes, Henry, that's what she said. Miss Stebbins being there one night has changed company for supper into guest for dinner. Miss Dunlap says goodbye to everybody, telling Miss Stebbins that she don't need to hurry, but to stay as long as she's enjoying herself.

And after Miss Blake comes back from seeing her to the door, Miss Tebbin says, If there is no new business to come before the house, a motion to adjourn will be in order. Nobody says anything, so Miss Deben says, Miss Warner, will you please stand up and say, I move we adjourn? So I stood up and I says,

I move we adjourn, and Miss Deben says, Miss Christy, will you please stand up and say, I second the motion? So Miss Christie stand up and says, I second the motion, and Miss Deben says, if there is no objection, the meeting stands adjourned. Just as she says that,

she takes her last whack at the varnish with her hammer, and moves her chair back so quick that she catches one leg of it on a hole in the carpet and falls over backwards, and a whole lot of little sausages made of hair rolls off her head and all over the parlor floor.

I'd been suspecting it was false, because I know no woman could ever make her natural hair look like that. After Miss Tebans and the sausages was picked up, we had tea that had stood on the ground so long it was bitter, and we took turns talking into Miss Harper's trumpet, till it was time to go home and some had gone. Everybody was waiting for Miss Debbins to go, and finally she went, and just as she went,

some of those us had gone come back by way of the back door. Miss Blake was at the door with Miss Debbins, and I heard her say loud and clear. Miss Debbins, if that table and that hammer would be of any use to you, you're quite welcome to take them with you. Neither of them is of any use to me, and I don't reckon they can be made so, she says, and Miss Tebens went off awful mad with her hat over one ear. I don't blame Miss Blake. The head kept coming off the hammer, and the table looked as though it had the smallpox. If she uses it, you'll have to keep it covered up. When I left, Miss Hartman. was asking everybody what a constitution was and miss christie was telling her to look in the dictionary it was a terrible exciting meeting it was supposed to be the last but i reckon there'll be another with miss stebbins and miss dunlap left out though i don't know how we're going to manage it without hurting somebody's feelings

i reckon there will mused uncle henry as molly turned into the shaded driveway of her own accord did you say you was laying out to have honey for supper, mother. Maybe. I ain't been thinking much about supper. I saw the flour measured out in the pantry and the bacon powder can down, so I know there was gone to be biscuits. I've always relished honey with hot biscuits and sweet butter. So have I, murmured Aunt Belinda, she climbed out at the back door. You put Molly up, father, and just as soon as I change my dress, I'll get supper. If I think of anything more that went on at the meeting,

I'll tell you while we're eaten. All right, Mother. Uncle Henry was perfectly willing to let the remainder of the meeting rest in the eternal oblivion to which he fain would consign it, but he was too wise to say so, before supper.

End of Chapter 11. Chapter 12 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 12. Mid-Summer Madness Chandler was playing solitaire, that last resource of the vacant mind. Marjorie sat near him,

embroidering the last clover blossom upon a square of pale green linen destined for a sofa cushion. There, she said, holding it up before him. Isn't it pretty? Chandler nodded. Not half as pretty as you are, was upon his lips,

but he did not say it. Instead, he asked, What's it for? It's for them. Who is, or are them? Judith and. Marjorie hesitated for an instant, then colored faintly and added, Mr. Keith.

Oh, for a wedding present? No, just because they've been so nice to me. I was in their house the other day, you know, and I thought I'd like to make something for it. When it's done, I'm going to take it up there and leave it on one of the window seats for a surprise. They'll never guess where it came from. Chandler thought they would know instantly,

but forbore to spoil. Marjorie's pleasure by saying so. Did you ever play that game? He asked. Where are you assigned to people you know the characteristics of a flower and a musical instrument? No. How do you do it? I was just thinking that the clover blossoms suggested you to anyone who knew you, but forget-me-nots

would be better. They're so like your eyes. And the musical instrument? She queried. Like most very young women, she was unfailingly interested in personalities. A mandolin, he said. Marjorie folded up her finished work, stuck her needle into the upholstered arm of the chair in which she was sitting,

and hung her thimble upon it. What is Judith? A scarlet poppy and her own harp. And Mr. Keith? Chandler hesitated. It's never quite so easy to place a man. A carnation, perhaps, and a clarinet. It's your turn now.

What is Miss Bankroft like? A tea rose. a pale pink one, and either a flute or a violin. I don't know which. Violin, he said half dreamily, and I a broken cello. His face saddened as he spoke. What is Eliza? asked Marjorie with quick kindness. A cabbage, laughed Chandler, and an accordion. There is no poetry to be connected with Eliza. When Judith came that afternoon, wearing her scarlet gown to please Chandler,

Marjorie greeted her playfully. Did your ears burn this morning? We were talking about you. That depends upon what you were saying. One isn't always safe, you know, even with one's friends. That sounds like Miss Bancroft, commented Chandler. Judith had brought him a book, a small basket filled with strips of candied orange peel,

and a paper butterfly that clung to whatever it touched, waving its wings in a most life-like fashion. Doesn't it? smiled Judith. I don't be. believe you can live with other people and not absorb something from their ways of thinking and manner of expressing themselves. Moreover, Aunt Cynthia has a very penetrating personality. All strong natures have, Chandler answered. Some people are shaped wholly by their environment,

as plastic material conforms to the receptacle in which it is placed. Others mold their environment to meet the demands of individuality. Can it be done? asked Judith thoughtfully. "'Always, if one is strong enough, "'from mysterious sources we draw to ourselves "'that which we require or expect. "'If a tree may lift into its trunk "'the materials for sap and fiber, "'and if the moon may control the tides,

"'why should not thought, "'which is the most wonderful and powerful of forces, "'bring harmony into one's daily life, "'if not the absolute control of circumstances?' "'Marjorie, frankly, bored, "'tap the verand tally with a tiny foot, "'and Judith laughed. You're getting into deep waters, she said with ready tact, where Marjorie and I can't follow you.

Then tell me about yourself. What have you been doing? Everything. I go to town every day now, like any businessman, to buy furniture. Is the house done then? Practically, Carter says it's the only house he ever heard of that would be ready before it was expected to be. Then, Chandler hesitated a little. That will hurry things, won't it? He was fond of Carter, but For some reason he could not have put into words if he tried to do it, he rather dreaded to have Judith Mary. Things might never be the same again. It's the way of things not to be.

Judith had turned her face away. Her eyes, lifted toward the distant hails, had something of the rapt fervor of the mystic in their starry depths. The common things of every day had faded from her sight. Alone with her own soul, she dwelt apart. Marjorie looked at her in amazement, slightly tinged with awe, but Chandler understood. A woman and her dreams.

With secret reverence he waited, until she came to herself with a start. I beg your pardon, she said with a rush of color staining her face. I was wandering around in my Spanish castles. Is the house furnished? asked Marjorie. Almost.

The inevitable piece of furniture isn't as yet upon the inevitable spot, but we can learn where things belong only by experience. You can build a house. but a home must grow. Miss Bancroft again, said Chandler. Judith nodded. I'm getting the epigram habit.

Later on I shall progress to cryptic monosyllables and puzzling metaphors. Aunt Cynthia's conversation isn't merely talk. Most of the time she means something entirely the reverse of what she appears to be saying. Most women do, don't they? I don't know. Judith fell to dreaming again,

but recalled herself almost instantly. I'm absent-minded today, she said in smiling apology. I'm thinking about the house all the time. I wish you'd tell me about it, said Chandler earnestly. Remember, I've never seen it and never shall. Haven't I been telling you all along? Yes, but I've got confused. My mind is a mass of unrelated details.

Begin at the beginning, won't you? It begins on a terrace overlooking the valley and the river. Outside is just a cement bungalow with a... a green-tiled roof and a veranda opening off the living room. Latest windows, you know, that is, the upper sash. Inside there's a big living room with a stone fireplace and an ingle-knook. Dull, gray-green grasscloth on the walls, white net curtains, lots of built-in bookcases, and a big table with a reading lamp on it. Carter's den isn't touched as yet. He says he wants to put his junk into it a little at a time. Judith went on patiently as she had done many times

for Aunt Cynthia from room to room. The house love, which belongs to some rare woman, illumined her face and put music into her voice. One could see that all of it was dear to her, quite apart from Carter, and yet, in a way because of him, for had they not built it together, with a dream at the beginning, as there is at the beginning of everything worthwhile.

Thank you, Chandler said when she had ceased. I see it all quite plainly now. We'll have it photographed for you as soon as it's in order. Did I tell you that Aunt Cynthia the might possibly come to live with us. No, Chandler answered in a different tone. His little world seemed to be rearranging itself and proceeding in new ways independently of him.

I'm afraid she won't, Judah's side, but Carter says she must. He threatens to kidnap her by automobile. Modern, isn't it? Lock and var up to date. Suppose the car should break down. Oh, but it won't. Isn't it a habit of automobiles?

"'Sometimes one is tempted to think so. "'We had a long walk back home last night. "'The car is far out on the east road at this blessed minute, "'waiting for somebody to tow it back where it can be repaired. "'Suppose Miss Bancroft had been in it,' queried Chandler. "'Don't borrow trouble, please. "'Aunt Cynthia says that when you borrow trouble, "'you give your peace of mind a security.

"'We're late about getting to our work, aren't we?' "'Judith went to the piano and ran her fingers idly over the keys. She took down the low-and-grin music first, then remembered that it had stirred up on happy memories for Chandler and immediately put it aside. Marjorie sat and listened for a time, then went out into the yard. She was restless and unhappy,

and the strains of dance music that came from the house only accentuated the blackness of her mood. She took the embroidered cushion cover into the kitchen and asked Eliza to press it. Then, seized with a swiftest taste for the whole thing, she hurried to the machine, sewed the two parts together and stuff the pillow in. By the time she had finished it, she was glad it was done,

and for the moment abandoned the idea of taking it to the house. She could give it to Judith as she was leaving. But no, that wouldn't be nice, to burden Judith with her own gift. Sometime, perhaps, when they came up to take her out in the car. But when had they come to take her out? When would they come? Resentfully, Marjorie went to her dresser and shook out the shimmering lengths of rose and turquoise that had lain there so long, dazzling no eyes but her own.

Perhaps if she showed the veils to Judith, it might give her a pleasant idea. Marjorie sat down in her low chair and kicked her small heels together nervously. Why were people in love always so abominably selfish? When she gave Judith the cushion, she might show her the veils. No, that would be altogether two-pointed. Mr. Keith had been so nice that day they met in town. And the day he came to bring back the stucet. he had been so entirely different, so moody and sullen and in such a hurry to get away.

Judith had asked her to dinner only once. She had been in the car but twice, and nothing could be more lonely than to stay cooped up all the time in a little house with a man old enough to be her father, and a lame man at that. Tears of conscious self-pity came into the blue eyes. Downstairs they were playing and would keep at it for an hour longer if not two hours. She could go away, almost anywhere. and come back long before they missed her. A dormant sense of justice bade her ask herself

why Judith should do for her more than she had, or why Mr. Keith should be expected to take a lonely little orphan out in his car. Nevertheless, the music from below grated upon her abominably. The finished cushion confronted her with a sort of impertinent stare. She wanted to get rid of it immediately, but how? Then a bright idea came to Marjorie.

Why not take it over to the house now and leave it? She would be back before they finished playing, and they would never know she had been away. The surprise would be complete if either of them went to the house that night. Smiling, and with an agreeable sense of adventure, Marjorie slipped out of the house and away from the tormenting tunes. She wore no hat, and was glad she had not burdened herself with it, for the sofa cushion, unwrapped as it was, made a very awkward armful long before she reached her destination. Indeed, at the river, she seriously thought of turning back. then reflecting that she was already nearly halfway there,

she sat down to rest a little before she went on. Nobody in the house had seen her go, and Chandler and Judith were wholly absorbed in their music. When a lilting, laughing melody came to an abrupt ending in a full chord of sadness, and then by a swift modulation changed into a minor key, Chandler stopped. Judith turned, wondering what was wrong.

The man's eyes were fixed upon her in almost passionate pleading, and a strange expression had come upon his face. Judith, he said huskily, Oh, my dear girl, take your joy, don't wait, I beg of you not to wait. What do you mean? She asked in astonishment. Don't wait.

The minute the house is done, go, go with him. Don't wait. Why? She asked with a queer little pang at her heart. Because things happen. So many thousand things might happen. When the cup of joy is once at your lips, drain it to the dregs.

We are sure only of the things we have had. She ran her hand over the keys again carelessly, but the lovely face was slightly pale. I like to go to it, she murmured, at sunset, and alone when nobody knows where I am. I like to think of all the love and laughter that some day will be there, of all the little household gods waiting,

asleep, for the love that shall bring them to busy life. And the voices, "'Oh, the little voices that I pray may come!' Her own voice had died into a whisper, but the light in her eyes came from the very altar fires of her womanhood. Then swiftly the divine moment passed. Little sunset house of hearts standing all alone, I could come and sweep the leaves from your stepping-stone.

"'I like to go there,' she went on in another tone, and say it to myself. "'You understand, don't you?' "'Yes. "'Yes,' muttered Chandler. "'No one can understand better than I. "'But, oh, my dear girl, don't wait!' The words chimed with her steps as she walked away,

turning instinctively toward the little house, lonely upon its hillside, waiting, Judith fancied for her coming. "'Don't wait, don't wait, dear girl, don't wait!' Every cricket chirped it at her as she passed, and even the birds leaned out from their leafy doors to sing at her. "'Don't wait, don't wait. Dear girl, don't wait. It had not occurred to Marjorie that a finished house,

almost entirely furnished, might be locked, but she did not want to carry the sofa cushion back again, and she disliked the idea of leaving it upon the veranda. If it should be stolen, all her work would be useless, and never would she make another? Unaccustomed to sewing, her fingers were rough and pricked, and there was a long needle scratch across the back of her left hand. She went down into the basement,

found a step-ladder left by one. one of the painters, and dragged it with some effort up to the kitchen window which was not fastened. Inspired by the emotions that conceivably may sustain a burglar in his nocturnal enterprises, she went back to the veranda, got the cushion, and after two failures succeeded in throwing it through the open window. Now to climb in, thought Marjorie gleefully, put it where it belongs and come out again. How surprised they'll be! Brushing off the dust, she took it into the living room, laid it upon a window-stice.

seat and turned to go. Then she was assailed by temptation. I don't believe it's very nice of me, she said to herself, but I do want to look at the rest of the house, just one peep. She went through the bedrooms, pausing to admire the curtains and furniture, took an appreciative look at the dining room, a rapid survey of the kitchen, and lingered for a few moments in the suite which she supposed would be assigned to Miss Bankroft should she go to live with them. It was a dear house, just such a house as Marjorie had all. always wanted herself. When she went back into the living room,

she came face to face with Carter, who had just unlocked the front door. He stared at her for a moment in profound astonishment. Where's Judith? he asked quickly. Up at Mr. Chandler's. Playing. How did you come here? Marjorie pouted for a moment, then answered coolly.

I climbed in through the back window. Why didn't you get the key of the kitchen door from Judith? She didn't know I was coming. it was a surprise. Carter was looking at her with an odd expression upon his face. I'm very sorry, Marjorie stammered. I suppose you think it isn't nice of me.

Perhaps it isn't, but I assure you I haven't meant any harm. I only came to bring you that, pointing to the cushion. I made it myself, and I wanted to bring it and not tell anybody until you'd both wondered where it came from. The blue eyes were misty and almost childlike in their appeal.

Carter took up the cushion and looked at it approvingly. I say, he began awkwardly. Did you really make it yourself? Every bit, and I pricked my fingers, too, see? Devoid of any impulse of coquetry, Marjorie extended her hands as she might have done to her father, or to Chandler, or even to Judith herself. But Carter did not see the rough fingertips and the long scratch.

His eyes were upon hers, and Marjorie translated the strange look into stern, approval. I'm sorry, she said again. Her eyes brimmed now and her sweet lips trembled. Please forgive me and I'll go. She turned, but the man suddenly caught her in his arms. Marjorie, he breathed. For a frightened instant she struggled, then yielded. Her lips met his in the first kiss she had ever given to any man, save her father. Marjorie, he whispered, Marjorie, dear. For a delirious minute he crushed her to him, knowing only that he held in his arms the one woman God had meant for him since the world was made, that no other woman could ever stir the unsounded depths of his soul.

He had the sense of divine completion that comes to a man but once in his life, and which is never to be mistaken or denied. over and above the riot of his senses, he knew that this was inevitable, that from the day he was born, every step had led him straight to Marjorie, and that he had her at last. The back door opened, but no one heard. Judith came into the dining room singing softly to herself. It might have been a lullaby stirring from her prayer for little voices and the fairy patter of little feet.

She opened the door into the living room, and still, no one heard. White and horror-stricken, she stood there for a blinding instant. Then her nerveless hand dropped to her side. The door closed of its own accord. Like a wounded animal seeking shelter, Judith turned toward the white room. Her own room. No, she said to herself in a shrill whisper.

Not there. She dragged herself to her own closet, locked the door on the inside, and sank to the floor. All her senses merged into one unspeakable hurt. oh said margery with a sob breaking away from carter how can you how can i not he answered his face was as pale as judas had been when she stood there in the door unseen she looked at him for a moment then with faltering steps went to the door he followed her out of the house and down the road she looked neither to the right nor to the left but held her head proudly though the tears were streaming down her face A torrent of broken words came from Carter's lips, but Marjorie did not answer. Finally, he said, with the dogged stubbornness which was characteristic of him,

You needn't speak to me if you don't want to, but I shall at least see you safely home. Marjorie ran then, so fast that he could not keep up with her. He stopped at the river and watched until the flying little figure in blue turned at the crossroads, never once looking back. Shaken to the depths by a whirlwind of emotion, he wasn't. the cold perspiration from his face. God, he said to himself, What shall I do?

Bitterly, he added, What can I do? He lingered upon the riverbank until after dark. Nor did he see in the gathering dusk, the pitiful figure in scarlet that crept past him in the kindly shadows, too deeply submerged in its own misery,

even to guess that he was there. End of Chapter 12. Chapter 13 of a weaver of Dreams by Mertral Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Thirteen. The right way.

When Carter finally pulled himself together, it was almost eight o'clock. Without stopping to think of dinner, he went slowly to Miss Bancrofts, hoping yet dreading to see Judith. Her beautiful serenity had always calmed him. When with her, he seemed to dwell in a higher atmosphere,

beyond the power of mundane things to disturb or to annoy. It did not occur to him to send an excuse, and indeed what excuse could he send? He could not say he was ill, or busy, for he had never been ill a day in his life, and he never worked evenings. At least he had not since he fell in love with Judith. The house was ominously silent. No friendly light beckoned from a window. No woman in a white gown waited in the shadow at the gate to put soft bare arms around his neck and murmur in a low voice that thrilled him to the depths of his soul.

dear my dear even miss cynthia was invisible the maid said that miss judith had a headache and had gone to bed no she had not been down to dinner insensibly relieved carter turned away he walked farther up the road then came back there was no light in judith's room nor in miss cynthia's except for the kitchen the house was dark memory stung him as with scorpions cad he said to him angrily. Coward, weakling, blind fool. Chaotic emotions surged through him, yet even then, he knew that his ultimate reckoning must come, not with Judith or Marjorie, but with himself. It was the first time since he had grown to manhood that Carter had lost his self-control. Proudly he had kept the command of himself with secret contempt for the weakness of those who would not. He shrank, frightened from the thought that anything outside himself could direct even his

smallest action. Anxiously, he considered Judith. In the year and more of their engagement, he had never known her to have a headache, nor to deny herself to him upon any pretext whatever. Above coquetry and the use of small feminine weapons, she met him openly and frankly as a man might. Always they stood upon equal terms,

yet because she was all woman, even in her frankness, she commanded his loyalty. A flood of it surged upon him now, drowning for the moment every tormenting thought. He went back to the day they met, when he came out to Edgerton to find a place where he might live reasonably and quietly, while in yonder roaring city he made daily offerings

upon the altar of the God's success. Someone had told him to go to Mrs. Warner's, but he could not remember who. Judith had been there talking to the old people. Uncle Henry had heard his foot, and the injured member had been wrapped in flannel and propped up on a chair. Judith had taken him a book and a picture puzzle, and was teaching him to play solitaire while she chatted with Aunt Belinda upon congenial topics.

Vividly as though it were yesterday, the picture appeared before him. The exquisite cleanliness and peace of the whole place, from the white picket fence around the yard to Aunt Belinda herself, matronly and kind, enveloped in a spotless white apron. He remembered how she had at first mistaken him for a book agent, and refused to admit him until he had spoken the talismatic. name that had wreathed Ant Belinda's face in smiles. Who was it anyway? Queer that he should forget that and remember everything else. And Uncle Henry, wearing the martyr-like expression of the man who is slightly ill, sitting in the best rocker in the center of the parlor with his sore foot upon the softest

chair, the pivot upon which the entire household revolved. Carter remembered the mild blue eyes that peered sharply at him from over the steel-bowed spectacles. the scanty white hair that stuck out all over his head because he had refused to let Aunt Belinda brush it or to do it himself and the full gray beard irregularly trimmed because he had done it himself with the aid of the kitchen scissors and the cracked mirror that hung over the sink. Five years ago, almost, yet it seemed as though it were only the day before.

He remembered he had gone upstairs with Aunt Belinda and how gratefully the lavender-scented stillness of the front room had appealed to his weary senses. Then, having come to terms with her, he went down, to find that Judith was leaving, in spite of Uncle Henry's loud, voiced protests and the shrill assertion that he couldn't play the game yet by himself, in what was he to do? Smilingly, Judith had suggested the picture puzzle and the book and promised to come again tomorrow. For the first time, then, Carter noted the cool depths of her voice, the full, vibrant

contralto that sounded through the rooms like the swept strings of a harp. He had asked if he might not walk home with her, since it would be an hour before the next train to town, and she had assented as readily, and as unemotionally as though she had been a man or he a woman. It was spring then, and he had never forgotten the long walk upon the good brown earth and the young grass, the scent of the blossoming willows that overhung the river and the mute aspiration upward even of the clods. The flutter of swift wings past him, the tranquil clouds that were reflected upon the rippling surface of the river, murmuring with full, low music

toward the ultimate sea that, with its siren call, lures every stream on earth into its arms. The day came back, pitilessly, to confront him now. Though hitherto not given to sentiment, Carter had kept that day the bunch of violets Judith had taken

from her belt and offered him, as they stood at the white gate hung upon posts in the midst of the box edge that surrounded Miss Cynthia's house. The pungent odor of the box never failed to bring before him Judas Frank's sweet eyes, as she said, Just a little breath of country to last you until you get to town. Won't you come in and meet my aunt?

Thank you, no, he had answered a little confused. I haven't time now, but I'll come very soon if I may. With the merest nod of assent, she said goodbye and left him. That had been the beginning of a long, happy comradeship which at last had ripened into love. He had liked Miss Cynthia at once and keenly enjoyed the barbed shaft she sped at him. At first it had been merely pleasant to go there when he was lonely. Later he found himself in the midst of the afternoon,

looking forward to the evening which would bring him to Judith. When he asked once if he did not bore them by coming so often, Miss Cynthia had assured him most heartily that he could not, and even Judith had echoed her assertion with a soft, No, indeed no. So it had gone on. Gradually she became his solace, then his necessity. He took his unhappy moods to her, his failures, and even his temptations.

One night, when two ways lay before him and on the morrow he must choose which one he would take, Judith had settled it for him in one clear sentence. When you've once seen which way is the right way, it ought never to be hard to choose. Hundreds of times it had come back to him, and at crucial moments of his career had never failed to appear before him. Tonight it confronted him with double force. the right way he muttered where is it if i knew i'd take it he saw now as never before how much he owed judith subtly she had seemed to demand the best from him and loyally he had given it to her long ago he had seen that however high he might climb judith would still beckon to him from heights of her own he had known also that into whatever darkness he might be plunged judith would be beside him with a light

a certain bitter comfort came from the thought to go to judith and tell her everything to let her heal the hurt that he himself had done to his manhood why not he stopped to think then his question answered itself only a cad would betray one woman to another and moreover why should he hurt judith for the sake of his own relief clear and distinct the night of their betrothal urged itself into his misery remotely as though it belonged to another life. Judith's sweet serenity had not been disturbed. She seemed indeed to have expected it, and taken it as a matter of course. Crimson with embarrassment which the kindly shadows of the veranda concealed, he had stammered out the few necessary words, and Judith, with a laugh that was more like music than anything else, had yielded herself to his open arms without a word. The first kiss, passionless, as the first kiss usually is, then the next when he crushed her to him hungrily, and Judith, awake at last, had answered him from the depths of her inmost soul,

as Marjorie. Carter shrank from himself. Beast that I am! To be comparing the way in which two women have kissed me, if I fallen so low as that. He had paced back and forth along the riverbank for more than an hour thinking. Through force of habit he went back to Miss Cynthia's and walked up and down under the long row of maples across the street from the house. There was still no light, but a tall figure in white was upon the veranda that opened out from the sitting-room at the side of the house overlooking the garden it was not miss cynthia for as he looked at rose from its chair and dragged itself the length of the verandah without the assistance of a crutch the whole aspect of it was so utterly changed however that he would scarcely have known it was judith had it not been for the heavy veil of hair that deep as midnight hung far below her waist poor girl he said to himself what can be wrong Then, upon the instant, a question staggered him. Did she know?

Could she have seen? His stiff lips smiled a little at the thought, for Marjorie had said that she was up a Chandler's playing, so how could she have been in the house? Upon the face of it the thing was absurd, and yet his six cents made him wonder in spite of his reason. As he stood there, the white figure upon the upper balcony turned and crept into the house, bent and broken,

as though it had all at once grown old. Presently, from the other side of the house, a light streamed out into the scented darkness for a moment, then disappeared. With a sigh he turned away, sorry for Judith, who was evidently so ill or unhappy, or both, and bitterly ashamed of himself. Yet above it all, dominant, compelling,

rose-man's supreme passion, that for his mate. With the touch of Marjorie's lips, his world had changed, and would not ever be the same again. His feeling for Judith was unchanged. Rather, with the new emotion, it had been accentuated if that were possible, but the blinding sun had risen upon one who had known only Starlight before. For a wild moment he considered going to Judith and asking for release, then craftily wondered whether it would not be wise to make sure of Marjorie first,

then was shaken from head to foot by the realization of his soul's debasement. Instinctively, relieving his mind by wearying his body he walked on and on. Down the road he had taken that afternoon when Marjorie had run ahead of him, so fast that he could not keep up with her, and had been obliged in a few moments to give up an undignified and hopeless pursuit. Her face was wet with tears when he saw at last, and her blue eyes blind with mist. Her mouth worked piteously in the last instant,

before she broke away from him and started home. The memory of her choking sobs filled his heart with remorse, morseful tenderness. What of Marjorie! What was she thinking now? When he came to the crossroads where Chandler's lantern hung, he stopped to look up at the little blue sailor that guarded the weather-vane. The painted smile that had hitherto seemed cheery was a hideous mockery now. At the crossroads, said Carter to himself. Which way, old man? Which way? Very slowly the sailor turned and answered to a vagrant breeze, and squarely faced Marjorie's window, where every light still burned brightly, though the rest of the

house was dark. You've turned your back to the right way, Carter thought. But I mustn't. I can't. Dimly, through the maze of things, he had begun to see what he must do. Judas's words came back to him imperiously. When you've once seen which way is the right way, it ought never to be hard to choose. In spite of the blue sailor, Carter had seen the right way, in a flash of insight that had made

marvel why he had not seen it before. White-faced and weary, for it was past midnight now, he turned back, pausing at the river to strain his eyes toward the crossroads, where the lantern twinkled like some great star and above it, deeper in the darkness, Marjorie's light still shone. None of the three had eaten dinner, nor would any of the three sleep. When Marjorie ran into the house sobbing, Chandler had called to her gently, Marjorie, Marjorie, dear. Carter's own words. in another voice and in another place, and with a wholly different meaning. In a tumult of pain she had stopped only to ask, "'Has she gone?'

"'Yes, long ago.' With a fresh rush of tears she had gone upstairs and locked her door, leaving Chandler in grieved amazement. "'What could possibly have happened?' he asked himself again and again. "'What could possibly have happened?' "'Having dried her tears and calmed herself in the sweet solitude of the room Judith had taken such pains to furnish for her, Marjorie sat down to think. First love, dawning with the first kiss, stabbed into her heart with poignant pain.

It did not occur to her that Carter had been cruel, or unkind, or even disloyal to Judith. Something that had to be had happened, that was all. It was written in the stars that she should meet him as she had done, by the contriving of neither, that he should want to kiss her, and should do it. presently he would marry Judith and everything would be as it had been before save in her own heart. She told herself repeatedly that Carter would forget, that men always forgot. Had not father told her since the day she put on long scourced that a man meant nothing until he said, I love you, will you marry me? Had he not sternly bad Marjorie remember it?

Had he not told her that no nice girl allowed herself to be kissed by any man who had not said that? and once when Marjorie had asked half shyly, but suppose a girl is taken by surprise? Father had bitten his lips trying to conceal a smile before he said more gently. A girl is never so much surprised, my dear, that there is not time to say no in a way that leaves no doubt as to whether she means it.

It came to her with a sort of shock that father could ever be wrong about anything. Unmistakably she had been surprised. She had never even dreamed of it. such a thing until... Then Marjorie fell to dreaming of Judith and of the dear little house. How happy she must be to have it,

and Mr. Keith! In Marjorie's thoughts he had always been, Mr. Keith. She could not imagine herself using his first name with careless freedom, yet Judith always spoke of him quite casually as Carter, just as he said, Judith and Marjorie. She had not noticed that he had never called her Miss Gordon since the first time he spoke to her.

She was Marjorie to everybody, perhaps because she was so young. It came to her now with an odd little stir in her heart that if he said Marjorie, perhaps she might say Carter. Carter, she said aloud to see how it would sound. Carter Keith. Judith's name would be Mrs. Carter Keith, after they were married. At once, Judith was set apart from all other women in the world because she was to be Mrs. Carter Keith. not in the least realizing what had happened to her, and fearing that Chandler would be lonely she went downstairs, though she did not care for dinner and said so.

Chandler asked if she were tired, and she said absently that she was. When he spoke, she answered him in monosyllables. While he finished his dinner, she stood there, hesitating. Marjorie, dear, said Chandler kindly. What is it? Is it anything you can tell me? She looked at him for a moment,

then her eyes filled and she turned her face away. No, she replied with trembling lips. I, I want my mother, that's all. She choked on the words, fled upstairs again, and locked her door. The darkness frightened her rather than soothed her. She lighted her lap and every candle in the room, then curled up on her couch staring at the lights. She longed for her mother, as she said,

but presently she became aware that she longed more intensely for Carter. only to be in his arms again for just an instant, to be kissed just once more, and then to say goodbye, and not see him until after he and Judith were married. Married! The thoughts at every nerve thrilling to its own torture. Then, out of the maze of torment, came knowledge.

Oh, she murmured, hiding her face in her hands. I love him. Indeed I do. Then she added to herself. I wonder if he knows. Carter, tossing uneasily from side to side of his bed, was thinking of nothing else, aside from his own emotion in the things he had to do. He had been cruel to Marjorie, perhaps, but not unjust.

The thing had to be, and it was. There was nothing more to it. When the carrier pigeon came to his window, he had not been asleep at all. Common decency demanded that he should send a line to Judith, and yet what was there to say? what could a man say when the girl he was going to marry had a headache finally he wrote i'm so sorry you were ill dear are you better now c

he waited at the window until the bird came back with a brief answer yes thank you that is i think so j s somewhat refreshed by his cold bath he sat down after he had dressed to write a note to margery it was late but he could not write in his office and did not care whether he missed the train or not. At length, after many attempts, he achieved this. My dear Miss Gordon, I trust he will forgive me for my unparonable offence of yesterday. I have no excuse to offer. Indeed, I know there is none.

I most humbly beg your pardon. I suppose you do not want to see me again, but it is inevitable under the circumstances that we should meet occasionally. For Judith's sake, if not for mine, will you try to forgive and forget? Sincerely yours, Carter Keith. It sounded brusque and even unfriendly as he read it over. He couldn't post it on his way to the train as he had first intended. There must be some more graceful way of offering an apology.

A florist's window in town presented him with an idea. He sent it out to her that afternoon, enclosed in a box of pink roses. End of Chapter 13. Chapter 14 of The Weaver of Dreams by Mertil Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Fourteen. The One Woman After the pigeon had gone back to Carter with her answer to his note, Judith fell into an uneasy sleep, waking at intervals from dreams that mocked her to a shuddering reality.

It was long past noon when she began to dress. Miss Cynthia was in the garden with a book, making a sorry pretense at reading. When Judith came home the night before in the dust that shielded her white face, Miss Cynthia had gracefully accepted her explanation as to a headache, which is woman's friend as often as it is her enemy. Tactfully, she ascribed it to the long walk in the sun, following upon late hours of the night before, but did not fail to notice that Judith winced at the vague illusion to Carter.

Afterwards, when she was alone, Miss Cynthia remembered that in the ten years and more that she and Judith had lived together, the girl had never had a headache, nor indeed more than a single day's illness at a time. her feminine instinct scented trouble and yet what could it be surely she had not quarrelled with carter for he had come as usual the night before and judith had been happy all day until she came home from chandlers and that very night carter had come and was disappointed the maid said not to see miss judith thus she had translated his involuntary sigh of thankfulness miss cynthia had been tempted to go down and talk to him herself but thought the sound of their voices however might annoy Judith, and, moreover, Carter had not asked for her.

So, she sat alone all the evening in the sitting-room upstairs without a light, musing upon the mysterious ways of people in general and of men in particular. Secretly disturbed, Miss Cynthia had passed a troubled night also. Now and then, upon the maple tree just outside her window, the faintest possible light shone, the merest suggestion of the candle that burnt in Judas' room. Presently it would disappear and Miss Cynthia would sleep again, but never for long. Fitfully as the night waned, she woke and slept, anxious for Judith and wondering what could possibly be wrong.

When the carrier pigeon fluttered past her window on his way to Judith's room, she had a vague premonition that the tide of emotion had turned and that Judith would sleep now. As she dressed, Miss Cynthia scouted the idea that Carter had anything to do with Judith's unhappiness. She had never known him to fail even in the smallest way. He had kept Judith surrounded constantly with the evidence of his devotion. During the morning Miss Cynthia bade the maid leave her dishes and attire herself for the street. Then she wrote a note to Chandler. Dear friend, can you tell me what happened to Judith yesterday? She left here at half-past one, happy and contented. She came back at half-past seven white as a sheet and the merest ghost of

herself. I thought she had stayed to dinner at your house. She said she had a headache, but she never has headaches and I am troubled. She is still in bed. Please answer by bear and oblige. Cynthia Bancroft. Under the address she wrote, confidential, and undescorted heavily. In an hour the mate came back with the answer. My dear Miss Bancroft, Judith came at two as usual and was altogether like herself. She went away at five. Nothing happened here, I am sure, for she was not out of my sight. I am very sorry that she is ill and shall be quite as anxious as you are.

Marjorie went out while Judith was here and had not returned when she left. Marjorie came home about six in a tempest of tears. She ate no dinner and her light burned all night. She too is still in bed. Something must be worried. wrong. If you find out, will you tell me? This is all so confidential. Sincerely, Martin Chandler. Marjorie, said Miss Cynthia to herself, tearing the note into bits.

What could make two women weep except a man? And what man was there, save Carter? For the moment she struggled with the temptation to call up Carter's office and have it out with him at long distance. Then she reflected that after all it was none of her fair, and that most things would work themselves out to a happy conclusion if people in general were not so eager to give assistance that was neither asked for nor needed. So much of the trouble in the world is not caused by those who keep their mouths shut. And yet, between five and half-past seven, something had changed Judith from a beautiful and happy woman who gave out joy as a flower gives fragrance into a lifeless counterpart of herself. Miss Cynthia remembered with a shudder

how the scarlet gown in the dusk had been the color of blood. The deadly white face above it, and the wistful appealing eyes still haunted her. The garden itself was the abode of serenity and peace. Miss Cynthia sighed as she looked about her, from the shrubs that were past their blossoming time to the mass of Larkspur that had budded, and in a day would break into starry bloom. The house, with its double-decked veranda,

seemed to her more like a stranded ocean liner than ever. the life within having come to disaster upon some sunken reef. Yet nothing was happening. Butterflies floated back and forth in the warm still air lazily. Birds twittered in the boughs over her head, cheerfully busy at their housekeeping amid the green leaves, and the hum and whir of the manifold life about her went on unceasingly, without hint of trouble.

Nevertheless, she had been plunged overnight into chaos. The undercurrents might be calm and steady, pursuing their destined course through deep smooth channels of sea, but above, rocked and shaken by tempestuous surges, one ship at least was fighting its way to the harbor. Miss Cynthia determined to be very kind and to ask no questions. If she could find out tactfully where the trouble lay, perhaps. Judith came out of the house slowly,

dragging a favorite chair toward the spot where Miss Cynthia sat. The old lady instinctively half rose to help her, then settled back among her cushioned. with a sigh. When for a time she forgot her dependence upon her crutch, the need of it was forced upon her more sharply than ever. As Judith approached, she tried to smile, but there were pitiful lines around her mouth. "'Now,' said Miss Cynthia to herself, "'she'll tell me, in one way or another, most likely another.' Judith's lacy white gown was open at the throat, rippling away toward her shoulders in a mass of frills. Her dark hair hung far below her waist.

in a single heavy braid. She was pale but not quite colourless. At the first glance, Miss Cynthia shrank from her pitiful burning eyes. Judith spoke first. I'm sorry to be so late. I believe I'm getting lazy. How is your headache, dear? My headache. Judith frowned, and in an instant recollected her last night's excuse. It's better, she said wearily, but not quite gone. Have you had breakfast? No, I didn't care for any. Miss Cynthia tinkled the silver bell that she kept by her. We'll have coffee here, she said. A good strong cup of coffee is sometimes a charm against evil spirits. Judith hesitated, but did not refuse the steaming cup when it came. A bit of color appeared upon her cheeks and the scarlet of her lips deepened. There, smiled Miss Cynthia, that's better. Won't you

have an egg and some buttered toast? No, thank you. Judith leaned back in her chair, turning a little, so that she faced the hill. Then she remembered that the house of heart stood at the foot of it, and with a shudder moved her chair. She was directly facing the house now, with her pure, proud profile in Miss Cynthia's line of vision.

The older woman took up her book and turned the pages listlessly. Presently Judith asked without interest, what are you reading abelard and a louise the old books are the best like old wine and old friends quoting from motto cards dear why not aren't they meant to be quoted from i presume so there seems to be no other use for them i detest a lot of little mottoes stuck up around a place so do i somebody had sent mr chandler a batch of them yesterday he was not amused but he said that the misguided person who did it had doubtless intended to be kind. I expect he'll surround himself with them, then, to save hurting anyone's feelings. Judith nodded. Without seeming to, Miss Cynthia was watching her closely in search of a clue. I never was one to put an ugly thing into my house to please anybody else, she went on. I've often wondered what our Christmas letters would be like if we all told the exact truth.

Christmas would come to an end in two or three seasons as a while. far as the gifts are concerned. In one, Judith, dear, you remind me of the Irishman who said that if women refused to marry, the whole race would die out in three or four generations. Judith did not smile.

The slightest tremor ran through her body. The faintest shadow crossed her face. Matrimony, thought Miss Cynthia, woman's one great trouble. First to marry, and get something to worry about, then to escape from it and get rid of the worry. She recalled Stevenson's allusion to the long, straight road that lay before one, hot and dusty to the

grave, speculated for a moment upon the general subject of divorce, then reverted to the cemetery where nobody worried about anything. Or did they worry? She remembered Kipling's poem about the lovers in India, who rode rapidly at midnight past the cemetery, and the dead stirred in their graves because love rode abroad that night. and there was something else it is death that is the guide of our life and our life has no goal but death why didn't somebody have that inscribed over the entrance to a cemetery where marrying and giving in marriage were of no account as in heaven in an instant her thought had come back to judith pale silent staring before her with eyes that did not see she tried another avenue of approach why doesn't mr chandler give the motto cards to miss marjorie she can pin them up on the curtains and disfigure the walls of her own room if the donor impents he can ask her to bring them down girls like that sort of thing as a rule at the sound of the talismanic name judith paled perceived acceptably. Effecting not to see, Miss Cynthia prattled on.

Why doesn't Miss Marjorie come to see me? She's never been here but twice. While you're up there, she can come here, can't she? It's not fair for him to have you both at once. I suppose she could, Judith replied almost inaudibly. I'll see about it. Marjorie and matrimony, thought Miss Cynthia. Consequently, Carter and nothing else. What can he have been doing? She picked up the book she had been reading. I've always liked this, she continued calmly. The thing is so eternally and beautifully just.

Here's Ebelar bravely set forth on the path of glory, living only because of the love of the woman he cast aside. Judith sprang to her feet her eyes ablaze. Primitive woman within her, sleepless and on guard, broke into impassioned speech. But, oh, Aunt Cynthia! To be the one woman. Tortured, abused, neglected, even starved and beaten if a man so chooses.

To answer man's inexplicable need of cruelty. To be hurt, as a man must always hurt the woman he loves. But to know, always to know yourself as the one woman. To take it all, standing as a brave man takes a blow, because there is no face in his heart but yours. No touch but yours to stir him. No breast but yours for him to come to when his work. world is wrong. And when there never has been any other woman, and when you know as truly as you

know there's a God, that there never can be, that sickness, mutilation, poverty, failure, and the thousand other things life may bring you count for nothing there. That even death is no denial. Oh, Aunt, Cynthia, how a woman could cross the desert on her knees for the man who would give her that. Pitifully shaken, Judith dropped into her chair. She laughed hysterically. She laughed hysterically then hit her face in her hands. Precisely, said Miss Cynthia half to herself. Exactly. That's it.

Mistaking her meaning, Judith turned. How do you know? I had it, answered the old lady grimly, startled for a moment into revelation. I was the one woman, once, for an hour, so I know. There was an instant tense silence, questioning, and even pleading, Judith's eyes sought hers, but the open way between them closed suddenly. Suttly, Judith felt that a door had been slammed in her face. You're an intensely monogamous person, said Miss Cynthia with an abrupt change of tone.

Feminine instinct according to the books. The more feminine, the more monogamous and so on. Conversely, the more polygamous a man is, the more masculine he is. That's the cause of the eternal tragedy. Woman is a continuous design. Man is polka dots, and society tries to make one harmonious garment out of the two. Pocodots, echoed Judith. I said, polka dots, dear. Large number of small affairs scattered on the background of his more serious pursuits.

Separated, distinct, and apart. Man's supreme effort to keep him so. No desire to have any one of the Pocodots commune with another. and, as it were, compare notes. The thing doesn't wash. Haven't you ever seen Pocodots that wouldn't stand boiling and ran all over the background and into each other?

That sort of man has made a mess of his life. He's sued for breach of promise or divorce or something. Anyhow, he has his love letters read in court, crowning humiliation for any man, except being hung or electrocuted. Did you ever read a love letter that wasn't an evidence of idiocy, except your own. Upon the whole, mused Miss Cynthia, receiving no answer.

Dry cleaning is safer, but most women are possessed with a mad desire to test a man's love. They want to take a sample of the polka dots and boil it in soap-suds and put it in the sun, just to see what will happen. Nine times out of ten it'll run. Anyhow, it's going to fade, so why bother with it? "'Anything will break if it falls far enough. "'Anything is coarse if you put it under a microscope. "'Follow anything far enough and disillusion will hit you in the face.

"'Get far enough away and everything is lovely, unless there's too much light. "'Women ought to pray for near-sighted souls, "'but they're forever looking at men through a sort of spiritual telescope. "'It doesn't do.' "'Your metaphors are confused,' commented Judith soberly. "'Why not?' demanded Miss Cynthia briskly. "'Everything else is.' "'It's getting late,' resumed Judith after an interval of silence.

"'I must go in and dress. I'm ashamed of myself for being so lazy. "'Ask Ellen to come here if you see her, will you please?' "'Certainly.' With an effort, Miss Cynthia preserved her outward appearance of calm until Judith had gone into the house. Then she sat up and rang her little silver bell violently. Paper and envelopes, please, she said to the maid who came in response to a double summons,

and get yourself ready to go out. Hurriedly, she wrote to Chandler, without the formality of a beginning. She's told me, but she doesn't know it. He's making love to them both. C.B. Chandler puzzled over the message for a few minutes, then queried on the back of Miss Cynthia's monogrammed half-sheet of paper. Who told you? Who's making love to whom? Don't understand. Please answer. M.C.

Here, wait a minute, Miss Cynthia called to the retreating maid. Take this right back. Under his questions, she wrote, Judith, Carter, Judith and Marjorie. Get it? Some men can be told things and others require kindergarten demonstration with beads.

Expecting no more than the briefest possible reply, Miss Cynthia was dozing in her chair when the weary maid came back with this. Yes, at last, I fear you think me stupid. Somebody sent Marjorie a big box of pink roses this afternoon with a note which made her cry. I haven't seen her since.

What would you do? Here, called Miss Cynthia. You'll have to go back with the answer. It was twenty minutes walk to Chandler's. The road was dusty and the day was hot. Flesh and blood rebelled at the suggestion. I'll go, Miss Bankroft if you want me to, but I think I'll leave in the morning.

I'm unconfir. housemate, not a messenger. All right, suit yourself. Miss Cynthia was ruffled, but not by a thing so slight as that. Get me a telegraph blank, will you? She wrote to Chandler, Pray for Judith, I'm going to. That's all there is to be done. On the telegraph blank, she wrote, to one of the employment bureaus in town Miss called an intelligence office. Send me five new maids immediately. We'll keep two or three and pay expenses of outing. This one too weak to walk, and very impertinent. Leave this at the telegraph office, please, as you pass it on the way to Mr. Chandler's, and speak to the expressman about your trunk. You came here to do whatever you were

asked to do, and not to tell me what you would do and what you wouldn't. At present I'm managing this place? No, you needn't say anything. It's not necessary. a careless wave of the hand sufficed for dismissal chandler did not answer miss cynthia's note when marjorie failed to appear at dinner he took matters into his own hands and wrote a message of quite another sort My dear Carter, I suppose you'll think it's none of my business, but I don't know whose it is if it isn't mine. Would you mind telling me why you send Marjorie roses and notes that make her cry? She's been miserable ever since yesterday. If you can enlighten me, I'll be much indebted to you. Sincerely, Martin Chandler. It was very late when the answer came back.

My dear Mr. Chandler, I offended Martin. quite unwittingly and apologized for it. I'm very sorry she's unhappy. Yours. C.K. By the same messenger, Carter sent a note to Judith, saying that he had worked hard all day, was very tired, and unless she wanted to see him especially, would go to bed early instead of coming over. He hoped she was well, and looked forward to seeing her tomorrow evening, and as always he was hers to command. He rather expected an answer, but there was none. In the morning, the pigeon flew from window to window without being admitted at either place or receiving a message to carry. Besides, there was no corn.

He sat apart from his fellows all day brooding over it. Certainly, it was very strange. End of Chapter 14. Chapter 15 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 15 The documents in evidence Aunt Belinda came out upon the back porch

with her blue gingham apron full of string beans Uncle Henry, busy for once, was mending the harness and she observed it with satisfaction. Reckin this'll be about the last time this can be mended, he said. Molly's got to have a new suit of clothes before long, seems as I have. Aunt Belinda clicked her teeth together sharply,

but made no other audible comment. A frown had spoiled the calm smoothness of her forehead, and there were unwanted lines about the corners of her eyes. Henry, she said irrelevantly. I'm worried about him. What for? He ain't sick, is he? I don't know. This morning he only ate one sausage,

and when I told him he'd have to run if he made his train, he said he didn't care whether he made it or not. Well, said Uncle Henry after a pocket. What of it? Aunt Belinda's mouth closed into a thin, tight line. Nothing, she replied with ill-concealed sarcasm. Perceiving that he was expected to seem interested, he dropped the harness and folded his hands. What is it, mother? What's gone wrong?

I ain't said nothing about it, because I ain't one to talk less than there's something to talk about. And if there was more that was that way, this world would be a peacefuler place than what tis. "'Just so, mother,' approved Uncle Henry. "'Just so, "'espelligo. He had women's stockens on his bureau. "'Silk they was, and fancy, pale blue and awful small.' "'Well,' said Uncle Henry, undisturbed, "'what of it?' "'What of it?' Henry Warner.

"'Do you mean to tell me you think it's proper for any young man, "'much less one that's engaged to be married to have women's stockens on his bureau?' I ain't thought nothing about it. It ain't none of our, that is, my business as I see. If he'd been ashamed of him, he'd have hit him. He wouldn't have left him on the bureau. And if he'd done anything wrong, he'd have been ashamed of it. You know that, Mother, just as well as I do. I reckon he would. I hadn't thought of that. Then you ain't got no call to worry, Mother, not as I see. I ain't told you the rest. slept for two nights. I've heard him walking around and striking a light and getting up to put

it out again. Soon as I'd get to sleep, he'd wake me up, walking around. And do you know what time twas when he come in night before last? Uncle Henry shook his head. Of course you don't. You don't know nothing from the time you get into bed until breakfast is ready. If burglars was minded to do it, they could carry you out and leave you in the middle of the street and you'd never know it. It was most half-past, too, when he come in, and he ain't never stayed at her house that late. Silence ensued of the intense variety. Well, said Uncle Henry. He was about to add, what of it, but luckily thought better of it in time. And this morning, resumed Aunt Belinda with suppressed excitement. I emptied his waist-basket. There was things in there that would

make anybody worry. There was half a dozen sheets of his best paper, some tore and some not tore, and all of them beginning either, my dear Marjorie, or my dear Miss Marjorie, or my dear Miss Gordon. On some of them he said he was very sorry for what happened yesterday, and on others he said he couldn't truthfully say he was sorry, because it was something sweet to remember all the rest of his life. On another one he says, "'Will you forgive me if you can? "'Or is there no forgiveness for such as I?' "'And on another,' he says,

"'I must have seemed like a brute to you.' "'Oh, tell me I didn't. "'That you do care a little.' "'And on another sheet, way down in one corner he'd written "'Marjorie Gordon, twice, and under it "'and smallest kind of writing, Marjorie Gordon Keith. "'He tore it almost straight through, "'but I put it together again.'

Well, I'll be jiggered, said Uncle Henry slowly. It was the strongest language he permitted himself to use in Aunt Belinda's presence. Then, last night, while you was taking your evening nap to get yourself rested so as you could go to bed, that man that works for Martin Chandler come with a letter. I reckon it was from her, and it took him more than half an hour to answer it. There's another letter in the waste-basket, with no beginning to it, asking to be excused unless she wanted to see him especially, on account of having worked hard all day and being more than calm and tired,

and he didn't sleep none last night. He was walking and lighten lights and blowing him out again, and turning over in bed every other minute when he weren't walking and blowing out lights. And this morning, when I was out in the front yard, who should come by but Miss Bankroft's Allen all packed up for leaving? I says, are you leaving? and she says she be, and I asked her what for, and she said she was tired of being a messenger boy,

and that all day yesterday she was running between Miss Bankrofts and Chandler's with letters. Whose letters? Miss Cynthia's and Mr. Chandler's letters. She had to wait while they wrote to each other. Both Miss Cynthia and Mr. Chandler was dreadful upset about something or other, and she said she'd been sick all day. What was she running around for? if she was sick, queried Uncle Henry naturally confusing the pronouns.

I don't mean she. I mean her, Miss Judith. Maybe they fit, he said with an air of pious resignation. Maybe they ain't. Miss Judith ain't the fight and sort, and he ain't neither. All these four or five years that he's been living here, they've got along as peaceful and quiet as a basket of kittens, and if they fit, there's not only some good reason, but it's a her that's done it. Sex loyalty was one of Aunt Belinda's finer characteristics. And, she resumed bristling, if he's gone and made that girl feel bad, and her being so nice and quiet and so kind to everybody, well, I'm going to tell him what I think of him, that's all.

Maybe he ain't caring what you think of him. I've known folks that didn't care what anybody thought of them. Least ways not enough to ask or set quiet while they was being told. if i was you belinda i wouldn't bother my head none about it as long as he pays his board regular i don't see that we've got any concern with his morals henry warner that boy ain't got no mother well neither have i you don't need none you're old enough to have sense and besides if you ever want to know what ought to be did about anything you can always come and ask me If I ain't told first, he remarked dreamily, then quickly recollecting himself, he asked, Who's Marjorie? I've been telling you that ever since she come. I ain't seen her myself, but some of the ladies at the Soan Circle have.

They said she was an awful pretty little thing. Her paw sent her to stay at Chandler's for a spell. He's dead. How can he send her if he's dead? He sent her before he died. returned Aunt Belinda with wifely patience. Was she here when he died? No, but when he was dying he told her to come here after he was dead,

and he writ to Mr. Chandler and asked him if he would be a father to his little girl for a few months. The man that works for him found the letter, and he told Miss Vancroft's Alan, and Ellen told me. She was up there twice, once to supper. I ain't seen her myself, but I'm laying out to. When? He queried without much interest. This afternoon, soon as I've got your dinner and washed the dishes and got the kitchen cleared up and the things ready for supper, I am going to put on my best dress and go up there and call on her.

Won't she think it's funny? I don't know why she should. It's manners for the old residents to call on the newcomers, and there ain't one of the so-en-circle ladies been near her. Besides, I ain't been up to see Mr. Chandler for quite a spell. I'm going to take him some fresh eggs. They don't keep chickens, nor even a cow, and Eliza told Ellen that once when she was breaking one of the store eggs to make a custard, that it exploded when she touched it and hit her in the eye.

Must have been in the wintertime, he commented, when it's hard to get fresh eggs. I don't know when twas. Anyhow, there's no reason why I should go up and see Mr. Chandler, and while I'm there, it'll be natural for me to see this Marche, as they call her. Maybe I can find out from him what's wrong, and then I'll know what to say to Mr. Keith if I see it's my duty to talk to him as his own mother would if she was alive. Uncle Henry moved restlessly in his chair. He disliked the idea of Carter's being talked to.

I hope you won't see it as your duty, mother. What ain't our business ain't our duty more once in a blue moon. Never you mind, father. I'm going to find out what's up before I'm much older. Why don't you go and talk to her then? Which her? Miss Bankroft,

if they was writing letters all day yesterday, her and Chandler, it's likely she knows as much as he does, ain't it? Why don't you go there? Maybe you can talk to Miss Judith, too. Huh, grunted Aunt Belinda. "'Unless you're a lot smarter an I be, "'you can't find out nothing from a woman.

"'Mr. Chandler's the one I want to see.' "'Uncle Henry gave it up. "'He knew that further argument would only make her "'more salt in her way as he termed it to himself. "'He took the harness out of the barn "'and wheeled the buggy out into the yard. "'Instead of spending a hot afternoon "'peacefully in the cool, shaded parlor,

"'he would be driving in the blistering sun. "'So much was certain.' cold chills ran through him at the thought that he might be taken there also immediately he conceived numerous errands which would have to be done at the store all plausible in admitting of no postponement but aunt belinda did not even suggest that he should do more than leave her at the gate when she came out in her best black silk and her sunday-go-to-meaton bonnet with eight or ten fresh eggs in a small basket she was too thoroughly alive to the importance of her errand to talk at all deeply absorbed in her own thoughts she did not speak until they reached the crossroads then she said merely you can come back in an hour henry if i ain't ready to go then i'll tell you when you can come back again chandler's wheelchair was on the porch he nodded to uncle henry and called to him to know whether he was not coming in too uncle henry shouted a concise negative and drove away hastily henry's busy said aunt belinda she came up the few steps and offered chandler a moist but friendly hand farmers is terrible drove at this season of the year i've brought you some fresh eggs your eliza was telling miss bancroft's ellen that when she took up a store egg to make you a custard that it busted and hit her in the eye i hadn't heard about that chandler returned repressing a smile but it's mighty good of you wouldn't you like that other chair better try the rocker no thank you i'm comfortable where i be i never was one to set much in rocker

chairs. I ain't had time. Most of my setting has been done in straight-back chairs, and when I do have time to rest, I don't often take a rocker. On account of Henry's having business in town, I thought I'd come along and bring the eggs and set a spell with you. I ain't seen you for a long time. No, returned Chandler absently. You haven't. I heard you had company, she began. Company? Oh, yes, Marjorie. "'Relative?' queried Aunt Belinda politely. "'No, the daughter of an old friend.

"'The dearest, prettiest. "'She seems as though she might be my own daughter,' "'he concluded abruptly. "'I've wondered sometimes,' returned Aunt Belinda, "'with the suspicion of a tremor in her voice. "'What it would be like to have a daughter, or a son?' "'To have a daughter would be like having Marjorie always, "'and to know that she'd never go away.

except to be married. And having a son, I reckon, would be like having him around forever just as he is, littering up everything and splashing water all over the place. Only a son would be leaving to get married, too, just as he's going to.

Unwanted lines of sadness settled around her mouth. The old eyes grew misty. She took off her spectacles and wiped them vigorously. Cheer up, said Chandler kindly. I'm sure you'll see him off. But not often.

I don't now. He's always going away. And coming back, too, isn't he? Remember that he couldn't go away unless he had come back. That's so, mused Aunt Belinda. I ain't never thought of that. Chandler rang the bell that summoned his attendant. Will you ask Miss Gordon to come down for a little while, please,

if she feels like it? Marjorie appeared, presently, in white. with a string of blue beads around her throat, and her wonderful hair piled high upon her head in a big loose knot. She murmured the conventional. Glad to meet you, Mrs. Warner. Most everybody calls me at Belinda, and I ain't got a niece or nephew to my name.

Henry says if I was an aunt to everybody that calls me so, I'd have to live in an ant-hill. But people call him Uncle Henry, too. I reckon twas him that started it. him queried Marjorie with a smile yes mr keith he lives with me oh said Marjorie does he ain't he told you where he lives i thought you knew him i've met him once or twice returned Marjorie but i can't say i know him she colored faintly as she spoke but her self-possession would have done credit to a woman twice her age chandler smiled at her approvingly i'll go and get my sewing if nobody minds she said rising when the sound of her light feet died away upon the stairs aunt belinda turned to chandler what she writon to him for if she doesn't know him who asked chandler startled for the moment she with an inclination of her head toward the door through which marjorie had disappeared when last night your man come with a letter and it took him more than half an hour to answer it

oh he returned somewhat relieved that was my letter i wrote to carter myself upon a matter of business he added then after an interval why nothing returned aunt belinda somewhat confused i was just wondering there's nothing to wonder about he assured her trying not to be too abrupt isn't there though she thought for the moment she was tempted to tell him what she had found in the waist-basket but wisely refrained. Marjorie returned presently with her work. The remainder of the conversation was upon topics of general interest, such as the long period of unbroken heat, the possibility of rain in the near future, the low water in the river and so on. Aunt Belinda was rather relieved when Uncle Henry appeared at the gate fifteen minutes before the appointed time. His watch had stopped, and, fearing that he would be late, he had aired in the right direction.

"'Good-bye, Mr. Chandler. come again soon. Goodbye, Miss. Gordon, supplied Marjorie with cool politeness. Miss Gordon, I'd like to have you come to see me some time if you want to. Thank you, I will. The words were irreproachable, and the accompanying smile was dazzling,

but nevertheless, Marjorie had managed to convey the impression of great distance. Well, said Henry, as they turned at the crossroads, did you find out what you wanted to know? "'I ain't found out nothing,' remarked Aunt Belinda tartly. "'Do you suppose I go around among my neighbors to gossip? "'I ain't that kind of a woman I'd have you know.' "'Oh,' said Uncle Henry,

"'I thought you was going to find out something. "'I disremember what it was.' "'Aunt Belinda grunted an unintelligible answer. "'With the tactlessness possible only to husbands he went on heedlessly. "'You was going to find out something.' from Chandler, about him. Don't you recall it? Oh, that. With an apparent effort, she searched the depths of her memory for a bit of unimportant fact with which, for some reason, best known to himself, Uncle Henry desired to become acquainted. He wrote the letter himself, on a business

matter. She didn't write to him at all. How did you find out? He told me of his own accord. Men is easy to get things out of. They'll tell all they know if you find him in the right mood. Huh, said Uncle Henry. But that Marjorie, continued Aunt Belinda with evident feeling. I tell you, she's a slick one. Pretty. My, yes, and that polite.

Regular city manners. I'm worried about him some way, but I don't know why. You ain't got no com. call to worry, Belinda. Just set easy and let things take their natural course. That's the way I do. Yes, she answered ironically.

That's the way you do and no mistake. I never saw anybody set quite so easy. She went on voluably until she noticed that Uncle Henry was almost asleep. When Carter came home, smiling and pleasant, as was his wont, she was vaguely reassured.

Yet, in her heart she knew, through sure feminine instinct, that all was not right with him, who in her inmost thoughts she termed, her boy. End of Chapter 15. Chapter 16 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Labor Fox recording is in the public domain. Sixteen A Challenge

Carter attired himself for the inevitable with solemn care. It was a relief of a minor sort, but still relief, that the car had been repaired and he would not be obliged to walk along the road where he has spent the greater part of an unhappy night in shamed questioning of himself. In spite of his legal training, he was too young and too thoroughly healthy in mind and body to be much given to self-analysis. He had brought red roses for Judith and white roses for Miss Cynthia, and was whistling to himself, though half-heartedly when he started off. Accusing conscience bade him linger on the road, Impulse urged him to take a longer route and past Chandler's house, where he might possibly have a fleeting glimpse of

Marjorie, but with his mouth resolutely set he turned toward Miss Bankrofts. The two women were upon the upper balcony. Occupied with the car he did not see Miss Cynthia bend over to get her crutch, nor did he hear Judith's low-voiced plea. No, no, please stay, just as long as you possibly can. The old lady's presence was a relief to Carter also. He spoke to her, then bent over to kiss Judith as well. his want, not noting in the confusion of the moment that she turned her cheek.

"'How are you, dear?' he asked, trying to keep his voice even. "'Better?' "'Quite myself, thank you,' she murmured, hiding her face in the roses. "'How exquisite these are! I must put them in water. Shall I take yours too, Aunt Cynthia?' Carter drew a long breath as Judith disappeared in the dusk of the unlighted room. The awkward first moment was over, and the path lay straight ahead. difficult though it might prove to be. Was Judith really ill?

He asked, unable to think of anything else to say. She was, returned Miss Cynthia concisely. Why? It isn't like her to have headaches. No, I think we all do things sometimes that aren't like us, don't you? Did you never do anything yourself that was conspicuously out of character? The random shot told, and even in the twilight Miss Cynthia saw the surge into his face.

Yes, he returned. I have. Then don't blame Judith. Sex loyalty, the distinguishing mark of a woman who is really fine was rampant in Miss Cynthia. I've missed you, Carter said when Judith came back. Night before last I walked all over the map, and even after that, for some reason I couldn't sleep. So last night, after a hard day in town, I was done up.

That wasn't like you. commented Miss Cynthia with malicious intent. No, the young man agreed moodily. Quite out of character, the old lady went on. Quite, Carter assented politely. Beneath the meaningless words, Judith detected warlike possibilities. When the ensuing silence threatened to become awkward, she relieved it with a laugh.

We're all in the dumps tonight, she said. What's wrong with us? It's the waning moon, Miss Cynthia. Cynthia responded. If it affects lunatics when it's at the full, why shouldn't sane people notice changes in it too? She sat up in her chair very straight. I hate dying things, she said passionately. Twilight, waning moons, autumn, old age, roses that drop their petals. Everything. Why do they have to do it? Why indeed? echoed Carter. It is death that is the guide of our life.

quoted Judith, And our life has no goal but death. Our death is the mold into which our life flows. It is death that, Oh, for goodness sake, cried Carter. Cut that out. I feel as though I were making an evening call in a cemetery. He rose and paced back and forth nervously.

I'll smoke if you don't mind. I wouldn't be surprised to have the ghost of Hamlet's father appear before me at any minute. Hamlet's father's ghost would be surprised, Miss Cynthia remarked. It's a long jump from the stage to the deck of a stranded ocean liner in a garden that's dying for rain.

I beg your pardon, Carter. I didn't mean to say dying. I intended to say that we needed rain and to ask what you thought of the prospects for it. And, speaking of ghosts, why shouldn't there be at least one ghost in a little hamlet like Edgerton? Carter laughed a little, but only to be polite.

You remind me of the two road companies that happened to strike a small town at the same time with an Uncle Tom's cabin show. The one that got the business advertised two Uncle Tom's, three little Evas, and had Eliza cross the ice until the audience hissed her. Miss Cynthia dropped into a reminiscent mood. Her usual high spirits had sunk to their lowest ebb. She suffered from the melancholy reaction. Last night's dreams still haunted her as they had all day,

not the inconsequence sort, usually ridiculous and to be dispersed with a smile. but the pitiful ones in which the dead come back without stretched hands and pleading eyes to forgive or to be forgiven. Symbols of mourning persisted in her thought. Long, unlighted paths, weeping willows, white gates with cypresses on either side, and rees of laurel tied with purple ribbon.

The gloom of the garden was not the peaceful dusk at the close of a hot day. It was menacing, overwhelming. Everything conveyed to Miss Cynthia the sense of foreboding of impending disaster. Our cow is very sick, Carter was saying. Aunt Belinda said at supper that if she should die, we should be obliged to get our butter from the crematory.

With a rush, Miss Cynthia's normal gait he came back. Dear child, she said to Carter in the midst of her laughter, You make me very sad. How your thoughts do run upon ghosts, crematories, and the like, you're a most depressing person. Can't you think of something pleasant? Only of you, he returned gallantly. What could be more pleasant?

Nothing, she said with childlike candor, when I am in the mood. Not quite at ease, Judith slipped into the sitting-room, lighted the tall candles upon the mantel-shelf, and drew her harp close to the open window. She was self-conscious to her fingertips. Primitive woman within her urged her to go to Carter. Tell him what she had seen, and ask for an explanation. Modern woman, thinly veneered upon the essential femininity of her nature, bet her be quiet, watching if she chose but to wait.

She reflected as she struck the first chord, that the greater part of life was spent in waiting anyway, and that those who have learned to wait patiently are those who have learned to live. Her face was in the shadow as she played, but from where he sat Carter could see the delicate outline of her profile in the full rounded throat, rising regally from the band of black velvet around the low neck of her scarlet gown. Having felt the need of color, she fairly blazed with it.

She seldom wore jewels, but tonight, aside from her ruby ring, she wore diamonds and emerales upon both hands, an antique bracelet, an oriental necklace, and a wide band of brilliance in her dark hair. She had no rouge, but she had put a bit of false crimson upon her cheeks and lips with nail paste, then angrily washed it off, despising herself, for the subterfuge. The candlelight wooed dancing gleams of fire from the band of brilliance.

Above the mantel shelf, the glass eyes of the Moth-Eaton's tag's head stared straight into the darkness. A pitiful mockery of the fleet incarnation of the forest that once, stepping so softly that even the leaves beneath his feet did not rustle, waited with dreamy eyes at the border of the stream for the low, sweet call of his mate. Fitfully, too, a gleam of old silver came from the cabinet in the far corner of the room, from a table in front of the bookcase half in shadow and half in flickering light carter's red roses in a brass jar breathed fragrance into the room somewhere outside a cricket chirped shrilly unmindful of the harp the full deep chords trembled out into the night thrilling like the soul of the woman who woke them from their silence with passion and with pain the harp's voice was hers now crying out in desperate appeal for the things which belonged to her by divine right Miss Cynthia stirred restlessly in her chair. What possessed Judith to play like that?

Had the woman no shame, to lay bare her heart for all the world to see? Then she reflected sagely that Carter, being a man, was protected by his own stupidity from ever knowing much about any woman that she did not tell him herself. This wild music was to her as intimate a revelation of Judith as her white face and pitiful eyes had been the day before. A single glance at Carter assured her that the music carried no deep meaning, if indeed he heard it at all.

Outwardly call meant collected, Carter took subconscious note of the details of the room, with that precise observation one accords to trifles and moments of stress. One of the tinkling prisms that hung from the chandelier was broken. Three of the books in the bookcase were pushed too far in, out of line. A vacant space in the red-bound edition of Stevenson indicated what Miss Cynthia was reading at present. The trellis at the end of the veranda where the wild grapevine climbed up from below was loose, and the next high wind would be likely to blow it down.

Yet, consciously, Judith dominated him as she dominated the room. Never had she been more beautiful, more perfect than to-night. Still, the essential thing between them was lacking. The bubble had burst. He was the same man, Judith the same woman, and in two days he had gone back to the point he started from. Liking, admiration, sympathy and understanding, but not love. Blue eyes came before him, to trouble and to beckon.

Sweet lips answered to his, as the lips of only one woman may ever answer any man. With a pang he crushed it down in defiant loyalty to Judith. What if she knew? What if she had already guessed? Could it have been that which made her ill? It'll come back, he said to himself miserably. It's got to come back. That's all?

The music ceased. The last rippling chord died away in an echo that was at once a question and a call. Suddenly the moment demanded from Carter something he had not in his power to give.

Dear, he said, and his voice was very gentle. That's lovely, but the harp isn't what you might call a joyous instrument. Will you come out in the car? Oh, no,

answered Judith, hoping yet fearing to be alone with him. Go, urged Miss Cynthia. you haven't been out of the yard for two days. It will do you good. Come, said Carter, rising. A pile of music upon a low stool beside her gave her a sudden inspiration. Why not? Her eyes flashed for a moment and her color rose. Then she faded and softened again

into her accustomed calm. I'll get my coat, she said it will be cool if we go fast. Take mine, dear, pleaded Miss Cynthia, please wear my white coat. So Judith came out presently in Miss Cynthia's long white opera coat, heavy with lace and silver, the white fur of the lining lying caressingly upon her bare neck and arms. I don't know whether I can stand the warmth of it or not, she smiled, but the luxury of it bids me endure anything for its own sake. She took a sheet of music from the stool, rolled it up,

snapped a rubber band around it, and bent to kiss Miss Cynthia. Goodbye, dear. I won't be gone long. "'Love night,' said Carter as he assisted her "'to her usual place beside him. "'Yes,' returned Judith in cool, even tones. "'Isn't it?' "'Where do you want to go?' he asked as they started. "'To Mr. Chandler's, please. I have some music for him.'

Carter moved nervously in his seat. "'Why take it to-night? Couldn't he wait for it?' "'Why not take it to-night?' asked Judith unemotionally. "'There was no answer to that, though. in Carter's mind there were many reasons. I don't care about making calls, he said moodily. No, perhaps, as Uncle Henry says, you're not a visiting man. No, I'm not.

We won't stop but a moment and I won't even ask you to take it in. I want to speak to Mr. Chandler myself anyway. Nothing more was said. When the car stopped at the gate, Judith got out, trailing Miss Cynthia's splendor heedlessly in the dust. Chandler and Marjorie were both on the porch. Am I not the grand lady? asked Judith playfully. It's Aunt Cynthia's coat.

She made me wear it. It's suffocating me, but it's so splendid I cannot bear to take it off. You're magnificent, Chandler said. I'm ever so much obliged for this. It's beautiful, murmured Marjorie. Come out with us for a little while, won't you, Marjorie? We'd love to have you. Thank you. No.

The girl replied, hesitating. Go, dear, said Chandler, in Miss Cynthia's words to Judith. It will do you good. Hurry, continued Judith. I promised Carter not to keep him waiting. So Marjorie went upstairs after her own coat and the white hat with the Cerre's bow upon it over which she tied the pink veil.

Judith wore no hat, most likely Marjorie thought, on account of the wonderful band of brilliant she had in her hair. Marjorie's coming with us for a little while. Judith said coolly as they opened the gate. She'll sit by you and observe the wonderful workings of the machinery while I sit back here alone in my glory and commune with the stars. Before anybody could say anything, the arrangement was made. Sutley, Judith had thrown down the gauntlet to Marjorie,

challenging her as it were to take from her even the merest fragment of what was rightfully hers. Now and then, as the car spun along, Judith leaned forward with some light comment or with a question, which required no answer. After the days and nights of pain she had come out at last upon her rightful path. She had regained her poise, never to lose it again. What was hers rightly she would not only have, but she would keep. Chandler had said that to her many times. What was not hers she surely did not want. She desired no man's love merely because there were no other women. She wanted it in spite of them. The truth had come to her suddenly, as it often

does after long groping through devious ways. Carter had not spoken to Marjorie at all beyond the conventional. Good evening. How are you? And Marjorie had said nothing to him except, Very well, thank you. How are you? Now, he said in a tone so low that Judith did not hear. Did you get my note? Marjorie's hand instinctively crept underneath his arm. Yes, she whispered. Oh, how could you? How could I what? demanded Carter through his clenched teeth. The touch had set the blood-tube racing through his body. Right to me like that. It made me cry. The temptation to take her into his arms temporarily unmanned him. He ran the car furiously through the deep dust and took a turn so sharply that

Marjorie screamed a little. Judith leaned forward. Don't be frightened, Marjorie, she said kindly. Nothing is going to happen to us that isn't meant to happen. You must cultivate poise. Then she quoted, Serene I fold my hands and wait, Nor care for wind or tide or sea. I rave no more against time or fate, For lo my own shall come to me. Carter turned back from the wheel.

Suppose it comes too late, he said hoarsely. He spoke to Judith, But the words were for Marjorie, And both women knew it. The things that come too late, answered Judith steadily, Are the things that were never meant for us to have. She leaned back among the cushions with a dull pain throbbing at her heart. Some iron hand seemed to clutch at it mercilessly, tearing at the tender fiber. The half-light

of the waning moon that was sinking below the hills, shown mockingly upon the silver of Miss Cynthia's coat. Had she been clothed in rags, Judith could not have been more acutely miserable. Nobody spoke again. Marjorie's mere presence had plunged Carter into a whirlwind of painful emotion, mingled with a strange newborn ecstasy that made him bite his lips and keep his eyes steadfastly upon the road ahead. The car stopped at Chandler's gate. Marjorie got out unassisted. Thank you so much, she said, including both in the remark. It has been lovely. I've enjoyed it. Judith had slipped out, too. As was natural, she took the vacant place beside Carter. Good night, she called to Marjorie with a friendly wave of the hand. We'll come for you again.

very soon. Carter said something under his breath, but Judith did not heed it. When they were halfway home, he broke the silence. I meant to tell you something when I first came tonight, he said, and I'd forgotten it. I'm going fishing tomorrow with the crowd of fellows, up in the north woods. Yes, said Judith politely. I'm sure you'll have a good time. How long shall you be away? I don't know. Perhaps a few days, perhaps a month. It depends upon the fishing. then too I'll be lonely, for I'll have no way of writing or of getting letters. That will be a relief in a way.

Yes, in a way, he muttered. The car stopped at Miss Cynthia's gate. I won't come in, Carter said. It's getting late. Yes, Judith agreed. It's very late. She had slipped out of the car and gone around it. Good night, she said as she came up beside him,

and good-bye. good night he repeated lifting her face to his and goodbye then he kissed her but his lips were cold end of chapter sixteen chapter seventeen of a weaver of dreams by myrtle reed this librivox recording is in the public domain seventeen farewells the rain miss cynthia had wished for was descending in torrents judith woke from troubled slumber to a a wet and dreary world. Every tree and shrub was dripping and pools of water lay upon the grass. It was not a merry downpour, such as comes in April, with the promise of sunshine even in its greyness, but a dull, dead rain. In the grey swirl of it the carrier pigeon wet-winged and weary alighted upon Judas' window-sill. With eager trembling fingers she took the message from him. Judith, dear, I'm afraid my farewell last night was rather abrupt. Please pardon me.

I have had so much to think of lately. I shall miss you constantly and think of you all the time. Yours always, see. Between the lines with aching heart, she read an effort to be absolutely sincere, to say nothing that was not true and yet to be kind. She answered in his own manner. My dear, I did not notice any abruptness. I know, of course, that you have much upon your mind.

I shall miss you also and think of you often, always with the hope that you are having a good time. Thy known wish, wish I thee in every place. J. When the pigeon flew away, the window closed of its own accord, gently, but with finality. Judith sighed as she began to dress. So many doors that are wont to open at our approach

some day swing shut instead. So many keys, once hours to command, fail all at once to fit the locks for which they were made. She had not determined what she must do, save to bear this sharp, sickening pain that stabbed unceasingly at her heart. Repeatedly she told herself that she was foolish. Suppose Carter had kissed Marjorie. What of it?

That in itself was nothing. Only the circumstances made it wrong. She knew there were a hundred kinds of kisses, of which ninety-nine meant nothing, but this. She shuddered at the memory of it, for Carter had never kissed her, as in the deadly instant of revelation she saw him kiss Marjor. In vain she reasoned with herself. Through sure feminine instinct she had felt

rather than seen the constraint between them the night before. Like an avenging goddess she had held herself aloof. Lead us not into temptation, was no part of Judas' daily prayer, rather was it, Make us strong enough to face temptation without even a thought of yielding. Accustomed as she had been to the admiration of men, Judith had not, as many women do,

frittered away any part of that treasure which was herself. She had kept her lips sacredly for the man to whom they should eventually belong. Refusing to be blinded with tinsel, she had waited for the gold. Most women love love rather than the man who gives it. Judith had loved Carter, and in torture loved him now. Not with the passion itself seeking of the women who receive all and give little or nothing in return, but with the royal self-abasement of women who give all, asking only for the right to give, and are rewarded with little aside from a tolerant, half-amused acceptance.

She had not stooped to play the game that the woman who holds her lover must play whether she will or no. Frank, free and full-hearted, meeting him with a certain proud equality she gave as he asked. She had not affected astonishment when he told her he loved her, for she had known almost before he knew it himself, nor had she asked for time in which to decide. She had gone to him at once, straightforwardly, her eyes shining with a great joy in that exalted state, where there is no need of proposing, and love goes to meet love with open arms. Judith's armory was destitute of the usual feminine weapons. She scorned the small concealments, the numberless coquettries, the thousand arts and evasions

of the wiser ones. Mystery and astonishment were not for her to deal with. She had caused no wonder for Carter, except the first ecstatic amazement in which he found her his. To make him doubt her, to stir his jealousy, to make him wait until the inmost soul of him was sick with longing for even the touch of her hand. All these were beneath her. She had not yet learned that woman loses by giving, winds by withholding, and must hide her burning need of love if she would have it hers in fullest measure. In other days, Judith would have gone to the train with him, heedless of the downpour, if he had not stubbornly refused to let her go.

once in the dead of winter when he was obliged to take a train that left at half-past six in the morning he had risen at an unearthly hour tramped through the snow to miss cynthia's and had breakfast served to him by judith herself under candlelight in a desolate dining-room long before any one else in the house was astir breakfast at half-past five in the winter is seldom a cheerful affair but they had made a holiday of it and their indiscreet laughter had roused miss cynthia to wonder for a moment if judith was never coming to bed before she turned over for her last nap as it happened carter was thinking of it too with remorseful tenderness gnawing at his heart his fishing trip was a hastily conceived escape from a tormenting situation more than margery or even judith he needed to get away into that blessed solitude where adjustments are made, and perspectives gradually appear in the all-encompassing fog. He saw the right way plainly before him, but it did not allure. Indeed, the right way seldom does, for it is not often the easiest. I'll go away and get myself full together a bit, he thought. Then I'll march straight ahead as any decent man would. I've got to, he added sternly to himself. Glad simply in his shirt and trousers, he leaned over the narrow stairway

at six o'clock and called. Aunt Belinda. Merciful goodness, she cried running into the hall as fast as her old feet would carry her. Are you sick? Usually it required prolonged effort to induce Carter to rise at seven. No, come

up here, will you please? What is it? She queried breathlessly. What's wrong? Nothing, only I'm going away and I've got to hurry. Get my suitcase, will you? Where is it? How should I?

I know. He returned good-humoredly. He began to shave before the chiffonier by the aid of the lamp with a reflector behind it, to the unfailing terror, as always of the feminine witness. Uncle Henry's full beard, trimmed at regular harvesting intervals, was a her-suit monument, as it were, to Aunt Belinda's fear of razors. "'Mr. Keith,' she said timidly, "'won't you cut yourself?' "'I won't if you don't make me laugh or disturb me in any other way. "'I'm going fishing, and I'll have to ask you to pack my things. When you've found one suitcase, get the other, I'll need two. Take the new one for civilized

clothes, and the old one for uncivilized. What's that? What do you mean? Flushed and excited, she emerged from the depths of the closet with a dusty suitcase in either hand. Never mind. We'll pack the uncivilized one first. That's the most important. Civilization is only a veneer laid thinly upon primeval instincts. Four suits of underwear first. Too heavy and too light. That's it. Two flannel shirts. My sweater.

Those brown corduroy trousers. My hunting boots. How are you going to get those boots in? They've got to go in. Consequently, they do. Could anything be more simple? Pajamas. No, no, not the silk ones.

Half a dozen pairs of socks. Three or four negligee shirts. My cigar case. My Macintosh. Mr. Keith, you'll have to take a trunk. trunk? What for? He turned to survey Aunt Belinda with simple masculine curiosity. I won't be gone more than a month at the outside. What do I need of a trunk? Put in that book on dogs and the one on pigeons. All the clean handkerchiefs I've got,

three or four shirts. I'll pick out my own collars and ties. Here's my belt and slippers. And the coal cream for sunburn and my smoked glasses. Now as I dress, I'll throw things to you as I use them and you can put them in. I don't care where you put them just so you get them in. A fusillate of brushes and other toilet articles assailed Aunt Belinda who bent over the two overflowing suitcases upon the bed. A tube of toothpaste aimed with less precision, struck her on the forehead, but such small things do not matter when a man is packing. Ask Uncle Henry to get my fishing tackle together, will you?

I can't. He's asleep. Wake him up, then. He ain't to be wot. woke up in such time as there is between now and the eight seventeen, leastways not by me. Then you get it. I'll take a look around and see if there's anything else I want. Hurriedly he opened one drawer after another, leaving them open quite naturally, and casting an occasional small article at Aunt Belinda with his free hand. Having thoroughly ransacked his closet and chiffonier, he went to his desk, took out the packet of Judith's letters and the framed photograph of her, taken soon after

their engagement. Judith had one of him upon her desk also. Only those two prints had been made, the place having been destroyed at once. The room looked as if a young whirlwind had passed through it, in eager obedience to the dictates of absolute mind concentrated upon a single object, but Carter stood calmly in the midst of the confusion with the picture in his hand. Aunt Belinda asked twice if there was anything else she could do for him, but he did not hear, so she went out, unnoticed, and down into the kitchen to prepare a hasty breakfast. Out from the frame of beaten copper,

the sweet face done in Sepia looked up at Carter with the merest suggestion of a smile. The dreamy eyes were a light with love, for he had been standing by the man who took the picture. With a pang at his heart he remembered how she had stood there looking at him and nod at the camera.

She had done her hair simply, so that it might never go out of fashion, and for the same reason had caught a chiffon scarf around her bare shoulders, fastening it in front with a rose that he had given her. The rose had died long ago. Its petals must have crumbled into the dust from which, by a heavenly miracle, they had sprung.

But the light in Judith's eyes, had that died too. Less than a week ago he had seen it there, but in seven days, or even an hour, a world may be made, or lost. The few letters were all that she had ever written to him. With a lover's fore knowledge he had preserved even. her first formal note asking him to come to dinner. The next, less conventional in tone, thanked him for flowers, and asked him to come to Sunday night tea. Two more were long, friendly letters full of the charm of her personality, written to him during a week's absence of her own.

The next was Judas' first love-letter, though Carter did not know it. The day following their engagement she had written to him from a full heart and shyly, as Mrs. Browning took to her lover husband, the sonnets from the Portuguese, had slipped it into his pocket that evening and asked him not to read it until he was alone. Much later in his room Carter had read it over and over again. It was less a letter than a revelation of the woman's inmost soul. Laying bare her deepest longings, her secret aspirations, her lifelong hunger, and her impassioned prayers, Judith had opened the door of her sanctuary and bade him enter in. And, reverently, as one who falters upon the threshold of a holy place, Carter had understood,

crushing the letter to his lips in an ecstasy of devotion that had lifted him at once to the heights. Clean as he was, it shamed him that he had not been cleaner. Fine as he knew himself to be, he longed to be finer still. Every righteous impulse in his nature had asserted itself, then merged into an overwhelming flood of loyalty and love. When he had faltered, Judith had sustained him. When he had failed, she had given him fresh courage, bidding him take heart again. Her serene eyes saw him always, not as the man he was, but as the man he might be. Star-like, her love had led him on, eagerly striving to make the best of himself.

In the evening when he left her, it was always in an uplifted mood. Perged of its thousand annoyances the day had left him at peace and eager for the moral. Knowing that life is a struggle and that the best of us would not have it otherwise, Judith sent him out to meet his fellows, already flushed with the victory he was to win for her. Steadily, she had failed his soul with purpose and with aspiration. When choice of two ways lay before him, she had asked him only to find the right way, and had taken the rest for granted. Nor had he failed her until something infinitely stronger than himself had taken him by the throat, and made him crush Marjorie to him in that passionate embrace.

Carter swallowed the lump that rose in his throat. He put Judas' letters into one pocket and her picture into another. It'll come back, he said to himself savagely as he closed the desk with a bang. It's got to come back. He bolted the breakfast Aunt Belinda had prepared for him, at a rate that made her anxious, accustomed though she was to his method of absorbing his morning nourishment. Once she asked him, hesitated.

what he supposed his teeth were given to him for, and Carter had returned on his way toward the chair where he had left his hat that they were intended to make him look pretty and attractive when he smiled. Now then, two suitcases, overcoat, fishing rod, and box of tackle. I guess that's all. Get my cap, will you? I can stuff it into this pocket. Yes, that's it.

Thanks. Goodbye, Aunt Belinda. Say goodbye to Uncle Henry for me, will you? I'll have to run if I catch that eight-seventeen. He stooped to kiss her wrinkled cheek in filial fashion and was out of the house before she could reply. With a long breath of relief, she dropped into a rocking-chair and wiped her face upon her apron.

Land sakes, she said to herself, If that boy ain't the beatenest, I don't know, after all, as I'm so sorry he ain't mine. Uncle Henry came out of the bedroom rubbing his eyes. He was fully dressed, even to the coat and collar upon which his mate firmly insisted. Folks as is able to sit up, she had always said, is able to be dressed. And folks as can't dress themselves ought to stay in bed and have their meals brought to

them. A man what's too weak to put on a collar is a terrible sick man in order to have the doctor. The air was still stirred by departure. Uncle Henry was not even mildly psychic, but his senses vibrated to the unusual. What's up? he demanded. What's happened? "'He's went,' Aunt Belinda returned, wiping her face again. "'He was took sudden to go away. Where's he gone? I don't know. I reckon he don't know himself.

He said he was gone fishing. Wonder if he'll catch anything.' Uncle Henry drew his chair up to the disordered table and reached for the coffee pot. "'I'll worm that up for you, Henry. Fishing ain't catching. It's just sitting in a boat and holding the pole and hoping. I know, the old man said meditatively, but he might catch something. A cold most likely, or mosquito bites, and a raw neck from sunburn. I ain't never known him to get anything else. What did he go for? Just took a wandering fit. Men has him. Unless they're married, married men ain't allowed to do no wandering.

"'Ain't they? Seems to me that they do a pile of it. You was down to the store yesterday expecting to be back in an hour, and you was gone all the afternoon. I had to feed the chickens myself.' Uncle Henry affected not to hear. He devoted himself to his breakfast and tactfully praised the cooking. "'I ain't never seen your beat at an omelette, Belinda, and these fried potatoes. My!' "'I reckon he'll come back with his neck so.

She resumed clearing her throat, like he did one time before. Do you remember how I was setting up half the night with him putting fresh cream on it? We didn't have no butter that week, and hardly none for the coffee. I told him he ought to save some for his coffee, and he said he'd rather have the cream on the outside of his neck when it was sore than inside. My, how he did peel. When's he coming back? I don't know.

He said he'd let up. know. He'll send me one of those sovereign postcards from somewhere, I suppose, telling me when he's coming and what he wants for supper. Uncle Henry's gentle old face brightened at the talismanic word. What are you laying out to have for supper, mother? I ain't thought about it yet. You can have anything you like now he's gone. Liver and onions, he mused,

with brown gravy and plenty of boiled potatoes and hot biscuits and honey, and maybe a few strips of bacon and the remainder of the sentence died away in the rattle of a stove lid and the scraping of the frying-pan that'll be about all henry unless you want to be sick i hope he'll have a good time if he ain't missed the train he'd started to have it by now carter had made his train by a margin so narrow as to be uncomfortable the cinders from the departing engine having fallen upon his outspread coat-tails as he ascended the rear platform of the last coast in one supreme effort. He was not, however, having the good time Aunt Belinda unselfishly wished him to have. He dismissed his stenographer for an unexpected holiday, after dictating the form of the letter which was to be sent in answer to all mail, looked up a timetable, sent a boy for a ticket, postponed a few important engagements by telephone, and locked the office door on the inside. In his earnest effort to be fair to Judith, he had forgotten that he owed

Marjorie at least the truth. She had told him that his note made her cry. Chandler had told him so, too, but in the stress of the hour he had forgotten it. Now on his own letterhead he wrote to Marjorie. Dear, my dear, you and I must never see each other again, for I cannot bear it. There are some things a man cannot endure, even at the price of his self-respect. If I should see you again, anywhere, and under any circumstances, I should take you in to my arms and tell you that I loved you better than everything else on earth. More than any man has ever yet loved any woman. In the note I sent you the other day, I said I was sorry that I kissed you, but I lied.

I'm not sorry, nor shall I ever be, for that one dear moment is the sweetest thing life has ever brought me, and beyond it I ask for nothing more. You will think, perhaps, that I have no right to say this to you. but why not, as long as it is the truth and for the last time. You know all that she is and how fine she is. You know, too, that she must not be hurt, that every spark of manhood I have in me urges me to keep faith with her, and never let her suspect for an instant that I have changed.

No, that isn't right, for I haven't changed. The feeling I had is exactly the same, except as it is overshadowed by this. I've tormented myself a thousand times by wondering whether you care too, but that I must not ask, for I have no right to know. I hope, that is, the better part of me hopes, that you do not. You must not answer this. I am going away until I get absolute control of myself,

and this madness, if it is madness, is forgotten. That is what we must do. Forget. If I have done wrong to write this, I humbly ask your pardon, and hers too. I owe her my best and always shall. Goodbye, Marjorie, darling. Oh, my dear little love, goodbye. May God bless you.

See, when he dropped it into the letter-shoot, it was with a feeling that, with his own hands, he had buried something very sweet and precious while it was still alive. He had thought that to tell Marjorie the whole country, truth would be a relief to him, but it was not. Instead, he spent a wakeful, miserable night and many of the following nights in wondering whether Marjorie cared. End of Chapter 17. Chapter 18 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertl Reed. This Leapervox recording is in the public domain. Eighteen. The Ashes of Desire

At the fourth day of cloud and mist broken only by intermittent showers, Miss Cynthia's drooping spirits took a final plunge into the depths of melancholy. Suttly, but certainly, Judith's wretchedness had reacted upon her, though the younger woman consistently endeavored to be cheerful. "'Don't try so hard to be pleasant, Judith,' said Miss Cynthia fretfully. "'You annoy me. Why not be miserable?' "'All right,' Judith returned gloomily. "'If you prefer it.'

"'I don't, but I'm not going to strain myself trying to be unnatural.' "'You said the garden needed rain,' Judith went on. She was standing at the window of the upstairs sitting-room, looking out into the sod and dreariness. Every morning the carrier pigeon came to her window without a message. Finding herself unable to bear it, she had begun seriously to consider moving to a back room on the other side of the house. "'Rain, yes, but not a cloudburst. I suppose you're not going to swim up to Chandler's to-day.' "'No, he'll hardly expect me. That is, they won't be.

surprised if I don't come. The old lady's keen ears caught the change of tone and the effort that lay behind the words. "'Worse than I thought,' she said to herself, "'what can he have been doing?' Pensively Judith stood at the window. The life was gone from her face, the youth from her figure. Within a week she had grown old, since joy and youth are one and the same. Frankly despondent herself Miss Cynthia unselfishly determined to rescue Judith. why despair she asked lightly you have everything judith turned suddenly yes she flashed back bitterly everything but the one supreme thing i want in other days miss cynthia would have said teasingly but he's coming back dear he isn't lost now she sighed and made no answer unutterable loneliness and heart-hunger brought tears to juda's eyes fearing that she had betrayed her

of she added brokenly. I want my mother. How true it is that we never grow up, Miss Cynthia went on after a pause. Age doesn't go by the calendar at all. Sometimes I'm sixty, and then, within an hour or so I'm six again, and wanting to play with dolls. I have them all somewhere yet, put away with my other outgrown emotions. Pitifully Judith's eyes sought Miss Cynthia's face.

Do we outgrown? our emotions, she asked pleadingly. How long does it take? Of course, why not? We cast aside thoughts and feelings that have served their purpose, just as the tiny creatures of the sea cast off

their shells. When things hurt us, we're merely on our way to another spiritual environment. Judith's lips moved but she did not speak. I have often thought that it must hurt the little beast to get out of his shell, Miss Cynthia resumed.

Without seeming to she was watching Judith closely. Sometimes they die when they're only halfway out, as I suppose we do. Anyway, we're continually making new surroundings for ourselves, outgrowing them, and with the inevitable accompaniment of pain going on to the next. Birth and death are only relative terms. We're forever dying and forever being born again. If the elements of our bodies are subject to daily, even hourly renewal, why not our minds and souls?

You talk like Mr. Chandler, commented Judith. Miss Cynthia bowed. I don't know just how you mean that, but I choose to accept it as a compliment, that being the more pleasant interpretation. Is it still raining? Yes. Miss Cynthia tinkled her silver bell sharply,

and in a moment had the entire establishment buzzing with life. It was not cold, but she ordered fire to be made in the big fireplace that yawned cavernously at the end of the room. A rumbling and scraping overhead jarred bits of plaster from the ceiling. Judith turned away from the window. Might I ask? Fire, merely, returned Miss Cynthia with a pretty shrug of her shoulders.

And trunks. I'm in a Greek mood today. Greek? Attic. The original apostles of high thinking. Get it? Rather subtle, answered Judith, smothering a yawn. but not altogether beyond me.

Would you mind getting my hat into my opera coat? What for? She asked without interest as she returned with the desired articles. I want to wear em. I fain would have the emotions of travel with neither the discomfort nor the expense. Now then. We're on an ocean liner that, for some reason, has mercifully failed to go. Maybe we're in quarantine, but anyhow we're not seasick.

It's nasty outside. and time hangs heavily upon our hands. I believe that's the usual phrase. It is a good time to rearrange our baggage, both material and immaterial. With the large white plumed hat perched jauntily upon her silvered hair and the festive opera coat thrown over the bag of her chair,

Miss Cynthia commanded the larger of two trunks to be placed in front of her and sent Judith after her bunch of keys. The dancing firelight brought gleams from the buckle of brilliance hitherto dead and dull in the dampness and gloom. Draw the curtains, please, Judith, and light every lamp and candle in the room.

Bring in the candles, from my dresser and from yours. We'll make a gay night out of a dark day yet. Miss Cynthia tried one key after another before she chanced upon the right one. Like everything else, she observed, it's a question of the proper approach. All things belong to the one who knows how to unlock him. You speak in parables, wise lady.

Wise ladies usually do. Men also. This is the lady trunk. All sentimental relics associated with ladies are in here. The gentleman trunk must wait in the hall, according to the strict rules of propriety. This is the larger trunk, said Judith. Gradually she was forgetting her unhappy mood.

Naturally, a woman's trunk is always larger than a man's trunk, isn't it? unless the man happens to be travelling for a millinery house and the season runs to large hats the rusty hinges creaked and the lid of the trunk slowly yielded to miss cynthia's vigorous push a faint musty fragrance as of long dead roses filled the room the old lady sneezed my word she said how the past can annoy you even though it's innocent i haven't looked these things over for years she continued every time time I do it, I get rid of a few of them. By the time we get to the little door between the arc of our mortal life and the rest of the circle, there isn't much that we desire to have buried, or cremated, with us, as the case may be. Do you remember the poet's wife who had to be disturbed after she was peacefully settled in her grave, because he had buried poems with her which he

afterward wanted to publish? I never want anything buried with me that anybody else is likely to want. You're cheerful, Aunt Cynthia. It's a cheerful day, and this is a merry occupation. My gracious, will you look at the moths? That means that this little white flannel coat of mine will have to be put into the fire. My mother embroidered it before I was born, and I wore it the first time I was taken out. Your mother wore it too. Being only two years younger than I, it descended to her through the natural love gravitation. We were inseparable, until she fell in love with an Englishman

and started out on the path of terror and of joy. Miss Cynthia fell to dreaming, with a tiny garment in her lap, contrasting oddly with her splendor. She was so pretty as she sat there with candlelight and firelight glowing upon her that Judith forbore to break the spell. She suggested the scene in the first act of Becky Sharp,

where that clever young woman upon spying the dancing costume and her open trunk, brings tears from those who had previously condemned her. Judith, she cried suddenly. Where does it all go? Where does what go, dear? All the love and the tenderness and everything else? Where are the dreams that went in with these tiny stitches?

Where has the love-light gone from my mother's eyes? Here's this futile, meaningless coat, moth-eaten, but still able to fulfill its original purpose. and I outgrown it these fifty years almost, and you who were not to be here for almost twenty-five years after this was made, where has the rest of it gone, Judith? Where is it? That's the riddle of eternity, Aunt Cynthia. The solution lies farther out upon the circle, past the little door that you spoke of some time ago. Miss Cynthia wiped away the suspicion of a tear. Here, she said sharply. Put this into the fire.

I haven't outgrown the emotion, but it's got moths in it. Oh, she put her dimpled hand to her nose when Judith did as she had requested. Will you open the windows, please? The violent death of that particular emotion, if I may so phrase it, is odorous. Does it smell to you like murder or suicide? Being familiar with neither I can't say, Judith laughed. No, it's all right. She continued to an anxious maid who appeared in the doorway.

We're merely burning some old things in the fireplace. This is your mother's wedding gown, Miss Cynthia was saying. I kept it after she died, having none of my own. It belongs to you, really. A sharp bang stabbed Judith to the heart. What of her own wedding gown. I'll take it, she said with trembling lips. I'll put it away with my own things.

She slipped into the shelter of her room, opened the drawer which held only the carefully press length of embroidered linen covered with tissue paper, and laid her dead mother's faded finery over it. Pinned to the back of the bridal gown was a wonderful veil of lace, deepened to the color of old ivory and with a bit of the wreath of artificial orange blossom still clinging to it. Tears fell upon it before Judith closed the drawer, catching her finger in the crack as she did so, and diverting her by real pain of another sort, though considerably less acute. When she went back she had her finger in her mouth.

good idea approved miss cynthia sometimes i think there'd be less trouble in the world if people kept a finger or two in their mouths all the time conversation is a real pleasure but it does keep things stirred up here's my autograph album the startling blue and gold of the cover had faded to a neutral tint which did not assail the vision i've looked all through it and discovered that i've forgotten everybody who has written in it except the teacher and i remember her most unpleasantly on account of a habit she had of keeping me after school to make personal remarks in regard to my conduct. Lay it on the fire, Judith, and this diploma, too. I don't know that I need to be reminded that I've left school. Do any of us ever leave it? Judith asked, as the sacrificial flames brightened the room.

Yes, dear, after we leave school, postgraduate courses confront us. Having learned about the dead, we begin to study the living at close. range. I've often wondered why they didn't teach the art of life in the schools, and leave history and the dead languages to the peace and quiet of our declining years. Put this school bag on the funeral pyre, dear, and the spin cushion. Wonder who gave it to me? Here is the pink gown I wore to my first dance. Put that in, too. The silk is in tatters, and I shall never

dance again. Ah, me. She peered into the devil, and I wore into the devil's, and I was a little, and I of the trunk and brought out a few old books. Put these in the bookcase, dear. I don't know why I've had them here so long. There doesn't seem to be much left but my own baby clothes. Look, Judith. Can you imagine that I ever wore that?

As she spoke, she held up a tiny white garment simply but exquisitely made, yellowed deeply by the passing ears. Judith bit her lip and turned away. Scarcely, she answered in a voice that was almost in auto. fool that I am, thought Miss Cynthia closing the trunk with a bang. Will you ask them to take this out in the hall and bring in the gentleman trunk?

Where's the key to it? It's this flat one, I guess. There. Letters, dance programs, a broken fan, and worn sheets of music seem to comprise the contents of the gentleman trunk. Miss Cynthia sorted out the dance programs and requested Judith to burn them. She hesitated over a carved sandalwood box filled with the dust of crumbled rose leaves. He died, she said softly. I didn't care, but he did. I think I'll keep this.

She picked up a photograph old-fashioned and faded and studied it for a moment. Then an ironical smile hovered about the corners of her mouth. Cree made him, she commanded, tossing it to Judith. Why? The man's face was pleasant. if not actually handsome. On the way to the fireplace, Judith noted the high fine forehead,

the poetic, dreamy eyes, the straight nose, the full sensuous mouth and the weak chin. I was engaged to him once, for a little while. I was engaged so many times it got to be rather a habit. He lied to me,

and I was on the verge of asking him to promise not to lie to me any more. Perceiving the irony of it, I returned his ring with a beautifully written copy of the Ten Commandments. i put thou shalt not lie in red ink so he would understand i think he did i never heard from him again you didn't expect to did you queried judith repressing a smile with difficulty but miss cynthia was in the trunk again hat and all and did not hear packet after packet of letters came out and struck the floor some near the trunk and others far from it miss cynthia's face was flushed when she emerged with the last packet and a triumphant there

That's every last letter. You reminded me of an energetic gopher, Judith commented, excavating a new burrow in a bank of old sentiment. Very pretty, my dear. Put these on the fire, will you? All of them? All of them. The prize idiot is the man or a woman who keeps love letters,

no matter who they're from. She selected a bundle as she spoke. It was tied with faded pink ribbon and dated in Miss Cynthia's own handwriting. She had her relic. as neatly labeled as a butterfly collector labels his specimens. This man is married and has six children. I sent him two large spoons as a wedding gift,

and his wife never acknowledged it. I suppose she thought it was too suggestive. This one is dead, but he was married twice first. This one isn't dead nor married, but he's in the penitentiary for forgery. Writing is a bad habit when it leads you too far. Don't know what became of this one. nor this one, nor this.

Here's two priceless epistles from a man who hated a pen as I hate a needle. I ought to have him framed, but it's wiser to burn him up. I remember reading a story about some children in a small town who got into an old trunk one afternoon, found a packet of letters, and went around leaving one or two at each neighbor's door. They were playing postman, and they had a beautiful time, but things were never the same again in the village. Very few of the women spoke to each other afterward. Judith sat by the fireplace stirring the letters with a poker,

for nothing burns quite so slowly as folded correspondence paper to which age has given a peculiar power of defying the elements. Now and then a, my darling, or my dearest, or my own beloved, flickered for an instant in the flame before it disappeared. How could you treat me so? one man had demanded, in violet ink that had faded to brown, and again in the same bold hand. Where were you yesterday? I waited and waited, but you did not come. I am terribly lonely without you.

I love you with all my heart. Everything that I am and all that I hope to be I owe to you. The time that separates us seems eternity. I love you as woman was never loved before. Dear, and always dearer. Good night, my darling. May God keep you. I love you as a man may love but once. You are the woman God made for me. Dear, I want you, need you, love you so. More than queen or goddess, you are woman.

What else is there for man to say? In scattered and broken phrases, the language of love appeared before Judith. dead passions warmed to life upon the coals that in another instant would reduce them to ashes. The letters crumbled into dust upon the hearth, and the spirit that had prompted them freed from the bondage of the written page, ascended in grey and purple smoke to the heaven where it was born. One last, I love you, curled within a wisp of burned paper, went up with the grey and purple to the unknown. There, Aunt Cynthia, your past has been properly cremated by your loving niece, Judith spoke lightly, quite at her ease again.

I haven't meant to read your letters, but I couldn't help seeing occasional lines as they burned. Do you remember that story of Addison's in the Spectator, where the people on an ice-bound ship found that they could not hear one another speak, and how when the thaw came, bits of conversation melted into the wrong ears? Miss Cynthia did not answer. She sat staring at the fire, lonely and pathetic in spite of her opera coat and white-plumed hat upon which the brilliance gleamed like so many diamonds. Upon her lap was spread a man's large silk handkerchief

that had once been white, but soaked to its margin by a rusty stain that, with a shudder, Judas saw must have been blood. One hand hung limply from the arm of her chair and from it by a tarnished gold chain hung a locket of black enamel, bordered by discolored pearls.

Upon the enamel in high relief was a diamond cross. It's all gone, Aunt Cynthia, said Judith very july. gently. There's nothing left but ashes. The ashes of desire, muttered Miss Cynthia, left from the fires of life. For a long time, there was silence. Then Judith went to the window. It was late in the afternoon and the sun was shining brightly. She drew back the curtains and let into the room a flood of golden light that mocked the candles and the fire. Come, dear, it's day again. See? She went around the room quickly putting out the candles. Miss Cynthia roused herself.

Her face was pale, but her wonderful eyes blazed as from some inward light. Yes, she said, it's day again. Then added to herself brokenly, How long, oh Lord, how long! She reached for her crutch and rose stiffly to her feet. She still had the locket and the stained handkerchief. What about the trunks? asked Judith as she blew out a candle.

Upstairs again, or anywhere you like, it doesn't matter. She held up the handkerchief and the locket to Judith. I have nothing left but these. Nothing left but these. Judith bent to blow out the last candle. When she raised her head again, Miss Cynthia had gone into her own room and slammed the door. End of Chapter 18.

Chapter 19 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertal Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Nineteen The Parting of the Ways The Adorable One, who had at her command Gifts of Chicken Bones and Cream was crying, and Algernan was very sad. Being a young dog, he failed to understand

how the writing on two sheets of paper could break one's heart. Yet, since the adorable one with trembling fingers had hastily torn open an envelope which he received one morning when they went as usual to the post office, things had not been the same. Were it not for Eliza

who daily took pity upon him, Algernon would have starved. Sometimes, too, Mr. Chandler would give him a bone at the table, though it was against the rules of the house for people and dogs to eat in the same place. Mr. Chandler was troubled, too, just as Algernon was.

Once the man had called him to his wheelchair and with a soft pat on his head had inquired, What's wrong, old boy? Do you know? Alginon did not know. so he only wagged his tail politely in acknowledgement of the caress, and reciprocated with a friendly lick of the man's hand. The adorable ones spent the rainy days alone in her room,

and never once opened the door, though Algernan scratched and whined outside and loudly thumped the floor with his tail. Today, for the first time, she had admitted him. But contrary to his expectations, there was no game to be played, or even the inconsequent chatter to which he was accustomed. having opened the door to him and as quickly closed it again, the adorable one went back to her couch where she had been lying and sat down upon a heap of rumbled pillows.

Alginon went to her and leaned hard against her as a dog will lean upon those he loves. He put his head into her lap, turned his big brown eyes to the brimming blue ones, and wagged his tail. The adorable one put her arms around his shaggy neck and hugged him so tightly that it hurt. All she said was, Oh, doggy, doggy, doggy. The door swung a jar, but nobody paid any attention to it. Finding it difficult to breathe, Alginon slipped out of her embrace, but very gently so that he might not hurt her feelings.

The sun was shining brightly, but apparently she did not care to go out. He nosed around in the closet until he found the old slipper which she had taught him to fetch and carry, but she was not interested in it. She merely said, take it back. so he did so, then sat down to wait developments. The roads were muddy, but the sidewalks were dry, and the grass was soft and cool. It was a day divinely appointed for people and dogs to be out, but the adorable one, usually so quick of comprehension, failed to understand this. He went back to the closet and brought the little whip,

which she usually carried when they went out, though she had never struck him with it but once or twice. Even to this she merely said, take it back and continued to sit there with her face hidden in her hands. Her loosened air fell about her like a veil of golden mist. Sunbeams came into the room and touched it caressingly, then retreated before the glory they themselves had made. Even the little blue sailor at the crossroads had a glimpse of it

as he spun around upon the weather vane, and now and then had a chance to peer into Marjorie's room. A halting figure in white paused at the crossroads. The little blue sailor turned on his perch, but his painted smile brought no response from the sad face beneath the poppy-trimmed hat. As one whose steps are guided by duty rather than pleasure, Judith turned the corner and went to the house.

Chandler greeted her warmly. It's good to see you again, he said, pressing her hand gratefully. I've missed you so. I was sorry, she answered, removing her hat and with swift, careless touches restoring her hair to perfect order. I'd have come if I'd been able to swim this distance. I didn't expect you. Indeed, I hoped you wouldn't come.

But it's been lonely here. Judith glanced at him quickly. Marjorie? Hasn't seemed like herself lately for some reason. Is she ill? No, merely unhappy. Judith bit her lips on the instinctive question. I don't know, Chandler returned an answer to her thought.

But if it were anything I could say, straight for her, I think she'd tell me. I'm sorry, Judith murmured. Here's a jar of sweet pickles from Aunt Cynthia, and the primer from which she learned to read. She said she expected you to keep the pickles, but she'd like to have the primer back. How did she happen to think of sending me the primer?

He asked, turning the worn and dog-eared pages with amusement. We were house-cleaning. That is, Aunt Cynthia was. She went over what she terms her, sole baggage, and rearranged it. She burned most of it, including all her old love letters. Wise woman, he said half to himself. Why, have you burned yours?

I never had any, muttered Chandler. I wrote one once, but there was nobody to send it to, so I tore it up. Aunt Cynthia says that anybody who keeps love letters is a prize idiot. Undoubtedly, you know, Carlisle says, there is no entirely fatal person. She wanted to send you some flowers, but there wasn't a thing in the garden that hasn't been drenched and had its petals soaked off.

She was rather inclined toward a spray of poison ivy that had turned scarlet weeks ahead of time, but I dissuaded her. She never can remember which is which. Well, which is? A five-fingered leaf, like your own hand,

means that the ivy is friendly, but a three-fingered leaf means you'd better let me alone. She always gets it twisted. While they were talking, Chandler had tuned his violin and replaced a broken string. Presently, the music of an old minuet danced up the stairway and threw Marjorie's open door, but she did not seem to notice it. Algernan looked up at her inquiringly, his head upon one side.

Didn't the girl know they had company downstairs? Apparently not. He whined restlessly, then dragged out the old slipper again. Nobody told him to take it back, so he lay down at the adorable one's feet and chewed the small French heel almost off. Algernan had some new teeth coming, and the slipper was acceptable in a way, though it was not palatable to a dog

that was accustomed to chicken and cream. The minuet ceased. Voices murmured below, then the music began again. With full, joyous cords, a waltz came through the open door. Marjorie shuddered and hid her face more closely in her hands. Sunlight streamed into the room.

Little leaves, made from shadow, danced upon the floor in time with the waltz. The blue sailor spun merrily, and in the rising wind, a sheet of paper fluttered off the couch and to the floor. Marjorie did not move. Alginon nosed at it, vaguely delighted by an old familiar scent of man and tobacco, inextricably mingled with that subtle fragrance which was part of the adorable one. Then, climbing up on her lap, he licked the small hands that covered her face. Go away, she said with a petulant slap. He sat down for a moment, and picked up the sheet of paper and began to chew it.

Go away, Marjorie commanded. Grieved and disappointed, Algernan slunk through the open door and crept downstairs, where the music was and where also people might be more cheerful. Judith, said the man in the wheelchair, Would you mind seeing what that pup has in his mouth? The music stopped with a broken cord. A commanding figure bent over Algernan,

who was chewing vigorously. Strong white hands forced his jaws upon. part and extracted a wet, crumpled sheet of paper. Dizzily, in Carter's unmistakable writing, a single paragraph confronted Judith. You will think, perhaps, that I have no right to say this to you, but why not, as long as it is the truth, and for the last time? You know all that she is, and how fine she is. You know, too, that she must not be hurt, that every spark of manhood I have in me urges

me to keep faith with her, and never let her suspect for an instant that. that I have changed. For the moment, Judith's senses failed her, then all at once became mercilessly acute. What is it? Chandler was asking. Anything important? No, returned Judith with lips that scarcely moved. Then she tossed it into the waist-basket.

I couldn't see what it was. He chewed it so. Algernan evidently believes with Macaulay that a page digested is better than a book hurriedly read. evidently Judas' stiff lips forced themselves into the semblance of a smile

On with the dance she said bravely Let joy be unconfined It would be an hour before she could possibly escape Mechanically she played the accompaniments that Chandler suggested Though more than once her hands

faltered upon the keys Like a wounded animal She longed for darkness and solitude Like a wounded animal too The trap still held her fast With unsuspected irony, Chandler's mood ran to dance music. All the afternoon they played waltzes, minuettes, stirring marches, and old-fashioned country dances. The utter discordance of it all affected Judith very much as a cotillion might if it were given in a cemetery.

At last, the clock struck five. With a sigh of relief, she turned away from the piano. Is it really five o'clock? she asked, with well-assumed surprise. I had no idea. I must be going. When after an interval which seemed much longer than it was, she had credibly achieved departure, Marjorie came downstairs. She received in silence the polite message Judith had left for her, and Chandler, putting his violin into its case, waited for her to speak. I've lost a letter, Marjorie said. That is, part of one. It troubles me. Chandler pointed to the waistbasket. I think you'll find it there.

The puppy came in chewing a piece of paper, and I asked Judith to take it away from him. Marjorie rushed to the waistbasket with the color surging over her face in a crimson flood. She found the torn page and smoothed it out. Then, from a tense silence, the question fairly leaped at Chandler. Did she see this? No, she said it was so much torn that she couldn't see what it was. Oh, the page was torn indeed, but that one condemning paragraph was intact, and Judith must know Carter's writing.

Had she seen it, or had she lied? I'm glad I found it, said Marjorie Dully, turning to go upstairs. It's of no importance, but... But one doesn't like to have one's letters chewed up, Chandler concluded kindly. Alginon is a very bad dog. You must teach him better manners. Before he had finished speaking, Marjorie was on the stairs.

Chandler smiled a little. He knew that she did not intend to be rude. She simply had not heard. Secretly, he was troubled, for afar, and beyond perception by any sense of his, the gods of life and joy waged bitter warfare against an overwhelming fate. Judith scarcely knew where she was going, but instinct led her along the usual path. Against the sunset the love-star gleamed in mockery. Judith had followed it, and, like a willow-the-wisp, it had led her into the quicksands.

but remorselessly insistent the right way lay open before her, and as she had told Carter many times, there was no possibility of a choice. White to the lips and very weary, she reached home and went at once to her room, sending to Miss Cynthia the excuse of a headache, which did not deceive the old lady at all. At the end of two weeks Carter came home, tanned, somewhat burned, and fully self-possessed, though far from happy. Upon his arrival at the office, he telephoned to Judith, said he was well, had had a good time, and would see her that evening. Though she seldom wore it, Judith arrayed herself in black.

Then, rebelling at the suggestion of mourning, she adorned herself with every jewel she owned, except the ruby ring, which she wore now only in Miss Cynthia's presence. If at dinner the old lady noticed that the seal of betrothal was missing, she had too much tact to speak of it. When Carter came with roses for both women, there was no trace of constraint in his manner, yet Judith shuddered when he kissed her. What is it, dear? he asked affectionately. Are you cold? Shall I get you a wrap of some sort?

Would you rather go into the house than to stay out here? To all of which Judith responded, no, in a quiet voice which seemed unlike her own. With gay banter, Miss Cynthia endeavored to conduct the conversation between herself and Carter. Judas sat a little apart from them, speaking only in monosyllables or in brief conventional phrases when she spoke at all. At last Miss Cynthia went in, saying that she was cold and preferred to read in her own room. When her door closed, Carter came over to Judith and bent to kiss her cheek. I've been away a long time, dear, he said, but I'll never leave you again. I had to go this time, really, though I didn't want to.

Judith did not answer. How is the house getting on? he continued. I don't know. Haven't you been there lately? No. It's rained a good deal, hasn't it? Yes.

Rather wet up in the woods, too, but there surely must have been some pleasant days. Why didn't you go to look at the house? I couldn't. Haven't you been there at all since I went away? No. Judith cleared her throat, then with desperate courage faced him

for the thing she had to say. I haven't been there since the day you met Marjorie Gordon there. I happened to come in the back way and saw you holding her in your arms. I went out again immediately. I don't think either of you heard me. So, said Carter half to himself. He got up and paced back and forth upon the veranda his hands in his pockets.

Judith, he began, I haven't any hope of making you understand me. You're too perfect to understand, but I'm going to try it. I didn't know. I never guessed that you were there. Something took me by the throat and made me do it. I can't tell you how I have hated myself for it. There aren't enough words in the language to give you a clear idea. I'd have come to you at once and told you,

only it wasn't decent to—to betray her, concluded Judith for him. Exactly. I had no desire to spare myself. If you can understand how a man might be overwhelmed by a momentary impulse, then. Judith rose too. Her face was in shadow, but the moon coming out from behind a cloud shone full upon his, boyish and perplexed. The mother in Judith pitied him. The outraged womanhood in her urged her to let him feel her scorn. Carter, she said, this is no time for lies. I want the truth. I'd rather have any man's honest hatred than his pretended love. I'm not so dense but

what I can understand a momentary impulse, a weak's madness even, or more. A kiss in itself means nothing. I'm not the jealous sort, as you know. You might kiss a dozen women without my caring in the least, provided. Provided what? In his turn he concluded a troublesome sentence for her, but she evaded it. Do you love Marjorie? The truth, please, she went on after an instant's hesitation. Carter sighed heavily, then miserably he met her scornful accusing eyes. Yes, but... Judas stopped him with a wave of her hand.

Never mind, she said clearly. That's all. She extended to him a white hand that trembled ever so little. The late summer moonlight revealed the ruby ring. He shrank back from her swallowing hard. Judith, he said hoarsely.

I won't. You've got to hear me. I've got to make you understand. You're making me hate myself for the rest of my life. you've got to give me a chance to be decent, to be right with myself. And with me? The mocking question was followed by a hysterical laugh. And with you?

You've been everything in the world to me, Judith. All that I am and all that I shall ever be I owe to you. I've loved you, I've adored you. I've worshipped you, and as God is my witness I have not changed. No, she returned, softening a little. I can understand that, but there's something else. I haven't been enough. Don't, he groaned.

Yes, go on if you like. I deserve it all. Dear boy, she breathed in pity. You've outgrown your need of me, and you're ready for something else. I don't want anything that is not wholly mine. I never want to be anything to you that any other woman on earth can be. Don't be hard on me, Judith. It was only a moment's madness, a momentary impulse. You've been thinking of yourself all this time, Carter.

It hasn't occurred to you that I might not want to marry a man who was subject to those impulses, nor that it might make any difference in my love for you. Do you think a woman can continue to love a man after she has seen him, even through a momentary impulse, putting another woman in her place? Have you thought of that? No, he answered wretchedly. I hadn't thought of that. Women, good women, forgive.

They always forgive. Surely, but the love isn't the same. How can it be? Judith, he cried. Have you ceased to care? Tell me the truth. He had her hands in his crushing them so tightly that her rings hurt.

Tense, eager, he waited for the answer which was so slow in coming. The truth, he muttered hoarsely, the truth. Judith lifted her clear eyes to his. Gallantly, she told her lie. I'm sorry, but I can't care. I can't go on.

This is the end. He dropped her hands and turned away, then came back. I see, he said grimly. I've lost you. Don't be so tragical, please, she replied, trying to speak lightly. We've simply outgrown each other, that's all. People do it, both before and after marriage. Then in Chandler's words, she added,

"'Whatever is mine, I shall have and shall keep. Nothing that is truly mine can ever be taken from me, and what isn't mine, I don't want.' He choked back the impassioned words that came to his lips. Upon the instant she had attained her quality of remoteness. Serene, untroubled by emotion of any sort, Judith was as far from him as a star. "'Good night,' she said.

"'I trust we shall be friends.' Carter did not answer. He went away blindly, his senses confused by an emotional fog. Judith kept herself control until she had closed the gate behind him, then sank to the floor of the veranda in a passion of bitter tears. Stabbing sharply, like the surgeon's knife, yet with something of its healing power, was the knowledge that she had saved her pride.

End of Chapter 19. Chapter 20 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mercer. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. 20. Cloth of Gold. Red and angry as though following some great disaster, morning broke over the roofs of the world. Judith woke with the sense that something had happened and in an instant was alive to her painful realities. The carrier pigeon came to her window with a message.

I can't bear it. You must let me keep myself respect. You must help me keep it. Surely you will not fail me now. To which she replied, Have I ever failed you? Is it not rather you who have failed me? Believe me, I have done the best for you as well as for myself. Please do not speak of this again. Like the stroke of a sword her agony had cleft her in twain.

She had become two selves. One a hurt and outraged woman on fire with resentment and passionate longing. The other calm and poised. like some subliminal self, watchful and on guard to save them both. The way lay straight ahead, and step by step she would go upon it. She must go.

She thought of going away somewhere, then swiftly reproached herself for her cowardice. Pace the thing, Judith, she admonished herself, and never let your bugle sound retreat. It required some courage to meet Aunt Cynthia's eyes when she went out upon the veranda to breakfast. Without obtrusively avoiding the sun, subject of Carter's return, the old lady chattered inconsequently of everything else.

When the trays were removed, Judith settled back in her chair. Aunt Cynthia, she said abruptly, I have broken my engagement. Taken off her guard, even Miss Cynthia was confused. For the moment she did not know what to say. Obviously she could not offer congratulations, nor ask why, nor make light of it as a lover's quarrel. She picked up her crutch, went to Judith. and kissed her. I may be selfish, dearest, she said softly. But I'm very glad I'm not going to lose you just yet.

Judith caught her hand and pressed it to her cheek, then released it. Thank you, dear Aunt Cynthia, she said tremulously. I knew you would understand. Beginning with the subject nearest at hand, Miss Cynthia spoke of the garden, and requested Judith's opinion as to the bulbs for fall planting. She went on to pickles, grape jelly, new curtains for the sitting-room and other housewifely matters to which as a rule she paid but scant attention she had never allowed herself as she expressed it to become the slave of things the house was for her she was in no sense for the house

except for the pitiful reminder of the crutch miss cynthia seemed to be in full bloom her cheeks were delicately pink her lips were red and the sun shining upon her silvered hair gave her the halo of a saint her wonderful eyes sparkled with animation and with the joy of living judith wondered what tragedy lay buried in miss cynthia's heart and if over the grave of her own she might ever hope to have such a garden a note ma'am said the maid appearing on the veranda mr chandler's man is waiting for the answer "'Wonder what's broken loose now,' thought Miss Cynthia as she opened it. "'Dear friend,' the note began, "'I am in genuine trouble. "'My little girl is very unhappy and is packing her trunk to leave me. "'I dare not ask. "'I cannot bear to have her so wretched,

"'and more than all the rest I cannot let her go. "'She is absolutely alone in the world. "'She is too young to be commended to its tender mercies, "'and when I asked her where she was going, she said with a sob that she didn't know. Tell me what to do, for I am in despair. M.C. Miss Cynthia sighed, looked at Judith for a moment, then sadly shook her head.

She thought of sending a note to Marjorie and asking her to come and see her, then realized that she knew the girl very little, never having seen her but two or three times. And, moreover, there was Judith to be considered. Something wrong, Judith was asking in her cool deep. voice. Am I concerned in it in any way? Is it anything that I can straighten out? I don't know, answered Miss Cynthia doubtfully. Then she tossed the note to Judith, acting upon one of those sudden impulses which are wise quite as often as they are foolish. Tell him there isn't any answer, said Judith to the waiting maid, but that I'm coming. That's an answer,

observed Miss Cynthia gratefully, into any place of doubt or trouble or unhappiness. there is never anything to send better than you. Thank you, dear. Judith bent to kiss her, and with a murmured goodbye, set forth upon her errand. Miss Cynthia watched her until the last bit of her white linen gown had disappeared among the trees.

Then and then only did she dare to commune with herself. Brute, she mused with her small hands clenched. What can he have done to that blessed girl? If I weren't helpless, I'd go to town this very morning and have it out. with him. However, there's the telephone. She was halfway to it when she stopped to think. If Judith had desired her to telephone to Carter while she was gone, she would have said so.

And if Carter wished to communicate with her, he knew the number. She went back to her chair upon the veranda, shaking her head and feeling herself singularly powerless. She might write to Carter and tell him what she thought of him. Miss Cynthia knew that our opinion of other people is seldom interesting to them, but she got out her writing-pad, and with the keenest edge of her sarcasm inspiring a blunted pencil, put down in clear and concise English, her exact estimate of a man who would willingly let Judith get away from him even if she wanted to. She added such vituporation as a lady may properly employ, and, much relieved in her own mind, tore it up. Acustomed to self-analysis, she began to wonder whether part of her concern for Judith and

Carter might not be merely personal curiosity. Anyhow, she thought, they'd credit me with that if I meddled. They're both strong, healthy people, and I think they're capable of managing their own affairs. And yet, she continued with pardonable scorn. What a hopeless mess they've made for themselves. What are they going to do with that house and the furniture, and Judith's wedding gown, and everything else? Reflecting that the answer would probably disclose itself in due time,

without inquiry upon her part, she settled herself to wait, very much in the mood of one at the theatre, when the curtain has fallen upon a stirring climax. When Judith reached Chandler's, he was out upon the porch, watching for his man with Miss Cynthia's answer, but, as is the habit of messengers, the man had loitered upon the way, and so it happened that Judith reached there first. Miss Cynthia, he began leaning forward to take her outstretched hand. I'm the answer. Isn't it a heavenly morning? "'It is if you're happy. If you're not, it isn't.

"'Where is Marjorie? Upstairs. Do you want to go up?' "'No. Ask her to come down, will you?' "'So Chandler called twice. Marjorie, Marjorie, dear.' Listlessly she came out, slow afoot and her hair in wild disorder. The blue eyes were deep and sad with dark hollows under them. The scarlet mouth drooped at the corners. Did you want me?' I asked for you, said Judith kindly. Marjorie had not appeared to notice her presence.

I was out for a walk, so I stopped in with my bit of news. I have broken my engagement, and I'm trying to tell everybody first before they hear it from others. It may not be the most delicate way, but is the most effective, don't you think so? Chandler was astonished, but had no time to say so. Before Judith, trying to make her trembling lips smile as she spoke, had even finished her sentence, had rushed to her crying.

Judith, I haven't had anything to do with it, have I? Oh, tell me I haven't. Judith was pale, but she forced herself to meet Marjorie's eyes. Of course you haven't. She lied. What on earth gave you such an idea as that? We merely discovered that we weren't suited to each other. That's all.

It's rather unpleasant in a way, but not nearly so unpleasant as it would have been if we had found it out after we were married. There's no occasion for his time. Terrics, Carter and I are the very best of friends, and hope to be so always. Oh, breathed Marjorie, oh, sobbing she left them and went upstairs. When her door closed, Judith turned to Chandler. She had herself well in hand now. That's the answer, she said briefly, inclining her head toward the open door. I don't think she'll go now. The man's eyes sought hers.

Judith tried to avoid that searching gaze but could not. At last, with a sigh, she faced him and leaned back against the pillar of the porch. Well, Judith, what of you? What of me? she repeated. I have everything. I'm young and strong. I have never been ill a day in my life. I'm not so bad to look at. I have money enough to enable me to live as I choose.

I have talent of which I may make something if I'm willing to work. I have a comfortable home, the dearest aunt who ever lived, and—the dearest friend. The slightest possible emphasis on the last words made it clear to Chandler that she meant him. But, Judith, what of you? What of me? She repeated once more. Why, I have everything. Everything, said Chandler very slowly, except the thing you want.

She caught her breath quickly. Yes, she said Dully. her eyes cast down and her mouth trembling. It's the way of the world, isn't it? Yes, he sighed. It's the way of the world. But I don't know that the fact that it's customary makes it any easier to bear.

Have you out of some quixotic generosity turned Carter over to Marjorie just because you thought one of them happened to be interested in the other? No, she returned almost inaudibly. I haven't done that. Her pitiful eyes sought his now. I haven't given away anything that was mine.

The things that our hours cannot be given away or taken away or lost. We break our hearts all of us, trying to keep things that do not belong to us, and to which we have no right. I know, he answered, to keep the thing that is ours, and not to lose sight of the dream. His thoughts were far away now, back in the dead years when Judith was only a little child. "'It's the dream that's kept me here,' he muttered. "'Els why should I stay, when there are so many ways out?

There's only one way to enter the world, but there are a thousand ways to leave it, and a brave man, as well as a coward, may sometimes force the door.' "'The dream,' said Judith idly, submerged in her own pain she scarcely knew what she was saying. "'Yes. Judith, look.' He pointed to his tiny front yard, where nothing. grew but cedars and a maple or two outside. With a comprehensive gesture he swept the circle of their vision. I could sit here with a camera and take a picture of all this. What would it be?

The absolute truth, wouldn't it? Judith nodded. And again, a painter might sit here with canvas and colors at sunset, perhaps, or in early morning, and without varying a line or hiding a defect make a beautiful picture. Isn't that so? Surely. "'It's the dream that makes the difference. "'You've made a painting of Carter, "'and now you've come face to face with a photograph. "'The illusion is gone, isn't it?' "'Not quite,' answered Judith.

"'She was pale but bravely tried to smile. "'I think it's going. "'I'm praying for it to go.' He leaned forward and closed his hand over hers. "'Don't pray for it to go. "'Pray rather that you may keep it, even though it hurts.' Keep your house of life as God gives it to you, and hide the dark places with the tapestry of dreams. Do you understand? Not altogether. Then listen. Memory will take for you out of the tangle every joy you've ever had.

She casts the rest aside. Try as you may. You cannot remember pain, only the fact that you had it. Is it not so? Thread by thread it is woven into the fabric of your mortals. mortal life, somberly perhaps, but never wholly dark. As you look back, you can see how you have woven blindly upon a design so large that you could not comprehend its purpose until it had slipped out of the loom. It may not be what you have wished it to be, but it's there. The pattern you were meant to weave, and with that perforce you must be content. No matter what the pattern is, nor how rough the thread, nor how the loom demands your endless labor

because it's in a dark place, or because it's difficult to move. If you have the dream in your heart, you achieve the cloth of gold. And so, even in the shadow, you have something which will catch the light when there is any, and give it back to you. And...

And, repeated Judith. And I think when all is done, the master weaver will lead us farther on. We, who have been weavers of dreams and have made the most from what we have. If, If we've put the golden thread into the fabric and woven the pattern as it was given to us without questioning or repining, we shall not stop here. I'm very sure of that.

How do you know? Because... But that's a woman's answer, not a man's. Judith, with the exception of one hour, all the happiness I've ever had in my life I've made for myself. I've had to, if I were to have any at all. He hesitated for the merest instant, then opened wide the secret door. I never told you, I couldn't tell anybody, but perhaps it may help you now. When I was twenty-five, I left the little town I lived in and started to the city yonder

to make my fortune, as many young men do. The train was wrecked and, this happened to me. It was a heavenly day, all gold and green and violets, with every bird singing its little heart out in ecstasy. Clear, crystalline and brilliant, as if God had just made the whole world and it was new. Without warning, and in the space

of a minute everything was changed. There was a blinding crash, a blaze and a glare. The pungent smell of smoke, the cries of hundreds of people in torture, men running with white faces, the stroke of an axe on fallen timbers, clouds of steam, more cries.

I needn't tell you all the horrors. I had seen that a girl occupied the seat in front of me, but I had paid no attention to her. She and I were pinioned by wreckage, and cut by broken glass. But before the fire reached us, they dragged us out and laid us side by side upon the other side of a grassy embankment, where we could not see the horrors behind us and where, if we stuffed our fingers in our ears, we could not hear very much. Naturally, we got to talking, during the hour that elapsed before the relief train came and took the injured to the hospitals. I cannot remember a thing that we said.

One of her little feet was badly hurt, and I know I managed to drag myself closer to her and bandage it after a fashion, with a big silk handkerchief I happened to have. I remember she wore white, and a white hat trimmed with roses, but the white hat was crushed and stained with blood from a cut somewhere under her heavy hair.

Fool that I was I never asked her name, nor she mine. We simply took each other for granted. She was the one woman who was meant for me since the beginning of time, and I was the man who was meant for her, and we both knew it, though neither of us said a word. We forgot how terribly we were hurt. We forgot everything but that. In the midst of the horror, we had come face to face with each other, and nothing else mattered but that. It did not occur to me that we could ever be separated. We simply belonged, and there was nothing more to be I knew at the first glance that she was neither married nor engaged, for she wore no rings. In fact, no jewelry at all except to locket.

She was mine, Judith, he said bitterly, and through my own absolute idiocy I lost her. We were taken to different hospitals, and never saw each other again. I spent every cent I had in advertising. I asked everybody I knew. I even sent a description of her to the police in different circumstances. cities. I did not know the name of the town she came from, for she had been on the train since early in the morning long before I started. I sent a man to every town upon that line of railroad to see if she could be found. I had absolutely no clue except the fact that she was injured in that

wreck. Even in the list of the injured at the newspaper offices, there wasn't the name of a single unmarried woman, though at every place they said the list was not complete, that some were dead and unidentified. That's all I've had, he concluded, that one perfect hour, with the woman God meant for me from the day he said, let there be light, and there was light. From that I've made my golden thread. Divinely, by the means of it, I've achieved my cloth of gold. And someday, because I have done the very best I could while I was here, because I've tried to sink myself in service for others whenever it was possible to do it, because I've waited and trusted and tried

not to rebel. Some day surely, God will bring us face to face again, and give us to one another for always, though it may be in some other world than this. It's right that it should be as it is, or it wouldn't be so.

You have faith, she said deeply moved. Yes, a weaver of dreams must have faith. Or else, when the dream fails, it would never come back. Someday, I shall have her. Or else see that this was all it was meant for us to have.

Judith hesitated, with a question upon her lips. Then she felt that the door between them was closed. Thank you, she said gratefully, for telling me. It has helped me. Goodbye. She bent over his chair, kissed his cheek softly, and went away, choking back the tears. End of Chilm. Chapter 20. Chapter 21 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertral Reed. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain.

21. Adjustments As Judith had expected, Marjorie said no more about going away. She unpacked her trunks and sent them up to the attic quite as a matter of course. She made no confidences nor did Chandler ask for any. Like Miss Cynthia, he did not care for the sort of confidence which is extracted by questions. In her eyes, an interrogation mark so much resembled a corkscrew that the comparison was evident. By observation and by a subtle use of the law of suggestion, Miss Cynthia usually found out what she wanted to know without much difficulty. Judith came home from Chandler's very quiet and not inclined to conversation. She said merely that Marjorie would stay, and Miss Cynthia guessed that Judith had told them both of the broken engagement. The carrier pigeon haunted Judas's window at sunrise until she said,

till in self-defense, she moved her possessions into a small back room. She burned the few letters she had received from Carter, but returned none of his gifts except the ruby ring, which he promptly sent back to her with a note saying that he wished her to keep it, and asking if there was anything she had given him which she wanted him to return. In answer, Judith asked for her letters, and one night, long after Miss Cynthia was asleep, she held a private cremation in the fireplace.

The following day she received a note from Carter saying that he had deeded the house to her, and that she might do whatever she chose with it. Some correspondence ensued, rebellious upon Judas's side and pleading upon his. It was her house, he told her, planned by her, and built for her, and of no conceivable use to him. He wanted very much to give it to her, and, for the sake of all that they had been to one another, he asked for the privilege. Boyishly enough, he asked her whether she were going to refuse him every slight opportunity to get square with himself. Judas smiled a little at that, though ironically.

It is so characteristically masculine to atone with material offerings for immaterial wrongs, or rather to attempt it, to pay for tears with diamonds and for disappointments with roses or pearls. She composed several notes before she achieved the brief line which she finally sent, to the effect that it was of no use to her either, but that if it would make him any happier, she would accept it for the time being and make some final disposal of it later on. Various plans occurred to her, ranging all the way from a summer home for convalescent women to a refuge for stray cats. With a subconscious idea of hardening herself, she arrayed herself one afternoon in the gown she had worn the day Carter asked her to marry him, and which she

had put away sacredly that night, slipped the ruby ring upon another finger, put on the silver chain with the abalone pearl pendant, and, with due announcement to Miss Cynthia, went over to look at the house. Nobody but the workman had been there since the fatal day more than a month ago. She went in by way of the back door, winced a little when she entered the dining room, and with a wild pain at her heart, opened the door leading into the living room,

where, last time, she had seen, she shuddered even at the thought of it. There's nothing there, Judith, she said to herself. It's all gone, quite gone. There's nothing to be afraid of. She forced herself to stand. where Carter and Marjorie had stood, until the hurt had somewhat subsided. She went over to the Ingle Nook, trembling from head to foot, and sat down to rest.

Then, for the first time, she saw the cushion which Marjorie had made. At first, she wondered where it could have come from. Then she remembered that at different times when she had been playing with Chandler, she had seen a bit of pale green linen in Marjorie's hands as she worked outside upon the shaded veranda. The clover blossoms were like Marjorie, too. Marjorie had come over probably to put the cushion in the house and had happened to meet Carter. It had not been planned then. It was purely accidental. There was a certain relief in the thought, even though the dice of chance had been thrown against her. The atmosphere of the house was entirely

different. The magic was gone. The exquisite emotion that glorified every rafter and gilded even the humblest commonplaces of construction had died with no hope of resurrection. The fireplace had once been a household altar, where the finer flames of the spirit might mingle with the breath of transmuted pine was only a fireplace now. Its secret charm had utterly vanished. The whole place

had the emptiness of a mirror which has nothing to reflect. Desolation had come upon every nook and corner, as though the little house itself were mourning for its lost joy. Little sunset house of hearts standing all alone. I could come and sweep the leaves from your stepping

stone. I and he could light your fires, laughing at the rain. But oh, it's far to happiness, a short way back again. Judith murmured the words to herself as she sat there holding the cushion. There was a definite relationship existing between her and the house which had been built for her. There had been light and life and music in her heart, just as there was to be in the house, and he who had summoned both into being had gone away, leaving only echoes and little memories that, like frightened children, tiptoed from place to place, dreading the sound of their own footfalls. Merged into an unspeakable sadness, the sharp, stabbing pain of the preceding week was mercifully eased. Like a river, winding a tortuous way among sharp cliffs, reaching at last its

ultimate sea, her soul had come to its peace. Memory would return at times, of course, she knew that, to torment her with visions of what might have been, but nonetheless she had outgrown her environment and was on her way to something altogether different. What Chandler had said the other day came back to her clearly. She must weave according to the pattern laid upon her loom. Later, when she had worked out this single episode and saw it in perspective, she could understand the design, but not now. She must go on with a dream in her heart and put golden threads into her fabric as she could.

The way of life is wonderful, it is by abandonment. The words flashed upon her consciousness as though someone had spoken them aloud. Was that Chandler? No. Aunt Cynthia had read it aloud a few days ago as she was turning the well-worn pages of her beloved Emerson in search of something else.

Judith walked home slowly, more nearly happy than she had been since the day the truth burst upon her with the vividness of a lightning flash. No longer, inextricably a part of it, she could see clearly. She had seen Carter not as he was, but as he might be, according to the way of lovers.

The reality jarring upon her vision had been her fault, not his. From what Chandler had told her, she realized that when divinity approaches, the blinding glory of the God shines afar into the hearts of those to whom he comes, long before they may look upon his face. He had dwelt upon the sense of completion, upon the fact that they too had been meant for one another since the beginning of time, that nothing mattered but that. It was not outside of Judith's understanding, but it was beyond her experience. She and Carter had come to love along the pleasant ways of friendship, which indeed the God may

sometimes travel, though more often he chooses unfrequented byways and secret passages, where strangers may meet, with something of his light reflected upon either face. She imagined that Carter had recognized Marjorie almost as soon as Chandler had known that he was face to face with the one woman. How hard it must have been for Carter, trying to be loyal, so sternly bidding himself be decent. For the first time, she pitied him, and realized that what is hard for us is seldom altogether easy for the others, that no situation arising in our complex life can possibly involve one individual to the exclusion of everyone else. When she reached home, she almost collided with Miss Cynthia, who with Crutch and Cain was taking a brief constitutional upon the graveled paths in the garden.

Have you found anything? asked the old lady. Yes, smiled Judith. My balance. Priceless possession, observed Miss Cynthia, dropping into a garden chair that was sorely in need of paint and a new rocker. I always feel sorry for a meteor when I see it flaming through the heavens, presumably jerked out of its orbit by some superior force. Carter gave me the house, said Judith calmly.

Yes, what are you going to do? do with it? I don't know. What would you do? Sell it and give him the money or endow a bed in a hospital with it. He wouldn't take the money. Perhaps not, but he might be glad to get the bed some day when he was sick or very tired. Perhaps. Judith had not thought of that. I don't know just what to do. Don't do anything, my dear, until you're absolutely certain that you want to do it. The way opens before us when we're meant to take. take it. I've learned that, if nothing else, during my five and forty years. Judith bent to put her cool cheek against Miss Cynthia's flushed face.

How have you learned so much, dear, shut away from the world for so long? By keeping my eyes open, snapped Miss Cynthia, and my mouth shut when I could. Chandler was keeping his eyes open also, but he saw nothing, save a listless and silent Marjorie with dark circles under her eyes, tense and strung all to the breaking point. Night after night during his own wakeful hours, he saw the light from her room streaming out upon the cedars and heard the wakeful murmurs of the little birds asleep in the scented boughs,

wondering if the day had come so soon. She ate almost nothing and the roses were gone from her cheeks. She seemed to be waiting for something which did not come. Day by day, she watched the post office feverishly, but there was never a letter for her. Judith came on Monday and Thursday afternoons, as usual, her beautiful serenity unbroken, her calmness and poise unshaken.

Secretly Marjorie marveled at her, and at length made up her mind that she could not have loved Carter at all. Chandler wondered at Judith too, but neither of them made any reference to the past. As a pebble cast into the depths may reach by means of ever-widening circles some distant, unseen shore,

Judith was at peace again, the rippling having gone, her ken. The center of the tumult was Carter himself, restless, remorseful, and almost unable to work. Every day he told himself that he had done the best he could, that however deeply he might have been at fault, he had atoned every way that was within his power. His conscience was at rest, but he was far from happy. He missed Judith more keenly than he had ever thought possible. He hungered for the old happy comradeship and even for Miss Cynthia stimulating talk. At times he thought of

going up to see Judith, for she had assured him that they would be friends. Reason told him there was nothing against it, but instinct kept him away. Night after night, Judith was awakened by his car rushing past the house at top speed. Night after night, too, Marjorie stirred uneasily in her fitful sleep at the sound of a distant automobile, which never came so near as the crossroads. Sometimes it stopped, far outside the circle of light made by Chandler's lantern, and after a long time, turn. turned and went back along the river road.

Marjorie did not guess, but Judith knew. She knew, too, that he spent an occasional remorseful evening upon the steps of the House of Hearts. Such small things as the tracks of his car in the road and an occasional cigarette stub betrayed him. Hoping, yet fearing to see him, Marjorie never went out of the yard during the hours he might possibly be at home. Once during the day, she had walked past Mrs. Warner's, but had looked neither to the

right nor the left. she was too miserable even to feel the pair of sharp eyes that took account of her passing, or to guess that she had stirred up a sharp resentment against herself that lasted well into the next day. Carter had told Aunt Belinda that his engagement was broken, and immediately had started for his strain, allowing neither time for question or comment. Aunt Belinda had at once repeated the fact to Uncle Henry and added viciously quite of her own accord, It's her that's done it. In his masculine innocence, Uncle Helen, Henry supposed that her meant Judith, as it had heretofore. He merely said,

"'Just so, mother, just so.' And resumed his nap. Feeling himself utterly helpless, Chandler watched Marjorie from day to day with anxious love. Having found at last that he did not intend to question her, she became more at ease with him and did not avoid him so much. Often she lingered downstairs long past her usual bedtime, talking indifferently or not at all. one night she asked pitifully do we always get the things we want the most not always the deep voice answered but we get the things that are meant for us to have then we shouldn't want what we don't get she said half to herself no but we do for some reason which he had never been able to define marjorie seemed very near to chandler sometimes he was forced to remind himself very sternly that she was not his own flesh or not his own flesh or not his own flesh or he was forced to find him very nearer but he was not his own flesh or he was not his own flesh or he was not his own flesh or he was, and blood. He yearned so unspeakably for the good-night kiss she never offered to give.

Father used to say, sighed Marjorie, that wanting was life and satisfaction was death. I don't know what he meant by it. Do you? If wanting is life, I know what that is. I'm very fully alive, if that's the test. He had the epigram habit, didn't he? I don't know. I guess so. Marjorie's thoughts were far away again now. Presently she turned to him again. Can you remember your mother? Yes, can't you? No, she died when I was born.

That's so, Chandler answered softly. I'd forgotten. Father didn't. I can remember how some women used to pet me and give me things and say what a dear child I was. I used to think it was the same as having lots of mothers, but they changed very quickly. One day I'd be the dearest child that ever lived,

and the next, though, hadn't done anything at all, all I'd get would be, run away, child, I'm busy. I see now that they wanted to marry father. Chandler laughed, but you didn't know it then. No, said Marjorie with her small hands tightly clenched. I wish I had. I'd have stirred things up.

You're vicious, dear. Your father didn't need you to protect him. No, answered the girl softening a little. I guess he didn't. I've wished so often I could remember my mother. she went on in a different tone. Father used to talk to me about her sometimes, until I felt that I almost knew her,

but I guess it isn't the same. He told me how lovely she was. He was always sorry, I think, that I looked like him instead of her. He said that whenever I saw a woman whom I admired, I must always remember that my own mother was lovelier, that if anybody was gentle and kind, mother was more kind and more gentle,

that other people might be very charming, but that mother was perfect. When I was bad, he always said, Why, Marjorie, the daughter of your mother doing a thing like that? I'm surprised. He used to tell me that I'd make Mother feel badly, even up in heaven, if I wasn't just what she wanted me to be. I used to say my prayers to Mother, and Father let me do it.

He said Mother was with God, though nobody knew where God was, and that he would listen to her, if not to me. Do you think it makes any difference whom you pray to? No. I believe a real prayer always goes straight. I don't see why mother had to die. Marjorie continued after a pause. Father didn't either. He said she was never ill a day in her life, except the time she was hurt in the railroad accident. Railroad accident, he echoed.

Yes, did father never tell you? No, said Chandler, his lips barely moving. Could it be possible that Marjorie had come to him as a sort of divine? compensation, bone of the bone and flesh of the flesh of the woman he had loved and lost. It was a long time before they were married, Marjorie was saying. She was coming to the city from some little town out in the country, I don't remember the name of it, and right in the middle of the afternoon there was a wreck, and mother was terribly cut by glass and her foot was broken, but she got well all right. There wasn't even a scar, but she never could bear to

go anywhere on a train afterward. Naturally not, Chandler answered. His lips were dry and stiff. Marjorie, have you a picture of your mother? Yes, of course. Did I never show it to you? No, neither you nor your father. I've often wondered, he stammered,

what she looked like. I'll get it. She went upstairs, and after what seemed an age, returned with a framed photograph. chandler snatched it from her his hands icy cold i forgot you couldn't see out here marjorie was saying i'll get a candle the light flickered died down then shone brilliantly upon the pictured face the grave sweet eyes the tender mouth the soft hair that curled low upon the forehead he looked at it long and earnestly isn't she lovely marjorie asked but not a bit like me no he said in a tone new to Marjorie. She isn't a bit like you, nor like anybody else I've ever seen.

He lay awake that night long after Marjorie slept, thinking. Of her, still existing somewhere as herself, or as wind and grass and sea, he humbly sought forgiveness. It was, of course, impossible that she could have married. Having once seen the sun as he had, she would never accept starlight. She would wait, as he waited, for dawn.

End of Chapter 21. Chapter 22 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertil Reed. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. 22. From the Unvarping Star Dim and far as from some distant army came the first bugles of the frost. Golden rain fell from the willows and birches, and now and then, amid the green-gold splendors of a sunlit maple, a scarlet leaf appeared. Back in the woods, the little people in fur were making ready for winter, and the little people in feathers had already begun their long night voyages upon cool seas of air to some more friendly climb.

Marjorie was still waiting, more listless and more weary than ever for that which did not come. During the cool evenings Chandler sat in the library among his beloved books, but Marjorie preferred the veranda, perhaps because she wanted to be alone. subconsciously she had absorbed something from Chandler's dominant faith. The things that were hers could never be taken from her or lost. She tried honestly not to want anything which was not hers. She sat on the top step of the porch leaning against the pillar, looking out into the somber shadows of the cedars and beyond them to the crossroads where Chandler's light burned, moonlight nights and all.

High above the circle of light thrown by the lantern upon the gravel, the little blue sailor stood at attention. attention, waiting for a wind to which he might answer, but there was none. The night was exquisitely still, save for the crickets that fiddled in the grass, unmindful of the fact that even fairy instruments must soon forget their merry tunes. The moon rose behind the cedars and flooded the earth with the clear, golden light of early autumn, throwing sharp shadows against the house. Chandler picked up his violin, and upon muted strings, played to himself that old sweet

serenade, beloved of lover since the day it was written. All the stars keep watch in heaven, while I sing to thee, and the night for love was given. Darling, come to me, darling, come to me. Oh, breathed Marjorie in pain. Her small hands clenched themselves tightly and she choked back a sob. Why, of all things, should the man play that? And then, quite simply and inevitably, like most other miracles, Carter. came at the first moment when he felt that he could, and at the same time keep square with himself. Marjorie heard the car when it turned at the river road and knew that it must be his,

for automobiles were not common in Edgerton. As it purred steadily toward her, it seemed that the loud beating of her heart must sound above the music within. When it stopped at the gate and Carter got out, she tried to go to the gate to meet him, but could not. She sank back upon the step, leaned heavily against the pillar, and waited. The little hand she gave him was cold. "'Aren't you chilly out here?' he asked. "'Shant I get you some sort of a rap?' "'No,' Marjorie stammered.

"'I'm quite warm.' And indeed she was, for long-forgotten roses bloomed upon her cheeks again, and the young blood danced through her veins. "'Do you want to come out in the car?' "'No. I'd rather stay here.' "'So would I.' from within came the music of the serenade crying out from the violin in passionate longing thrilling from the desolation of the man's soul to the strings that gave it voice how is he asked carter inclining his head toward the open door all right just the same as he always is there was silence again save for the serenade when it ceased carter leaned forward out of the shadow you know don't you marjorie that my engagement is broken

The tone was very gentle, such as a man would use in speaking to a child. Yes. Did—do you know why? Yes, she told me. Oh. He was astonished, for that was not like Judith at all. Then he took second thought. What did she tell you?

Oh, nothing, except that you weren't suited to one another and found it out in time. She said lots of people who weren't suited to one another didn't find it out until after they were married, and she was glad it had happened now instead of later. Carter nodded. That was more like Judith. She's right, he said. She always is right about everything. Perfectly, unmistakably, unfailingly right.

I was... Marjorie hesitated, then stopped. Yes, you were... Please go on. I was afraid at first, when she first told me, you know, that I might have had something to do with it, so I asked. her. And she said. She said I hadn't, but I couldn't help feeling badly. That, that day in the house, you know, I, I thought I heard somebody come in at the back door when,

Imagination, Marjorie, nobody came in. For one of them, at least, he said to himself, their first divine moment should be kept sacred. And, and then, the letter? Yes, he said quickly. The letter. What of that? Algernan got one page of it and chewed it up and she took it away from him. Mr. Chandler said she said she didn't see it, but when I got it out of the wastebasket where she put it, there was one paragraph left, as plain as anything. Which paragraph?

The one about her. Where you said how fine she was and all that, and that she mustn't be hurt, and that you must go on and not let her know that you had changed. Carter got up and started toward the gate, his hand in his pockets. Marjorie followed him, a little white ghost slipping noiselessly through the shadow. She put a pleading hand upon his arm. Don't, she said brokenly.

You're not angry with me? He turned and caught her in his arms. Angry with you. Oh, Marjorie, Marjorie, Marjorie. Don't, she said again. She put her hands up to his shoulders and pushed him back. I don't want you to think I was careless with the letter because I wasn't. I was reading it.

I read it every day and sometimes in the night. It was all I had. And I was crying, so I didn't see Algern and get it. Do you think she could have seen it? No, of course not if she said she didn't. Nonetheless, Carter knew now why Judith had refused either to understand or to forgive. He appreciated, too, her shielding of Marjorie. Only a fine woman could have done that.

yet it did not matter nothing mattered any more save that he held margery in his arms unresisting now she yielded him her lips all the hunger of the years without her was as chaff in the divine fire that burned in his blood it was one of those rapturous instance in which man realizes that as truly as god is love heaven is immortality with love darling dearest beloved sweetheart he murmured "'Do you care?' "'Crushed to his, her lips answered. "'Yes.' Chandler had begun the serenade again, but it sounded faint and far away. "'Say you love me,' Carter pleaded, holding her so close that she almost cried out with a delicious pain of it. "'I do.'

"'Do what, darling?' "'Love you?' "'How much?' "'Oh, I don't know. "'There aren't any words for it. "'There's nothing, anywhere. but this. No, and there never has been, and never will be again.

Listen, dear. The first time our eyes met I loved you, but I didn't know it, because I was blind. All my life I've wanted you, and all my life I've been trying to find you. Every step I've taken has led me to you, through devious and winding ways. And then, when you came and I did know,

I fought against it and struggled, but it was no use. There's never very. any use of that when a man comes face to face with the one woman. Back in the beginning of things, Marjorie, you were made for me to love, and I for you. I belong to you just as your hands and eyes do. You're mine, mine, mine. There was a murmur of little dead leaves at their feet. The blue sailor turned, smiling, to look at those two who stood so closely together in the shadow of the cedar, but quickly

turned his back again, as became a gentleman of politeness and discretion. From within, like an undertone of the serenade, came emptiness and longing crying out from the violin. Is it for always? she asked as he drew her closer still. For always, darling. For this life and the next and for all the lives to come, till death and even beyond it, Marjorie. You're mine, mine, mine. The music died away, in a low, sweet cord. A far, in the withered grass, the cricket paused to rest. Blown stars drifted across the measureless seas of space between the clouds and moon. As she had said, there was nothing anywhere but this.

In the scented shadow of the cedar, there was only the fragrance of the lips that clung to his, and the sound of his own heart, surging with the nameless rapture that comes but once. Because the night was cool, Miss Cynthia had a fire, but there was no. other light in her room. By contrast, the flood of autumn moonlight that made the windows blue was chill and desolate, sending a shiver through Miss Cynthia that impelled her to draw her chair closer to the fire. Her purple velvet gown was heavy with lace, and over her shoulder she had drawn the white Egyptian scarf heavy with spangles. Being in the mood to shine, she had borrowed Judas' band of brilliance to gleam amid the silvery masses of her hair. At her throat was the

locket she had taken from the trunk the other day, of black enamel with a diamond cross and high relief bordered by discolored pearls. Judith had never seen it before until the day Miss Cynthia took it out of the trunk with the blood-stained handkerchief that had affected her so strangely. Something lay behind it all, so much was certain. There was a grave in Miss Cynthia's heart, too, as there was in her own. The firelight brought Judith a certain warm sense of intimacy. It was a for confidences to be bestowed upon those who do not ask. Judith leaned forward and methodically stirred the fire. The flames leaped up, sending a glow to the stag's head over the mantle

and a narrow of light to a bit of old silver in the cabinet at the other end of the room. Not so much light, my dear, warned Miss Cynthia. We swear at one another even in total darkness. Why didn't you tell me you were going to blossom out like a pansy in purple velvet? asked Judith with a laugh. I have plenty of other gowns. I needn't have worn scarlet. I wore this because it was warm and I was cold.

I chose this because it looked warm, Judith returned. But you're not deceiving me, dear. With your arms bare to the elbow and your neck and shoulders clothes simply in a scarf and a locket, you can't be unusually warm. Well, challenged Miss Cynthia with a mischievous light in her eyes. You put it on because you knew you'd be beautiful in it, but it seems a pity to waste a royal robe like that upon a mere woman. If Carter, Judith paused to stir the fire again.

I suppose Carter will marry Marjorie eventually. In the glow of the fire, Judas's lovely serene face did not seem to change. She spoke in the tone one uses in speaking of the dead who have been dearly loved. Miss Cynthia's answer was irrelevant, yet in a way much to the point. Some men require to be loved by a resourceful and non-lawful. "'Mollageful woman. Others by a squab.' "'Is Marjorie a squab?' queried Judith without much interest. "'I think so.'

Carter racism, doesn't he? The change is quite natural. He'll be true to her. That is, I hope he will. What is it to be true? To continually fight yourself and resist every temptation that comes your way?' Somebody said that temptations were made to be yielded to, but I don't go quite as far as that. still it isn't possible that everything you ever want to do is radically wrong no judith agreed i suppose not i wonder miss cynthia resumed after a little if any man was ever true to one woman i mean so absolutely hers that he never thought of anybody else after he saw her "'Yes,' said Judith dreamily. "'I know of one. Mr. Chandler.' "'He's lame,' commented Miss Cynthia wickedly.

"'He can't go out.' "'But this happened at the time he was made lame. "'I wonder he didn't say I shouldn't tell anybody. "'It can't matter if I tell you.' "'No,' Miss Cynthia returned moodily. "'What people tell me doesn't matter.' "'He was on his way to the city,' continued Judith to make his fortune. He was only 25.

In the seat in front of him was a girl in a white gown with a white hat trimmed with pink roses. The train was wrecked, and they too were caught by falling timbers and taken out, terribly hurt, just before the fire reached that car. For an hour they lay on a grassy bank out of sight and even out of hearing if they put their fingers in their ears. They talked, and Mr. Chandler knew that she was the one woman. He said she knew it, too, though neither of them said anything. They didn't even ask each other's names.

They just took each other for granted. When the relief train came an hour later, they were taken to different hospitals, and after he was able to leave the hospital, Mr. Chandler spent every cent he had trying to find her, advertising, detectives and all that, you know, and by the time his money was gone, he had to give it up. He's loved her ever since.

She continued clearing her throat, and dreamed about her and wanted her all the time the way a man wants the woman he loves. I've been so sorry for him ever since he told me. If he could only have kissed her once and had that to remember, why? Judith! Miss Cynthia had risen and was leaning against the mantle.

Her face was deathly pale, but her wonderful eyes were alight with secret fires. Judith, I don't care whether you're on speaking terms with Carter or not. Get him. Get his scar. Get my hat. Get my opera coat.

for the love of heaven, hurry. But Aunt Cynthia! Don't talk, act, get Carter, get the car, bring my things. Oh, she sobbed, sinking into her chair and hiding her face in her hands. What a fool I've been. What a blind, blind fool! In an instant the house was awake with confusion. Judith wrote two notes to Carter, sent one maid with one to Mrs. Warner's and the other to

Mr. Chandler's with the other. unless he had stayed in town he would be at one place or the other. Both were brief and exactly alike. Come at once with the car. Aunt Cynthia wants you. Hurry. J.S. Carter and Marjorie were still standing in the shadow of the cedar when the breathless messenger

arrived. Wait a minute, said Carter to the weary and excited maid. I'll take you back. Then to Marjorie. Something is wrong, dear. You'd better go in. I'll come back just as soon as I can. Anyway, I'll let you know.

Marjorie waited until the last sound of the car had died in the distance, then went into the library, literally a glow with the light which came from within. One look at that radiant face was all Chandler needed. Is it all right, dear? he asked softly. Yes, cried Marjorie. It's all right. Everything's all right. Nothing can ever be wrong again.

I understand, he said with a nod. The things that are hours come to us. and abide with us. They're not to be taken away or lost. Listen, you'll understand this now. He picked up the book Miss Cynthia had sent him. It opened of its own accord at one passage which he had underlined heavily. Far above our heads in the very center of the sky shines the star of our destined love, and it is in the atmosphere of that star and illumined by its rays that every passion that stirs us will come to life even to the end. And, and it is, in the atmosphere, And though we choose to right or to left of us, on the heights or in the shallows,

though in our struggle to break through the enchanted circle that is drawn around all the acts of our life, we do violence to the instinct that moves us, and try our hardest to choose against the choice of destiny, yet shall the woman we elect always have come to us straight from the unvarying star. There was a silence, then Chandler asked, tenderly, Do you understand? But Marjorie did not hear him. "'Listen,' she said. "'He's coming back.'

She ran out to the gate and waited until Carter appeared. Blinded by the fact of his return she did not notice Miss Cynthia at all, nor did the old lady stop to speak to her. Scorning assistance, she wriggled out of the back seat and with Crutch and Cain went up the steps and straight through the open door into the library where the light was burning. The white-plumed hat upon her silvered hair was slightly askew, but the brilliance blazed both from her hair and from

the buckle. Her purple velvet gown trailed sumptuously back from the folds of her white fur-lined coat heavy with lace and silver. The Venetian lace Bertha and the Egyptian spangled scarf rose and fell with every breath. Upon her bare neck hung the locket, bordered by discolored pearls, with the diamond cross putting the brilliance to shame. Her deep eyes met his with longing and appeal. Startled by the vision, Chandler wondered for a moment where he had seen that splendid coat before, then he remembered. Judith had worn it one night.

She said it was Miss Cynthia's. Then he saw the locket. Thrilled to the depths, yet secretly afraid to believe, and utterly forgetting his helplessness, he started from his chair his empty arms outstretched. Oh, my dear, he said brokenly, The many, many years.

End of Chapter 22. Chapter 23 of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertral Reed This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Twenty-three. Gossip Folks as wants to live in the city can, if they like, said Aunt Belinda, pointedly. It's plenty enough excitement for me right here. Just so, mother, just so. Uncle Henry was nodding in a sunny corner of the kitchen porch,

sniffing appreciatively now and then at the spicy scents that were wafted afar from the preserving kettle. Is it tomato pickles? No, it's peaches, and yellow tomato preserves with lemon peel in them. I'd admire to taste the peaches, mother, when you think they're done. I ain't never seen your bead on pickles. They ain't done yet. They've got to cook slow or they'll bust.

She came out, wiping her flushed face upon her apron, and settled down in the decrepit rocker that stood beside Uncle Henry's armchair. As I was saying, she resumed, it's plenty exciting for me right here. So tis, mother, so it is. What with the marrying and the given in marriage and the swapping of partners going on almost at the last minute, a body'd get flustered if they let their selves get to dwelling on it. Then don't dwell on it, mother. I ain't a-dwelling. I was just a-thinking. I was wondering what his mother'd say if she knew it.

whose mother his what she'd think of her son chasing after one girl for three or four years and then getting engaged to her and building her a house and gettin the furniture most all into it and then getting his self-engaged to another girl that he ain't never seen six months ago what do you say i'd say that as long as he was the one that was going to live with her he had the most to say about it i wouldn't let it concern me none but it ain't honourable henry i can't bear to have him do a thing like that his own mother couldn't have brung him up more carefully for the last five years than i have he was brung up belinda when he come here you ain't had nothin to do with it i suppose not she returned sarcastically I ain't picked up after him and cooked for him, and mended his clothes and put cream on his sunburn, and fed his pets and aired his low-necked coat to keep the moths out of it, have I? That ain't nothing, Mother.

It's only woman's work. Huh, she snorted. What have you done? Me? queried Uncle Henry reminiscently. Why, I've built the pigeon house. He helped you do that. "'In the shed for the automobile.

"'He paid a carpenter to help you do that. "'And I made the roads "'so's he wouldn't have to run over the grass. "'That ain't nothing, making roads ain't.' "'No,' the old man sighed. "'Maybe not. "'Folks make their own roads, and we can't help them none. "'All we can do is to smooth the path a bit.

"'I've thought lots of times "'that if we all tried to make them, other people's paths easy, how her own feet would have a smooth, even place to walk on. You talk like a minister, Henry. She was not to be diverted by spiritual parallels from the main issue. What I'm saying is that it ain't decent for him to act so, and I don't know what to do about it. There ain't nothing to be did, Belinda. You can't make Miss Judith marry him if she don't want to, and I reckon she don't. She could, have. What do you think Miss Judith has done? She's gone and given that handkerchief linen

that she spent months embroidering to that margery for a wedding dress. She said it was made for his wedding, and she wanted the dress to be there. What do you think about that? Who told you? Miss Bankroft, Susie? Whyn't she give it to Miss Bankroft? I don't know. That's what I'd have done, if I hadn't been going to use it myself. where are they all going to live afterwards who after what after all the marion aunt belinda sighed i dunno henry she answered with wifely patience if i did i tell you she had the air of one unwillingly placed upon the witness stand he's give her the house uncle henry reached over to the broom selected a straw and chewed it meditatively who'd he give it to Her or Marjorie? Her.

Henry Warner. How long have you note that? Since day before yesterday, when I was to the store after the cinnamon, and you sent me back to get that kind that comes in sticks. Who told you? Cy Walters. He was over to the courthouse, and he see the deed all recorded, Carter Keith to Judas Sylvester,

for one dollar and other valuable considerations. "'Land sakes! She ain't doing so bad, then. She's getting the house without the trouble of a husband. I reckon she's smarter than I thought.' If the comment contained a hidden arrow, it glanced harmlessly aside from the armor of Uncle Henry's content. From his sunny corner he contemplated the rolling meadows that stretched from the road back to the hills. One of Carter's rabbits had escaped from its hut and was hopping across the clover patch with an air of festivity. Pigeons promenaded back and forth in the sun with deep-throated murmurs, which seemed to indicate that it was a bright and beautiful morning and that all was well.

The ladies at the Soan Circle was saying yesterday, she continued, that after Miss Cynthia had waited as long as she had, she'd ordered to have a husband that wasn't lame. So I up and told him that Mr. Chandler and Miss Cynthia was made lame at the same time, and they was that surprised. Don't take much. to surprise a sewing circle, the old man said meditatively. Perhaps not. Aunt Belinda clucked her teeth sharply as she often did when she was annoyed.

I don't know why women shouldn't talk about the things that interest them, same as men do. Women gossips, replied Uncle Henry severely. Men doesn't. What do you call gossiping Henry Warner? Answer me that. Talking about things that don't matter. Telling about things that don't matter. things about people. Like Miss Bankroft's Susie, telling you that Miss Judah that give her address. What's that amount to? That's

gossip. And Assai Walters, telling you that he'd give her the house and that he'd seen the record of it for one dollar and other valuable considerations. And you setting on a soapbox all the afternoon to discuss it and forgetting to bring the right cinnamon and having to be sent

back for it? That ain't gossip, is it? No, Belinda taint. That's business. Is business transacted on soapboxes? Might be, he returned cautiously. He had the feeling that an unsuspected trap was about to close upon him. Business is transacted wherever men happens to be. Restaurants, stores, hotels, saloons, or any other place. Officers, too. Miss Stebbins was saying at the Soan's

that she reckoned about the first thing to be did after women got the vote would be to pass a law requiring all saloons to be closed at five o'clock so's the men could get home to their suppers in decent season. I ain't in favor of women's voting. Why not? Aunt Belinda bristled, for the modern unrest had penetrated the sewing circle. Well, they ain't got time. It'd take him away from their home duties. It don't take no more to-es. It don't take no more time to vote than it does to go to the market. That ain't what I'm speaking of. They'd have to think about how they was going to vote and why. It'd divert their minds. I don't know why they'd have to think about it. Men doesn't. Women order to be protected from the hardships of the world.

Yes, they order, but they ain't. As long as over half the world's work is slid onto women's shoulders, I don't see why they shouldn't have something to say about the running of it. I'm glad I ain't called on to settle it, he mused. There ain't no use of getting yourself stirred up, Belinda. Smiles is pretty and pleasant, but it takes fists to do things, and a vote or to have a fist behind it. Moral force, she began. It's all right in lots of places, but it takes fists in clubs and guns to make a man's world straight. A mob now. Do you suppose a lady policeman could walk into a mob and smile and say, Gentlemen, will you please disperse yourselves and go to your separate homes?

A club is what's needed, or maybe the fire hose. I could turn on the fire hose, returned Aunt Belinda thoughtfully. I'd admire to do it. I reckon you would. If we'd had a hose. I'll reckon you'd have turned it on me more than once when your temper got hit up. That's why I ain't never bought one. I wouldn't have turned no cold water on you, Henry.

You'd take your death a cold. Sakes alive, the peaches are burning. She fled to the rescue, and Uncle Henry, unperturbed, selected another broomstraw with extreme care. When she came out, he reverted to the original topic. When's he going to leave? I don't know. he ain't said yet he's been packing up his clothes and books and fish and tackle and other traps but he ain't talk none about moving the furniture i forgot returned uncle henry placidly chewing upon his straw he told me we was to keep the furniture in remembrance of him and i hope uncle henry he says that you and aunt belinda will see your way clear to take some mother lonely young fellow into your hearts and home and be father and mother to him

same's you've been to me. Them's his very words. Henry Warner, when'd he tell you that? I don't know, as I could say just when. Last week sometime, I reckon. I disremember. Well, if you ain't the beatenest, I never in all my life. Aunt Belinda's lower jaw dropped, but words mercifully failed. It's a wonder you wouldn't tell me something now and then, she concluded sarcastically. I do, Belinda, I do. What's right and proper for you to know I tell you in due season and what ain't I don't?

I never was one to gossip. I don't know of anything you've ever kept to yourself. I ain't complaining that you don't tell me everything. I'm complaining that you don't do it quick enough. A man is obliged to have a reservoir for his mind. He can't let everything trickle out the minute it gets in, like a woman does. Reservoir, she repeated scornfully.

You'd better say cistern, with the cover off, too, and mosquitoes hatching on top. You remind me some of a pepper box, Belinda. If you'll bring me the corn, I'll feed the pigeons. It must be about time. And if you'll bring out a pail of water when you come, too, I'll go and fill the tile so as they can drink. It got low, and one of them almost fell into it just now.

A cloud of feathered pensioners descended into the yard as the first handful of corn struck the bare earth. Aunt Belinda stood watching, but Uncle Henry, as was his wont, sat whenever it was possible to sit. He had theories about making his mind save his feet, and was occasionally reminded with a certain tartness that he never used his mind for any other purpose. I wonder, he was saying, how they know what time it is. By their stomachs, I reckon, same as a man does. What are you laying out to have for dinner, mother? There ain't going to be no dinner till after the peaches and tomatoes is put up.

I'll get you a snack of bread and cheese if you'd like it. You can set out here and eat it. All right, maybe I could eat one or two of them cold sassages, too. and I'd like one of them peaches, no matter whether it's cooked or not. Raw peaches is good. But raw pickles ain't. You shan't have none till they're good and done, so you can just make up your mind to wait.

All right. He had the pathetic submissiveness of the married man in his tone. I was wondering whether as long as he's give us the furniture, he wouldn't let us keep the rabbits and pigeons and dogs. i'd admire to have em they remind me of him so that's for you and him to settle father if i was a man and was just goin to be married i don't know what i'd want of a menagerie do you remember the time he went hunting and brought home that little wildcat to tame i ain't likely to forget it and the mud turtle that was forever climbing out of its pan and walking around where it could get stepped on i remember miss judith told him he ought to name the turtle maud because it insisted on going into the garden and he said he was going to call it napoleon on account of the bony part i suppose there was some joke in that i can remember yet how they was laughing so can i but there needn't have been no joke folks in love is terrible easy to please if they wasn't they wouldn't be in love i reckon

maybe not uncle henry munched peacefully at his bread and cheese and threw an occasional bit to the pigeons he shared his cold sausage with one of the collies and aunt belinda set out a panful of scraps for the remainder of the kennel, which arrived immediately with a unanimous and unmistakable request. I was just thinking about Miss Cynthia. He continued, settling back comfortably in his chair. Ain't it funny that she and Chandler should have been in the same wreck and living here these twenty years and more, and never lay in eyes on each other, and now they're gone to be married? It beats all. That was where they got acquainted, in the wreck. If a either of them had ever went anywhere. They'd have seen each other, but they both stayed close to home. They could have went if they was a mind, too, he suggested. I suppose they could. Miss

Cynthia got up there quick enough when she was once in the notion, but how'd they know they was the ones that was wrecked together? How'd it come that they'd knowed it now? Why, ain't they just stayed here and never seen each other till they was both dead? On account of them both, Both haven't kept their mouths shut, and neither of them being given to gossip. Just by chance, they each tells Miss Judith, I understand, and she goes right ahead and fixes things up. Men muddles things, and women straightens them out. If men is muddlers, women is meddlers.

Ain't it so, Belinda? Uncle Henry laughed heartily at his own joke, but nobody else appeared to notice it. He was telling me yesterday, the old man continued out. after a pause, that he had a couple of friends in mind that he thought would like to come here and stay with us. One of them is a lawyer, same as he is, and the other works in a bank. Must be nice to work in a bank. Shutting up shop at three o'clock and at noon on Saturdays all the year round. Henry Warner, why didn't you tell me that yesterday? I ain't given to gossip,

Belinda. Besides, there ain't no hurry is there. He said he'd bring them both out to supper tonight and let him see how they like the place. The bank and feller has been driven almost crazy by too much arithmetic, and the doctor told him he must have quiet. Henry Warner, you're enough to try the patience of a saint. Here you've note since yesterday that there was going to be company for supper, and you ain't never said a word to me about it. What am I going to do I'd like to know?

tears of vexation rolled down her wrinkled cheeks. There, there, Belinda, comforted Uncle Henry. What's good enough for him and me is good enough for anybody else, ain't it? I ain't saying it isn't, she snapped. But what'll feed three ain't going to make five comfortable? And if the two that's coming has got appetites anything like yours and his, it'll mean cooking from now till train time to get enough to fill them up. "'You go and hitch up, and I'll write out what I want at the store.'

A pained expression came upon the old man's face. "'But my dinner, Belinda. "'Your dinner, Henry Warner, is your supper. "'There's another cold sassage in the pantry, "'and you can munch on it while you're driving in. "'But don't stop to talk. "'Go and hitch up and see that you come right back. "'Promise me you won't set down until you come home.'

weekly he promised must have done something terrible he said to himself as he went toward the barn or belinda never make me go to town without my dinner she knows i'm likely to get sick if i don't have my meals regular women is queer even the best of em they certainly is late in the afternoon aunt belinda relented she had her kitchen table heavily laden with jar after jar of preserve and pickles. A pleasant, spicy odor pervaded the spotless house. The table was set with the best china and silver, and a feast, which included hot biscuits and honey, was well underway. Aunt Belinda herself had donned her second best black silk and had on a new white apron. She appeared before the dejected one with a tray laden with sandwiches and warm little cakes fresh from the oven and a teapot steaming in the center. He ate gratefully and of his own accord took the ravaged tray into the house. I reckoned you'd find it comforted, she said

pacifically. It was, mother. You've been given me comfort ever since I've known you. And you, me, that is, most of the time. Aunt Belinda was trying to be truthful and at the same time, polite. The post-prandial contentment had Uncle Henry firmly in its grasp. I don't see as you've changed none, mother. You look just about the same to me as you did thirty years ago when we was married, only prettier. A faded pink blossomed upon Aunt Belinda's wrinkled cheeks and her keen eyes softened. The old man leaned forward out of his chair.

Mother, if we want married and I was to ask you, would you come now, like Miss Cynthia and Chandler? I reckon I would. He got up, went to her, and bent down to kiss her. "'Thirty years,' he said. "'It don't seem as if we was old, Mother, does it?' "'No, Henry, it doesn't, and we ain't, neither. Love never gets old.'

"'End of Chapter 23. Chapter 24 of A Weaver of Dreams by Myrtle Reed. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Twenty-four. The Sunset Hour after the first time Miss Cynthia steadfastly refused to go to Chandler's house again, but insisted that he should come to her as was right and proper. Judith went to the city and selected a wheelchair for him that could be used upon the street. The day it came, he went out of his little yard for the first time in twenty-five years.

Apart, and more alone than ever, Judith watched the two, so strangely brought together after many years. Forgetting the silver that shone fitfully in the same. Chandler's hair and made a crown of glory upon Miss Cynthia's beautiful head. They had magically become young again. With a queer little pain at her heart, Judith comprehended Miss Cynthia's intervals of absent-mindedness when the wonderful eyes, softened with dreams and tears, looked at things they saw not, searching the far beyond for things they could not see. The situation had become reversed. Once, Miss Cynthia, lonely, though unselfish, had sat apart and communed with herself while the lovers were unconscious even of her remote existence. Now Judith spent solitary evenings in the

upper room with only the fire for companionship, while the other two downstairs sat close together, with clasped hands bridging the empty and desolate years. Just as Judith had waited for Carter upon the upper balcony, Miss Cynthia sat there now, straining her eyes for the first glimpse of the wheelchair. Chandler always came to dinner, and even though the afternoon was cold, Miss Cynthia, in her white and silver coat, bad brave defiance to all Judith's warnings, and watched for her lover as was her woman's right. More beautiful than ever missed, Cynthia literally irradiated joy. Roses bloomed upon her cheeks again as they had in years gone by. Her sweet voice, once high and clear, was filled with deep undertones of tenderness. The music of it thrilled

Judith to the heart. It was so full of longing and appeal. Practical considerations appeared before Judith, but did not disturb Miss Cynthia at all. For instance, where were they to live? Chandler's house was small and inappropriate, and Miss Cynthia's double-decked mansion was hardly the place for a man who left his wheelchair only to be lifted into bed. Judith pondered through many a wakeful hour before the inspiration came to her. But would Aunt Cynthia go? The little old lady was extraordinarily self-willed. Would Chandler accept it? And yet, why not? Judith waited, fearing to speak. The golden afternoon was waning.

Long purple shadows lay upon the valley while the last light lingered upon the hills. Flaming tapestries of sunset hung from the high walls of heaven, at once a death and a promise of resurrection. Miss Cynthia, closely wrapped in her splendor, sat facing it. She reminded Judith of a saint upon a stained glass window. So radiant was she from the sunset and from the light within. "'Dear,' said Judith softly,

"'you'll have to have a wedding gown.' "'Why?' asked Miss Cynthia dreamily. Her eyes were fixed upon the road below. "'Everybody does,' Judith answered with a little laugh. "'I'm not everybody,' the old lady murmured. "'No, but you can't be married as though you weren't anybody. "'Will you let me go to town tomorrow and get you a wedding gown? "'White satin and lace veil and orange blossoms

"'and everything else that goes with it?' "'I don't know what you're talking about, Judith,' the disturbed one remarked fretfully. "'Why should you prattle about white satin on a day like this? "'Do you see that wonderful sunset? "'Isn't it the most perfect day God ever made?' "'And he's coming. He'll be here inside of half an hour.' "'For that half hour you must be sensible,' said Judith with affected sternness. She went to the little white and silver figure, lifted the saucy chin, and kissed the sweet

lips. Would you mind telling me, dear, as woman to woman, what you intend to be married in? My purple velvet, said Miss Cynthia promptly. Dearest, it's impossible. Nothing is impossible in this world of miracles, my dear. We speak as though the days of magic were over, but they're not. Aunt Cynthia, your purple velvet is low-necked, isn't it? Somewhat, do you consider it indecent? For daytime where, yes.

"'Unless you're going to be married in the evening, you can't wear it.' "'I will if I want to. "'I'm going to be married in church as near a sunset as possible, "'and I'm going to wear my purple velvet.' "'Why church?' queried Judith. "'Why sunset? Why the velvet gown?' "'Miss Cynthia turned to Judith, with the air of a teacher "'about to turn a fountain of wisdom upon the parching minds of an eager class.

"'Church?' "'Because marriage is a religious ceremony and religion below. to church. Indeed, most people keep theirs there exclusively. Sunset, because we're both in our declining years. Morning and high noon are not for people of fifty, are they? Besides, it's like that, pointing to the splendor in the west. The wonder and the glory at the close of a long, dull day. This is my hour. And the purple velvet, because it belongs with the sunset, and with me. And because I wore it, the night, that, that, she hesitated and dimpled in lovely confusion.

Because I look like a real lady in it, don't I? She concluded with airy defiance. Oh, you darling, said Judith half to herself, forgive me, you shall have all the purple velvet you want. I'll have the church upholstered with it if you say so. Not at all, said Miss Cynthia, disclaiming the offer with a wave of her hand. I'm a simple and modest person, with quiet tastes. What are you going to give me for a wedding present? She inquired with childlike interest. Judith knelt beside the old lady's low chair.

Haven't you guessed? Haven't you thought of the one thing I have to give you? The one thing that you ought to have? No, murmured Miss Cynthia. I haven't. She stood up for a moment shading her eyes, but there were no signs of the approaching chair, so she settled back again.

Where are you going to live? dear. I don't know, any place, both places, under a red umbrella on the river bank. It doesn't matter. But it does, guess, dearest? I can't. Don't torment me by making me use my mind when I don't want to. The House of Hearts, said Judith softly. Miss Cynthia turned startled. No, she said. You mustn't. But I must. It's a little. It's a little. It's a little. It's a little. It's a little. It's a little. It's It's mine, isn't it? Besides, I've already deeded it to you, and you can't say a single word. She stopped the flood of protestations with a kiss.

Miss Cynthia's eyes filled. The dear little house, she said half to herself. All for me, and for him. Yes, said Judith, choking back her own tears. Built for a bride, and to be given to the loveliest bride that ever was as a wedding gift from someone who loved. her very, very much. Judith.

Miss Cynthia lifted her arms, and the two wept together, as is the way of women when they are very, very happy. I can't believe it, sobbed Miss Cynthia. What a long, awful day I've had, and what a wonderful sunset I'm having now. Judith, do you think it's wrong for anybody to be so happy as I am? No, dear, it's perfectly right. "'Look,' she pointed to the road below. "'You mustn't let him find you crying.'

"'No,' said Miss Cynthia, rising and hurriedly wiping her eyes. "'I mustn't.' She went down and was waiting for him at the door when the chair turned in at the gate. Judith walked back and forth slowly upon the veranda, glad she had given as she had. Carter would be glad too when he knew. She must write him a note and tell him. She had heard, through Chandler and Miss Cynthia of the engagement,

and also that Marjorie had chosen to live in town where so much was going on all the time that one could never be dull. If the house had been built for Miss Cynthia and Chandler, it could not have been more suitable in every way. The low bungalow with only four or five steps to the porch and no stairs at all inside. She decided upon additional bookcases for the living room and den. Otherwise, she would finish it as she had meant to do long ago, and the few last touches should be though she had planned for herself. even to the pink and white chintz in one dressing-room and the blue and white in the other. The name of the house was right, too, and the stationery, for which the dye had been made months previously, and the garden, to be a bloom with roses wherever roses could be made to grow.

Strangely also, the verses belonged to Miss Cynthia and Chandler, who had come to their joy so late. Little sunset, House of Hearts, standing all alone. I could come and sweep the leaves from your stepping-stone. I and he could light your fires, laughing at the rain. But, oh, it's far to happiness, a short way back again. It had been far to happiness for Miss Cynthia and Chandler, but because they had waited, it had come at last, with no shadows to divide or deny them,

and no barriers to lie between. I'll wait, too, said Judith to herself. If it's meant for me, it will come, and if it isn't, I don't want it. That night after dinner, when the fire was blazing in the fireplace in the downstairs living room, when Chandler's attendant was making Mary in the kitchen with Miss Cynthia's household staff out of sight, yet within call, when Judith, with the plea of an interesting book, had betaken herself to her lonely hearthstone upstairs, Miss Cynthia pushed a little footstool close to Chandler's chair and knelt upon it, leaning against him. In the little broken phrases she told him what Judith had done.

She was stirred to the depths by the pity of it. Judith's own joy had so gone astray. The man said nothing. He only stroked his old sweetheart's silver hair. Isn't it wonderful? she asked. No, the deep voice answered. Nothing is wonderful but this. But it's part of this, isn't it, Martin?

Surely, dear, everything is, isn't it? Is there anything in the whole wild? world that doesn't belong to this. Yes, pain and sorrow and waiting and hungry hearts. Those don't belong. We've had those dearest. Have you forgotten? I've forgotten everything, sighed Miss Cynthia, that unspeakable horror, and that one dear hour together in the midst of it, and then the long waiting, then this. It's as if we died in the wreck, isn't it, and had gone straight on to heaven. Do you think heaven can be any more than this, or different? No. If God himself is love, what else can heaven be save immortality, with no fear of parting? Miss Cynthia leaned closer.

There isn't much time left for us to be together, Martin. We've come to sunset now, and the night must be very near us. Have you thought of that? Yes, I've thought of it, but this isn't all. It can't be. Our more mortal life is only the flaming arc of a circle, as someone has said, the rainbow between two silences. The rest of the circle is wrapped in shadow, so we cannot see or even guess what lies beyond, but the arc implies the circle, just as night means day if you look far enough into it. Yes, but sometimes, when I think of all we might have had. Hush, sweetheart, you must never think of that, nor must I. The things that are meant for.

us come to us when we are meant to have them. Dawn and high noon and the long days of struggle may be for the others, but sunset is for us, and twilight. And night, too, Martin. The long night out upon the circle, when the ark merges into it. Yes, dear.

Together. Always together, darling. Never to be parted any more. He leaned forward and lifted her up into his arms as though she were a child. He kissed the full, soft throat, the silvered hair, the dimpled hands, the wonderful dreamy eyes, and then the sweet lips, answering him with the rapture that follows long denial.

Always together, she murmured again and the man's deep voice echoed, always. Carter's normal masculine conceit was somewhat injured by the fact that Judith had suggested a double wedding in the church when she found that Marjorie and Miss Cynthia had chance to choose the same wedding day. Judith made all the plans for it, directed the decoration of the church, and ordered a wedding feast to be served at Miss Cynthia's with two cakes, one for each bride. Not forgetting Miss Cynthia's favorite poison ivy, but taking care to handle it with gloves, Judith had filled the church with autumn leaves, great boughs of gold and crimson, mingled with the russet of the oaks and trailing vines of golden scarlet everywhere. The sunsets streamed through the stained glass windows, carrying the color of autumn and

to every nook and corner. The fragrance of it floated in through the open door to the murmur of drifted leaves. Upon the altar, the yellow taper lights gleamed like fallen stars. Mr. and Mrs. Warner

with Judith and the minister's wife sat in the front pews. Carter and Marjorie were married first. Marjorie in the white linen gown Judith had embroidered for her own wedding. Pale but lovely, with the particular loveliness that belongs to brides.

Then Miss Cynthia in her purple velvet gown and a white hat went up to the altar, beside Chandler's chair, and knelt while the brief service was said. It had not been planned, but Judith instinctively followed Miss Cynthia when she went, and held her hand all through the ceremony, bridesmaid at the wedding that was to have been her own. Judith went back with Chandler walking beside him. Mr. and Mrs. Warner and the minister and his wife followed them.

The others went in Carter's automobile. The feast was meant to be. be gay, but it was not. Wedding Feast Sal Demar, and everyone was relieved when it was over. The minister and his wife disappeared, then the warners followed, Uncle Henry's joy at departure being painfully evident, as he was not a visit in man. The bride in purple velvet

went to her new home in the car, to be waiting at the door when her husband came with his attendant. Neither of them had seen the house. Marjorie and Judith were left alone until the car should come to take Marjorie back to Chandler's, while she changed her wedding gown for her street costume she was to wear into town. Marjorie spoke first. Oh, Judith, she said with a laugh that was half a sob. I'm so happy.

Are you? queried the older woman with a beautiful serene smile. I'm glad. I hope you always will be. I'm sure you will be. Judith, said Marjorie with youth's unconscious cruelty. Don't you care? I mean, you couldn't have cared, could you? "'No,' said Judith calmly.

"'I couldn't have cared.' The old pain stabbed at her heart for a moment, then went away, to return as she guessed more than once in the lonely days that lay ahead. "'I'll say goodbye now, if you don't mind,' she went on. "'I've been driven mad by a headache almost all day. I'll see you both often later on.' "'Yes,' Marjorie said, lifting her face to be kissed.

"'You must come to us often. Good-bye.' The car was already humming and fain. furring along the river road, so Marjorie went out to meet it, and Judith went upstairs, glad to be alone at last. From the safe shelter of Aunt Cynthia's room, she saw Carter assist his bride into the car and guest, by the quick glance he sent to the upper windows that Marjorie had passed on her excuse. I ought to have waited, said Judith to herself. I could have been decent for fifteen more minutes, I guess, if I'd tried. From below came the mournful clatter of dishes. Saddest sound on earth to those who dread the inevitable washing.

Judith looked at her own white hands smooth and beautifully kept. I'm spared that, she thought. I've been spared lots of things. Because it was her home and the only one she had, Judith had chosen to stay on alone in the old house for a time at least. It seemed singularly desolate without Aunt Cynthia, but Judith told herself sternly that she was a grown woman, not a child, and that she mustn't let herself be lonely.

Why, she had everything, except the one thing she wanted. Forcing back the tears she went out upon the balcony. In pride of purple and pomp of gold, the day and summer were dying together. The thousand miles of splendor stretched away to the sea. Valleys full of silver mists, hills veiled by amethystine haze, a sunset lain down upon the earth to dream a while, and then to sleep. I wonder if it's sunset for me too. she thought, or is there another day to come?

Something Chandler had told her once came back to her. Nobody could take away from her the things she had had. They were hers securely beyond all chance of change. And the things that were truly hers should come to her and abide with her forever, not to be destroyed or taken away or lost. And so she must be content. She must learn to wait and keep on dreaming. Upon her loom of life she had worked.

out a single episode, but it was not yet far enough out of the loom so that she could understand, or even see, the design. To be a weaver of dreams, to put the golden thread into the warp and woof of the fabric, to make the best steadily, of what little she might have, to sink self-in-service, and to find the wonderful way of life as it is written in terms of self-abandonment, this lay before her now. And with the golden thread to make a literal cloth of gold, to try to try and to transfigure even a gloomy fabric by the magic of dreams, to spread this tapestry everywhere within her house of life, to seek steadily for joy until she deserved it, even commanded it. Then mysteriously, from the far corners of the earth, it would come, as Chandler had said,

and as his own life had proved. Slowly the glory died. On flame-bright hills the last light still lingered, but sadly, as though it was never to come again. A cold wind came. from the east where light was born. Judith shivered a little, but she still stood there, thinking. The afterglow shone behind the trees, but faintly. In the midst of it was the pale gold crescent of the autumn moon.

A star or two came out. The advance guard of that celestial army which was to set the heavens ablaze with javelins of silver light. Fallen leaves murmured, sending subtle fragrance afar into the dusk as they drifted across the road. A belated squirrel scampered madly across the garden on his way to his home in a hollow tree, stirring a cricket to shrill

pipings of resentment which presently ceased. Tonight might have been so different, thought Judith, if, if it had been meant to be. Already her feet were firmly set upon the paths of peace. The things that are mine I shall have, she went on to herself, so I'll wait, and dream, till they come. Smiling, serene, and fully content, she turned and went in, alone. End of Chapter 24.

End of A Weaver of Dreams by Mertil Reed. Thank you for listening.