Her Father’s Daughter
“What makes you wear such funny shoes?” Linda Strong thrust forward a foot and critically examined the narrowvamp, the projecting sole, the broad, low heel of her well-worn browncalf-skin shoe. Then her glance lifted to the face of Donald Whiting,one of the most brilliant and popular seniors of the High School. Hereyes narrowed in a manner habitual to her when thinking intently. “Never you mind my shoes,” she said deliberately. “Kindly fix yourattention on my head piece. When you see me allowing any Jap in myclass to make higher grades than I do, then I give you leave to sayanything you please concerning my head.” An angry red rushed to the boy’s face. It was an irritating fact thatin the senior class of that particular Los Angeles high school aJapanese boy stood at the head. This was embarrassing to every senior. “I say,” said Donald Whiting, “I call that a mean thrust.” “I have a particular reason,” said Linda. “And I have ‘a particular reason’,” said Donald, “for being interestedin your shoes.” Linda laughed suddenly. When Linda laughed, which was very seldom,those within hearing turned to look at her. Hers was not a laugh thatcan be achieved. There were a few high places on the peak of Linda’ssoul, and on one of them homed a small flock of notes of rapture; notesas sweet as the voice of the white-banded mocking-bird of Argentina. “How surprising!” exclaimed Linda. “We have been attending the sameschool for three years; now, you stop me suddenly to tell me that youare interested in the shape of my shoes.” “I have been watching them all the time,” said Donald. “I can’tunderstand why any girl wants to be so different. Why don’t you dressyour hair the same as the other girls and wear the same kind of clothesand shoes?” “Now look here,” interposed Linda “You are flying the track. I amwilling to justify my shoes, if I can, but here you go including mydress and a big psychological problem, as well; but I think perhaps thewhy of the shoes will explain the remainder. Does the name ‘AlexanderStrong’ mean anything to you?” “The great nerve specialist?” asked Donald. “Yes,” said Linda. “The man who was the author of half-dozen booksthat have been translated into many foreign tongues and are used asauthorities all over the world. He happened to be my father. There aretwo children in our family. I have a sister four years older than Iam who is exactly like Mother, and she and Mother were inseparable. Iam exactly like Father; because we understood each other, and becauseboth of us always knew, although we never mentioned it, that Motherpreferred my sister Eileen to me, Father tried to make it up to me, sofrom the time I can remember I was at his heels. It never bothered himto have me playing around in the library while he was writing his mostcomplicated treatise. I have waited in his car half a day at a time,playing or reading, while he watched a patient or delivered a lectureat some medical college. His mental relaxation was to hike or to motorto the sea, to the mountains, to the canyons or the desert, and hevery seldom went without me even on long trips when he was fishing orhunting with other men. There was not much to know concerning a woman’sframe or her psychology that Father did not know, so there were tworeasons why he selected my footwear as he did. One was because he bebelieved high heels and pointed toes an outrage against the nervoussystem of a woman that would in time bring her within his province, andthe other was that I could not possibly have kept pace with him exceptin shoes like these. No doubt, they are the same kind I shall wear allmy life, for walking. You probably don’t know it, but my home lies nearthe middle of Lilac Valley and I walk over a mile each morning andevening to and from the cars. Does this sufficiently explain my shoes?” “I should think you’d feel queer,” said Donald. “I suspect I would if I had time to brood over it,” Linda replied, “butI haven’t. I must hustle to get to school on time in the morning. It’snearly or quite dark before I reach home in the evening. My fatherbelieved in having a good time. He had superb health, so he spent mostof what he made as it came to him. He counted on a long life. It neveroccurred to him that a little piece of machinery going wrong wouldplunge him into Eternity in a second.” “Oh, I remember!” cried the boy. Linda’s face paled slightly. “Yes,” she said, “it happened four years ago and I haven’t gotten awayfrom the horror of it yet, enough ever to step inside of a motor car;but I am going to get over that one of these days. Brakes are not alldefective, and one must take one’s risks.” “You just bet I would,” said Donald. “Motoring is one of the greatestpleasures of modern life. I’ll wager it makes some of the gay old boys,like Marcus Aurelius for example, want to turn over in their graveswhen they see us flying along the roads of California the way we do.” “What I was getting at,” said Linda, “was a word of reply to theremainder of your indictment against me. Dad’s income stopped with him,and household expenses went on, and war came, so there isn’t enoughmoney to dress two of us as most of the High-School girls are dressed.Eileen is so much older that it’s her turn first, and I must say sheis not at all backward about exercising her rights. I think that willhave to suffice for the question of dress; but you may be sure that Iam capable of wearing the loveliest dress imaginable, that would besuitable for a school girl, if I had it to wear.” “Ah, there’s the little ‘fly in your ointment’—‘dress that would besuitable.’ I bet in your heart you think the dresses that half thegirls in high school are wearing are not suitable!” “Commendable perspicacity, O learned senior,” said Linda, “andamazingly true. In the few short years I had with Daddy I acquireda fixed idea as to what kind of dress is suitable and sufficientlydurable to wear while walking my daily two miles. I can’t seem tobecome reconciled to the custom of dressing the same for school as fora party. You get my idea?” “I get it all right enough,” said Donald, “but I must think awhilebefore I decide whether I agree with you. Why should you be right, andhundreds of other girls be wrong?” “I’ll wager your mother would agree with me,” suggested Linda. “Did yours?” asked Donald. “Half way,” answered Linda. “She agreed with me for me, but not forEileen.” “And not for my sister,” said Donald. “She wears the very foxiestclothes that Father can afford to pay for, and when she was going toschool she wore them without the least regard as to whether she wasgoing to school or to a tea party or a matinée. For that matter shefrequently went to all three the same day.” “And that brings us straight to the point concerning you,” said Linda. “Sure enough!” said Donald. “There is me to be considered! What is ityou have against me?” Linda looked at him meditatively. “You seemexceptionally strong,” she said. “No doubt are good inathletics. Your head looks all right; it indicates brains. What I wantto know is why in the world you don’t use them.” “What are you getting at, anyway?” asked Donald, with more than a hintof asperity in his voice. “I am getting at the fact,” said Linda, “that a boy as big as you andas strong as you and with as good brain and your opportunities hasallowed a little brown Jap to cross the Pacific Ocean and in a totallystrange country to learn a language foreign to him, and, and, with thesame books and the same chances, to beat you at your own game. Youand every other boy in your classes ought to thoroughly ashamed ofyourselves. Before I would let a Jap, either boy or girl, lead in myclass, I would give up going to school and go out and see if I couldbeat him growing lettuce and spinach.” “It’s all very well to talk,” said Donald hotly. “And it’s better to make good what you say,” broke in Linda, with equalheat. “There are half a dozen Japs in my classes but no one of them isleading, you will notice, if I do wear peculiar shoes.” “Well, you would be going some if you beat the leading Jap in thesenior class,” said Donald. “Then I would go some,” said Linda. “I’d beat him, or I’d go straightup trying. You could do it if you’d make up your mind to. The troublewith you is that you’re wasting your brain on speeding an automobile,on dances, and all sorts of foolishness that is not doing you anygood in any particular way. Bet you are developing nerves smokingcigarettes. You are not concentrating. Oka Sayye is not thinking of athing except the triumph of proving to California that he is head manin one of the Los Angeles high schools. That’s what I have got againstyou, and every other white boy in your class, and in the long run itstacks up bigger than your arraignment of my shoes.” “Oh, darn your shoes!” cried Donald hotly. “Forget ’em! I’ve got tomove on or I’ll be late for trigonometry, but I don’t know when I’vehad such a tidy little fight with a girl, and I don’t enjoy feelingthat I have been worsted. I propose another session. May I come out toLilac Valley Saturday afternoon and flay you alive to pay up for mypresent humiliation?” “Why, if your mother happened to be motoring that way and would care tocall, I think that would be fine,” said Linda. “Well, for the Lord’s sake!” exclaimed the irate senior. “Can’t afellow come and fight with you without being refereed by his mother?Shall I bring Father too?” “I only thought,” said Linda quietly, “that you would like your motherto see the home and environment of any girl whose acquaintance youmade, but the fight we have coming will in all probability be such apitched battle that when I go over the top, you won’t ever care tofollow me and start another issue on the other side. You’re dying rightnow to ask why I wear my hair in braids down my back instead of incootie coops over my ears.” “I don’t give a hang,” said Donald ungallantly, “as to how you wearyour hair, but I am coming Saturday to fight, and I don’t think Motherwill take any greater interest in the matter than to know that I amgoing to do battle with a daughter of Doctor Strong.” “That is a very nice compliment to my daddy, thank you, said Linda,turning away and proceeding in the direction of her own classrooms.There was a brilliant sparkle in her eyes and she sang in a muffledvoice, yet distinctly enough to be heard: “By gracious! She’s no fool,” he said to himself. In three minutes’unpremeditated talk the “Junior Freak,” as he mentally denominated her,had managed to irritate him, to puncture his pride, to entertain andamuse him. “I wonder——” he said as he went his way; and all day he kept onwondering, when he was not studying harder than ever before in all hislife. That night Linda walked slowly along the road toward home. She wasnot seeing the broad stretch of Lilac Valley, on every hand greenwith spring, odorous with citrus and wild bloom, blue walled withlacy lilacs veiling the mountain face on either side; and she was notthinking of her plain, well-worn dress or her common-sense shoes. Whatshe was thinking was of every flaying, scathing, solidly based argumentshe could produce the following Saturday to spur Donald Whiting in someway to surpass Oka Sayye. His chance remark that morning, as they stoodnear each other waiting a few minutes in the hall, had ended in hisasking to come to see her, and she decided as she walked homeward thathis first visit in all probability would be his last, since she hadnot time to spare for boys, when she had so many different interestsinvolved; but she did decide very firmly in her own mind that the wouldmake that visit a memorable one for him. In arriving at this decision her mind traveled a number of deviousroads. The thought that she had been criticized did not annoy her asto the kind of criticism, but she did resent the quality of truthabout it. She was right in following the rules her father had laiddown for her health and physical well-being, but was it right thatshe should wear shoes scuffed, resoled, and even patched, when therewas money enough for Eileen to have many pairs of expensive lacedboots, walking shoes, and fancy slippers? She was sure she was rightin wearing dresses suitable for school, but was it right that she mustwear them until they were sun-faded, stained, and disreputable? Wasit right that Eileen should occupy their father’s and mother’s suite,redecorated and daintily furnished according to her own taste, to keepthe parts of the house that she cared to use decorated with flowers andbeautifully appointed, while Linda must lock herself in a small stuffybedroom room, dingy and none too comfortable, when in deference to herpride she wished to work in secret until she learned whether she couldsucceed. Then she began thinking, and decided that the only available place inthe house for her use was the billiard room. She made up her mind thatshe would demand the sole right to this big attic room. She would sellthe table and use the money to buy herself a suitable work table anda rug. She would demand that Eileen produce enough money for betterclothing for her, and then she remembered what she had said to DonaldWhiting about conquering her horror for a motor car. Linda turned inat the walk leading to her home, but she passed the front entranceand followed around to the side. As she went she could hear voices inthe living room and she knew that Eileen was entertaining some of hermany friends; for Eileen was that peculiar creature known as a socialbutterfly. Each day of her life friends came, or Eileen went—mostly thelatter, for Eileen had a knack of management and she so managed herfriends that, without their realizing it, they entertained her manytimes while she entertained them once. Linda went to the kitchen, laidher books and package of mail on the table, and, walking over to thestove, she proceeded deliberately and heartily to kiss the cook. “Katy, me darlin’,” she said, “look upon your only child. Do you noticea ‘lean and hungry look’ on her classic features?” Katy turned adoring eyes to the young girl. “It’s growing so fast ye are, childie,” she said. “It’s only a littlewhile to dinner, and there’s company to-night, so hadn’t ye better waitand not spoil your appetite with piecing?” “Is there going to be anything ‘jarvis’?” inquired Linda. “I’d say there is,” said Katy. “John Gilman is here and two friends ofEileen’s. It’s a near banquet, lassie.” “Then I’ll wait,” said Linda. “I want the keys to the garage.” Katy handed them to her and Linda went down the back walk beneath anarch of tropical foliage, between blazing walls of brilliant flowerfaces, unlocked the garage, and stood looking at her father’s runabout. In the revolution that had taken place in their home after the passingof their father and mother, Eileen had dominated the situation and doneas she pleased, with the exception of two instances. Linda had shownboth temper and determination at the proposal to dismantle the libraryand dispose of the cars. She had told Eileen that she might take thetouring car and do as she pleased with it. For her share she wanted herfather’s roadster, and she meant to have it. She took the same firmstand concerning the library. With the rest of the house Eileen mightdo as she would. The library was to remain absolutely untouched andwhat it contained was Linda’s. To this Eileen had agreed, but so farLinda had been content merely to possess her property. Lately, driven by the feeling that she must find a way in which shecould earn money, she had been secretly working on some plans that shehoped might soon yield her small returns. As for the roadster, she aswell as Eileen had been horror-stricken when the car containing theirfather and mother and their adjoining neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Thorne,driven by Marian Thorne, the playmate and companion from childhoodof the Strong girls, had become uncontrollable and plunged down themountain in a disaster that had left only Marian, protected by thesteering gear, alive. They had simply by mutual agreement begun usingthe street cars when they wanted to reach the city. Linda stood looking at the roadster, jacked up and tucked under a heavycanvas tent that she and her father had used on their hunting andfishing trips. After a long time she laid strong hands on the canvasand dragged it to one side. She looked the car over carefully and then,her face very white and her hands trembling, she climbed into it andslowly and mechanically went through the motions of starting it. Foranother intent period she sat with her hands on the steering gear,staring straight ahead, and then she said slowly: “Something has gotto be done. It’s not going to be very agreeable, but I am going to doit. Eileen has had things all her own way long enough. I am gettingsuch a big girl I ought to have a few things in my life as I want them.Something must be done.” Then Linda proceeded to do something. What she did was to lean forward,rest her head upon the steering wheel and fight to keep down deep,pitiful sobbing until her whole slender body twisted in the effort. She was yielding to a breaking up after four years of endurance, forthe greater part in silence. As the months of the past year had rolledtheir deliberate way, Linda had begun to realize that the course herelder sister had taken was wholly unfair to her, and slowly a tumultof revolt was growing in her soul. Without a doubt the culminationhad resulted from her few minutes’ talk with Donald Whiting in thehall that morning. It had started Linda to thinking deeply, and themore deeply she thought the clearly she saw the situation. Linda was aloyal soul and her heart was honest. She was quite willing that Eileenshould exercise her rights as head of the family, that she should takethe precedence to which she was entitled by her four years’ seniority,that she should spend the money which accrued monthly from theirfather’s estate as she saw fit, up to a certain point. That point waswhere things ceased to be fair or to be just. If there had been moneyto do no more for Eileen than had been done for Linda, it would nothave been in Linda’s heart to utter a complaint. She could have wornscuffed shoes and old dresses, and gone her way with her proud younghead held very high and a jest on her lips; but when her mind reallyfastened on the problem and she began to reason, she could not feelthat Eileen was just to her or that she was fair in her administrationof the money which should have been divided more nearly equally betweenthem, after the household expenses had been paid. Once rebellion burnedin her heart the flames leaped rapidly, and Linda began to remember athousand small things that she had scarcely noted at the time of theiroccurrence. She was leaning on the steering wheel, tired with nerve strain, whenshe heard Katy calling her, and realized that she was needed in thekitchen. As a matter of economy Eileen, after her parents’ passing, haddismissed the housemaid, and when there were guests before whom shewished to make a nice appearance Linda had been impressed either towait on the table or to help in the kitchen in order that Katy mightattend the dining room, so Linda understood what was wanted when Katycalled her. She ran her fingers over the steering wheel, worn brightby the touch of her father’s and her own hands, and with the buoyancyof youth, found comfort. Once more she mechanically went through themotions of starting the car, then she stepped down, closed the door,and stood an instant thinking. “You’re four years behind the times,” she said slowly. “No doubtthere’s a newer and a better model; I suspect the tires are rotten,but the last day I drove you for Daddy you purred like a kitten, andran like a clock, and if you were cleaned and oiled and put in propershape, there’s no reason in the world why I should not drive you again,as I have driven you hundreds of miles when Daddy was tired or whenhe wanted to teach me the rules of good motoring, and the laws of theroad. I can do it all right. I have got to do it, but it will be sometime before I’ll care to tackle the mountains.” Leaving the cover on the floor, she locked the door and returned to thekitchen. “All right, Katy, what is the programme?” she inquired as lightly asshe could. Katy had been cook in the Strong family ever since they had moved toLilac Valley. She had obeyed Mrs. Strong and Eileen. She had worshipedthe Doctor and Linda. It always had been patent to her eyes that Mrs.Strong was extremely partial to Eileen, so Katy had joined forces withthe Doctor in surreptitiously doing everything her warm Irish heartprompted to prevent Linda from feeling neglected. Her quick eyes sawthe traces of tears on Linda’s face, and she instantly knew that thetrip the girl had made to the garage was in some way connected withsome belongings of her father’s, so she said: “I am serving to-nightbut I want you to keep things smoking hot and to have them dished upready for me so that everything will go smoothly.” “What would happen,” inquired Linda, “if everything did notgosmoothly? Katy, do you think the roof would blow straight up if I hadmyway about something, just for a change?” “No, I think the roof would stay right where it belongs,” said Katywith a chuckle, “but I do think its staying there would not be becauseMiss Eileen wanted it to.” “Well,” said Linda, deliberately, “we won’t waste any time on thinkingWe are going to have some positive knowledge on the subject prettyimmediately. I don’t feel equal to starting any domestic santanato-day, but the forces are gathering and the blow is coming soon. Tothat I have firmly made up my mind.” “It’s not the least mite I’m blaming you, honey,” said Katy. “Ye’ve got to be such a big girl that it’s only fair things in thishouse should go a good deal different.” “Is Marian to be here?” asked Linda as she stood beside the stovepeering into pans and kettles. “Miss Eileen didn’t say,” replied Katy. Linda’s eyes reddened suddenly. She slammed down a lid with viciousemphasis. “That is another deal Eileen’s engineered,” she said, “that is justabout as wrong as anything possibly can be. What makes me the maddestabout it is that John Gilman will let Eileen take him by the nose andlead him around like a ringed calf. Where is his common sense? Where ishis perception? Where is his honour?” “Now wait, dearie,” said Katy soothingly, “wait. John Gilman is amighty fine man. Ye know how your father loved him and trusted him andgave him charge of all his business affairs. Ye mustn’t go so far as tobe insinuating that he is lacking in honour.” “No,” said Linda, “that was not fair. I don’t in the least know that heever askedMarian to marry him; but I do know that as long as hewas a struggling, threadbare young lawyer Marian was welcome to him,and they had grand times together. The minute he won the big Baileysuit and came into public notice and his practice increased until hewas independent, that minute Eileen began to take notice, and it looksto me now as if she very nearly had him.” “And so far as I can see,” said Katy, “Miss Marian is taking it withouta struggle. She is not lifting a finger or making a move to win himback.” “Of course she isn’t!” said Linda indignantly. “If she thought hepreferred some other girl to her, she would merely say: ‘If John hasdiscovered that he likes Eileen the better, why, that is all right’;but there wouldn’t be anything to prevent seeing Eileen take John fromhurting like the deuce. Did you ever lose a man you loved, Katy?” “That I did not!” said Katy emphatically. “We didn’t do any four orfive years’ philanderin’ to see if a man ‘could make good’ when I was ayoungster. When a girl and her laddie stood up to each other and lookedeach other straight in the eye and had the great understanding, thereweren’t no question of whether he could do for her what her father andmither had been doing, nor of how much he had to earn before they wouldbe able to begin life together. They just caught hands and hot-footedit to the praste and told him to read the banns the next Sunday, andwhen the law allowed they was man and wife and taking what life had forthem the way it came, and together. All this philanderin’ that youngfolks do nowadays is just pure nonsense, and waste of time.” “Sure!” laughed Linda. “When my brave comes along with his blanket I’lljust step under, and then if anybody tries to take my man I’ll have theright to go on the warpath and have a scalping party that would be somesatisfaction to the soul.” Then they served the dinner, and when the guests had left the diningroom, Katy closed the doors, and brought on the delicacies she hadhidden for Linda and patted and cajoled her while she ate like anyhealthy, hungry young creature. “‘Ave, atque vale!’ Cotyledon!” Linda slid down the side of the canyon with the deftness of the expert.At the first available crevice she thrust in her Alpine stick, andbracing herself, gained a footing. Then she turned and by use of herfingers and toes worked her way back to the plant, she had passed. Shewas familiar with many members of the family, but such a fine specimenshe seldom had found and she could not recall having seen it in allof her botanies. Opposite the plant she worked out a footing, droveher stick deep at the base of a rock to brace herself, and from theknapsack on her back took a sketch-book and pencil and began rapidlycopying the thick fleshy leaves of the flattened rosette, sittingsecurely at the edge of a rock. She worked swiftly and with breathlessinterest. When she had finished the flower she began sketching in themoss-covered face of the boulder against which it grew, and other bitsof vegetation near. “I think, Coty,” she said, “it is very probable that I can corner a fewsimoleons with you. You are becoming better looking every minute.” For a touch of colour she margined one side of her drawing with alittle spray of Pentstemon whose bright tubular flowers the canyon knewas “humming-bird’s dinner horn.” That gave her the idea of introducinga touch of living interest, so bearing down upon the flowers fromthe upper right-hand corner of her drawing she deftly sketched in aruby-throated humming bird, and across the bottom of the sheet the laceof a few leaves of fern. Then she returned the drawing and pencil toher knapsack, and making sure of her footing, worked her way forward.With her long slender fingers she began teasing the plant loose fromthe rock and the surrounding soil. The roots penetrated deeper than shehad supposed and in her interest she forgot her precarious footing andpulled hard. The plant gave way unexpectedly, and losing her balance,Linda plunged down the side of the canyon catching wildly at shrubs andbushes and bruising herself severely on stones, finally landing in asitting posture on the road that traversed the canyon. She was not seriously hurt, but she did not present a picturesquefigure as she sprawled in the road, her booted feet thrust straightbefore her, one of her long black braids caught on a bush at her back,her blouse pulled above her breeches, the contents of her knapsackdecorating the canyon side and the road around her; but high in onehand, without break or blemish, she triumphantly held aloft the rareCotyledon. She shrugged her shoulders, wiggled her toes, and moved herarms to assure herself that no bones were broken; then she glanced ather drawings and the fruits of her day’s collecting scattered on theroadside around her. She was in the act of rising when a motor carcontaining two young men shot around a curve of the canyon, swerved toavoid running over her, and stopped as abruptly as possible. “It’s a girl!” cried the driver, and both men sprang to the roadand hurried to Linda’s assistance. Her dark cheeks were red withmortification, but she managed to recover her feet and tuck in herblouse before they reached her. “We heard you coming down,” said the elder of the young men, “and wethought you might be a bear. Are you sure you’re not hurt?” Linda stood before them, a lithe slender figure, vivid with youth andvitality. “I am able to stand,” she said, “so of course I haven’t broken anybones. I think I am fairly well battered, but you will please toobserve that there isn’t a scratch on Cotyledon, and I brought herdown—at least I think it’s she—from the edge of that boulder away upthere. Isn’t she a beauty? Only notice the delicate frosty ‘bloom’ onher leaves!” “I should prefer,” said the younger of the men, “to know whether youhave any broken bones.” “I’m sure I am all right,” answered Linda. “I have falling downmountains reduced to an exact science. I’ll bet you couldn’t slide thatfar and bring down Coty without a scratch.” “Well, which is the more precious,” said the young man. “Yourself orthe specimen?” “Why, the specimen!” answered Linda, in impatience. “California is fullof girls; but this is the finest Cotyledon of this family I have everseen. Don’t mistake this for any common stonecrop. It looks to me likean Echeveria. I know what I mean to do with the picture I have made ofher, and I know exactly where she is going to grow from this day on.” “Is there any way we can help you?” inquired the elder of the two men. For the first time Linda glanced at him, and her impression was that hewas decidedly attractive. “No, thank you!” she answered briskly. “I am going to climb back up tothe boulder and collect the belongings I spilled on the way down. ThenI am going to carry Coty to the car line in a kind of triumphal march,because she is the rarest find that I have ever made. I hope you haveno dark designs on Coty, because this is ‘what the owner had to do toredeem her.’” Linda indicated her trail down the canyon side, brushed soil and twigsfrom her trousers, turned her straight young back, carefully set downher specimen, and by the aid of her recovered stick began expertlymaking her way up the canyon side. “Here, let me do that,” offered theyounger man. “You rest until I collect your belongings.” Linda glancedback over her shoulder. “Thanks,” she said. “I have a mental inventoryof all the pencils and knives and trowels I must find. You mightoverlook the most important part of my paraphernalia; and really I amnot damaged. I’m merely hurt. Good-bye!” Linda started back up the side of the canyon, leaving the young mento enter their car and drive away. For a minute both of them stoodwatching her. “What will girls be wearing and doing next?” asked the elder of the twoas he started his car. “What would you have a girl wear when she is occupied with coastingdown canyons?” said his friend. “And as for what she is doing, it’sprobable that every high-school girl in Los Angeles has a botanicalcollection to make before she graduates.” “I see!” said the man driving. “She is only a high-school kid, but didyou notice that she is going to make an extremely attractive youngwoman?” “Yes, I noticed just that; I noticed it very particularly,” answeredthe younger man. “And I noticed also that she either doesn’t know it,or doesn’t give a flip.” Linda collected her belongings, straightened her hair and clothing,and, with her knapsack in place, and leaning rather on heavily on herwalking stick, made her way down the road to the abutment of a smallrustic bridge where she stopped to rest. The stream at her feet wasnoisy and icy cold. It rushed through narrow defiles in the rock,beat itself to foam against the faces a of the big stones, fell overjutting cliffs, spread in whispering pools, wound back and forthacross the road at its will, singing every foot of its downward wayand watering beds of crisp, cool miners’ lettuce, great ferns, andheliotrope, climbing clematis, soil and blue-eyed grass. All alongits length grew willows, and in a few places white-bodied sycamores.Everywhere over the walls above it that vegetation could find a footinggrew mosses, vines, flowers, and shrubs. On the shadiest side homedmost of the ferns and the Cotyledon. In the sun, larkspur, lupin, andmonkey flower; everywhere wild rose, holly, mahogany, gooseberry, andbayoneted yucca all intermingling in a curtain of variegated greens,brocaded with flower arabesques of vivid red, white, yellow, and blue.Canyon wrens and vireos sang as they nested. The air was clear, cool,and salty from the near-by sea. Myriad leaf shadows danced on the blackroadbed, level as a barn floor, and across it trailed the waveringimage of hawk and vulture, gull and white sea swallow. Linda studiedthe canyon with intent eyes, but bruised flesh pleaded, so reluctantlyshe arose, shouldered her belongings, and slowly followed the roadout to the car line that passed through Lilac Valley, still carefullybearing in triumph the precious Cotyledon. An hour later she enteredthe driveway of her home. She stopped to set her plant carefully in thewild garden she and her father had worked all her life at collecting,then followed the back porch and kitchen route. “Whatever have ye been doing to yourself, honey?” cried Katy. “I came a cropper down Multiflores Canyon where it is so steepthat it leans the other way. I pretty well pulverized myself for apulverulenta, Katy, which is a poor joke.” “Now ain’t that just my luck!” wailed Katy, snatching a cake cutter andbeginning hurriedly to stamp out little cakes from the dough before her. “Well, I don’t understand in exactly what way,” said Linda, absentlyrubbing her elbows and her knees. “Seems to me it’s my promontoriesthat have been knocked off, not yours, Katy.” “Yes, and ain’t it just like ye,” said Katy, “to be coming in late,and all banged up when Miss Eileen has got sudden notice that there isgoing to be company again and I have an especial dinner to serve, andnever in the world can I manage if ye don’t help me!” “Why, who is coming now?” asked Linda, seating herself on the nearestchair and beginning to unfasten her boots slowly. “Well, first of all, there is Mr. Gilman, of course.” “‘Of course,’” conceded Linda. “If he tried to get past our house,Eileen is perfectly capable of setting it on fire to stop him. She’sgot him ‘vamped’ properly.” “Oh I don’t know that ye should say just that,” said Katy “Eileen is amighty pretty girl, and she is somemanager.” “You can stake your hilarious life she is,” said Linda, viciouslykicking a boot to the center of the kitchen. “She can manage to go downtown for lunch and be invited out to dinner thirteen times a week, andleave us at home to eat bread and milk, bread heavily stressed. Shecan manage to get every cent of the income from the property in herfingers, and a great big girl like me has to go to high school lookingso tacky that even the boys are beginning to comment on it. Manage?I’ll say she can manage, not to mention managing to snake John Gilmanright out of Marian’s fingers. I doubt if Marian fully realizes yetthat she’s lost her man; and I happen to know that she just plain lovedJohn!” The second boot landed beside the first, then Linda picked them both upand started toward the back hall. “Honey, are ye too bad hurt to help me any?” asked Katy, as she passedher. “Of course not,” said Linda. “Give me a few minutes to take a bath andstep into my clothes and then I’ll be on the job.” With a black scowl on her face, Linda climbed the dingy back stairwayin her stocking-feet. At the head of the stairs she paused one minute,glanced at the gloom of her end of the house, then she turned andwalked to the front of the hall where there were potted ferns, daintywhite curtains, and bright rugs. The door of the guest room stood openand she could see that it was filled with fresh flowers and ready foroccupancy. The door of her sister’s room was slightly ajar and shepushed it open and stood looking inside. In her state of disarrayshe made a shocking contrast to the flower-like figure busy before adressing table. Linda was dark, narrow, rawboned, overgrown in height,and forthright of disposition. Eileen was a tiny woman, delicatelymoulded, exquisitely coloured, and one of the most perfectly successfultendrils from the original clinging vine in her intercourse with men,and with such women as would tolerate the clinging-vine idea in thepresent forthright days. With a strand of softly curled hair in onehand and a fancy pin in the other, Eileen turned a disapproving lookupon her sister. “What’s the great idea?” demanded Linda shortly. “Oh, it’s perfectly splendid,” answered Eileen. “John Gilman’s bestfriend is motoring around here looking for a location to build a home.He is an author and young and good looking and not married, and hethinks he would like to settle somewhere near Los Angeles. Of courseJohn would love to have him in Lilac Valley because he hopes to builda home here some day for himself. His name is Peter Morrison and Johnsays that his articles and stories have horse sense, logic, and humor,and he is making a lot of money.” “Then God help John Gilman, if he thinks now that he is in love withyou,” said Linda dryly. Eileen arched her eyebrows, thinned to a hair line, and her lips drewtogether in disapproval. “What I can’t understand,” she said, “is how you can be so unspeakablyvulgar, Linda.” Linda laughed sharply. “And this Peter Morrison and John are our guests for dinner?” “Yes,” said Eileen. “I am going to show them this valley inside andout. I’m so glad it’s spring. We’re at our very best. It would beperfectly wonderful to have an author for a neighbor, and he must begoing to build a real house, because he has his architect with him;and John says that while he is young, he has done several awfully goodhouses. He has seen a couple of them in San Francisco.” Linda shrugged her shoulders. “Up the flue goes Marian’s chance of drawing the plans for JohnGilman’s house,” she said. “I have heard him say a dozen times he wouldnot build a house unless Marian made the plans.” Eileen deftly placed the strand of hair and set the jewelled pin withprecision. “Just possibly things have changed slightly,” she suggested. “Yes,” said Linda, “I observe that they have. Marian has sold the homeshe adored. She is leaving friends she loved and trusted, and who wereparticularly bound to her by a common grief, without realizing exactlyhow it is happening. She certainly must know that you have taken herlover, and I have not a doubt but that is the reason she has discoveredshe can no longer work at home, that she must sell her property andspend the money cooped up in a city, to study her profession further.” “Linda,” said Eileen, her face pale with anger, “you are positivelyinsufferable. Will you leave my room and close the door after you?” “Well, Katy has just informed me,” said Linda, “that this dinner partydoesn’t come off without my valued assistance, and before I agree toassist, I’ll know onething. Are you proposing to entertainthese three men yourself, or have you asked Marian?” Eileen indicated an open note lying on her dressing table. “I did not know they were coming until an hour ago,” she said.“Ibarely had time to fill the vases and dust, and then I ran upto dress so that there would be someone presentable when they arrive.” “All right then, we’ll agree that this is a surprise party, but if JohnGilman has told you so much about them, you must have been expectingthem, and in a measure prepared for them at any time. Haven’t youtalked it over with Marian, and told her that you would want her whenthey came?” Eileen was extremely busy with another wave of hair. She turned herback and her voice was not quite steady as she answered. “Ever sinceMarian got this ‘going to the city to study’ idea in her head I havescarcely seen her. She had an awful job to empty the house, and packsuch things as she wants to keep, and she is working overtime on a veryspecial plan that she thinks maybe she’ll submit in a prize competitionoffered by a big firm of San Francisco architects, so I have scarcelyseen her for six weeks.” “And you never once went over to help her with her work, or toencourage her or to comfort her? You can’t think Marian can leave thisvalley and not be almost heartbroken,” said Linda. “You just make mealmost wonder at you. When you think of the kind of friends that MarianThorne’s father and mother, and our father and mother were, and how wechildren were reared together, and the good times we have had in thesetwo houses—and then the awful day when the car went over the cliff, andhow Marian clung to us and tried to comfort us, when her own heart wasbroken—and Marian’s the same Marian she has always been, only nicerevery day—how you can sit there and say you have scarcely seen her insix of the hardest weeks of her life, certainly surprises me. I’ll tellyou this: I told Katy I would help her, but I won’t do it if you don’tgo over and make Marian come to-night.” Eileen turned to her sister and looked at her keenly. Linda’s brow wassullen, and her jaw set. “A bed would look mighty good to me and I will go and get into minethis minute if you don’t say you will go and ask her, in such a waythat she comes,” she threatened. Eileen hesitated a second and then said: “All right, since you makesuch a point of it I will ask her.” “Very well,” said Linda. “Then I’ll help Katy the very best I can.” In less than an hour, Linda was in the kitchen, dressed in an old greenskirt and an orange blouse. Katy pinned one of her aprons on the girland told her that her first job was to set the table. “And Miss Eileen has given most particular orders that I use the verybest of everything. Lay the table for four, and you are to be extremelycareful in serving not to spill the soup.” Linda stood very quietly for a second, her heavy black brows drawntogether in deep thought. “When did Eileen issue these instructions?” she inquired. “Not five minutes ago,” said Katy. “She just left me kitchen and I’llsay I never saw her lookin’ such a parfect picture. That new dress ofhers is the most becoming one she has ever had.” Almost unconsciously, Linda’s hand reached to the front of herwell-worn blouse, and she glanced downward at her skirt and shoes. “Um-hm,” she said meditatively, “another new dress for Eileen, whichmeans that I will get nothing until next month’s allowance comes in,if I do then. The table set for four, which, interpreted, signifiesthat she has asked Marian in such a way that Marian won’t come. And thecaution as to care with the soup means that I am to serve my father’stable like a paid waitress. Katy, I have run for over three years onEileen’s schedule, but this past year I am beginning to use my brainsand I am reaching the place of self-assertion. That programme won’t do,Katy. It’s got to be completely revised. You just watch me and see howI follow those instructions.” Then Linda marched out of the kitchen door and started across the lawnin the direction of a big brown house dimly outlined through widelyspreading branches of ancient live oaks, palm, and bamboo thickets.She entered the house without knocking and in the hall uttered a lowpenetrating whistle. It was instantly answered from upstairs. Lindabegan climbing, and met Marian at the top. “Why, Marian,” she cried, “I had no idea you were so far along. Thehouse is actually empty.” “Practically everything went yesterday,” answered Marian. “Those thingsof Father’s and Mother’s and my own that I wish to keep I have put instorage, and the remainder went to James’s Auction Rooms. The house issold, and I am leaving in the morning.” “Then that explains,” questioned Linda, “why you refused Eileen’sinvitation to dinner to-night?” “On the contrary,” answered Marian, “an invitation to dinner to-nightwould be particularly and peculiarly acceptable to me, since thekitchen is barren as the remainder of the house, and I was intending toslip over when your room was lighted to ask if I might spend the nightwith you.” Linda suddenly gathered her friend in her arms and held her tight. “Well, thank heaven that you felt sufficiently sure of me to come to mewhen you needed me. Of course you shall spend the night with me; and Imust have been mistaken in thinking Eileen had been here. She probablywill come any minute. There are guests for the night. John is bringingthat writer friend of his. Of course you know about him. It’s PeterMorrison.” Marian nodded her head. “Of course! John has always talked of him. Hehad some extremely clever articles in The Postlately.” “Well, he is one,” said Linda, “and an architect who is touring withhim is two; they are looking for a location to build a house for thewriter. You can see that it would be a particularly attractive featherin our cap if he would endorse our valley sufficiently to home in it.So Eileen has invited them to sample our brand of entertainment, and inthe morning no doubt she will be delighted to accompany them and showthem all the beautiful spots not yet preëmpted.” “Oh, heavens,” cried Marian, “I’m glad I never showed her my spot!” “Well, if you are particular about wanting a certain place I sincerelyhope you did not,” said Linda. “I am sure I never did,” answered Marian. “I so love one spot that Ihave been most secretive about it. I am certain I never went furtherthan to say there was a place on which I would love to build for myselfthe house of my dreams. I have just about finished getting that homeon paper, and I truly have high hopes that I may stand at least a fairchance of winning with it the prize Nicholson and Snow are offering.That is one of the reasons why I am hurrying on my way to San Franciscomuch sooner than I had expected to go. I haven’t a suitable dinnerdress because my trunks have gone, but among such old friends it won’tmatter. I have one fussy blouse in my bag, and I’ll be over as soon asI can see to closing up the house and dressing.” Linda hurried home, and going to the dining room, she laid the tablefor six in a deft and artistic manner. She filled a basket withbeautiful flowers of her own growing for a centerpiece, and carefullyfollowed Eileen’s instruction to use the best of everything. When shehad finished she went to the kitchen. “Katy,” she said, “take a look at my handiwork.” “It’s just lovely,” said Katy heartily. “I quite agree with you,” answered Linda, “and now in pursuance of arecently arrived at decision, I have resigned, vamoosed, quit, deadstopped being waitress for Eileen. I was seventeen my last birthday.Hereafter when there are guests I sit at my father’s table, and youwill have to do the best you can with serving, Katy.” “And it’s just exactly right ye are,” said Katy. “I’ll do my best, andif that’s not good enough, Miss Eileen knows what she can do.” “Now listen to you,” laughed Linda. “Katy, you couldn’t be driven toleave me, by anything on this earth that Eileen could do; you know youcouldn’t.” Katy chuckled quietly. “Sure, I wouldn’t be leaving ye, lambie,” shesaid. “We’ll get everything ready, and I can serve six as nicely as anyone. But you’re not forgetting that Miss Eileen said most explicit tolay the table for four?’ “I am not forgetting,” said Linda. “For Eileen’s sake I am I sorry tosay that her ship is on the shoals. She is not going to have clearsailing with little sister Linda any longer. This is the year ofwoman’s rights, you know, Katy, and I am beginning to realize thatmy rights have been badly infringed upon for lo these many years. IfEileen chooses to make a scene before guests, that is strictly up toEileen. Now what is it you want me to do?” Katy directed and Linda worked swiftly. Soon they heard a motor stop,and laughing voices told them that the guests had arrived. “Now I wonder,” said Linda, “whether Marian is here yet.” At that minute Marian appeared at the kitchen door. “Linda,” she said breathlessly, “I am feeling queer about this. Eileenhasn’t been over.” “Oh, that’s all right,” said Linda casually. “The folks have come, andshe was only waiting to make them a bit at home before she ran afteryou.” Marian hesitated. “She was not allowing me much time to dress.” “That’s ’cause she knew you did not need it,” retorted Linda. “The moreyou fuss up, the less handsome you are, and you never owned anything inyour life so becoming as that old red blouse. So farewell, Katy, we’redue to burst into high society to-night. We’re going to help Eileenvamp a lawyer, and an author, and an architect, one apiece. Which doyou prefer, Marian?” “I’ll take the architect,” said Marian. “We should have something incommon since I am going to be a great architect myself one of thesedays.” “Why, that is too bad,” said Linda. “I’ll have to rearrange the tableif you insist, because I took him, and left you the author, and it wasfor love of you I did it. I truly wanted him myself, all the time.” They stopped in the dining room and Marian praised Linda’s work inlaying the table; and then, together they entered the living room. At the moment of their entrance, Eileen was talking animatedly aboutthe beauties of the valley as a location for a happy home. When she sawthe two girls she paused, the colour swiftly faded from her face, andLinda, who was watching to see what would happen, noticed the effortshe made at self-control, but she was very sure that their guests didnot. It never occurred to Linda that anyone would consider good looks inconnection with her overgrown, rawboned frame and lean face, butshe was accustomed to seeing people admire Marian, for Marian was aperfectly modelled woman with peach-bloom cheeks, deep, dark eyes, herface framed in a waving mass of hair whose whiteness dated from the daythat the brakes of her car failed and she plunged down the mountainwith her father beside her, and her mother and Doctor and Mrs. Strongin the back seat. Ten days afterward Marian’s head of beautiful darkhair was muslin white. Now it framed a face of youth and beauty withpeculiar pathos. “Striking” was perhaps the one adjective which wouldbest describe her. John Gilman came hastily to greet them. Linda, after a swift glanceat Eileen, turned astonished eyes on their guests. For one secondshe looked at the elder of them, then at the younger. There was norecognition in her eyes, and there was a decided negative in a swiftmovement of her head. Both men understood that she did not wish them tomention that they ever had seen her previously. For an instant therewas a strained situation. Eileen was white with anger. John Gilman waslooking straight at Marian, and in his soul he must have wondered ifhe had been wise in neglecting her for Eileen. Peter Morrison and hisarchitect, Henry Anderson, had two things to think about. One was thestunning beauty of Marian Thorne as she paused in the doorway, thelight misting her white hair and deepening the tints of her red waist.The other was why the young girl facing them had forbidden them toreveal that two hours before they had seen her in the canyon. Katy,the efficient life-saver of the Strong family, announced dinner, andLinda drew back the curtains and led the way to the dining room, sayingwhen they had arrived: “I didn’t have time in my hour’s notice to makeelaborate place cards as I should have liked to do, so these little pensketches will have to serve.” To cover his embarrassment and to satisfy his legal mind, John Gilmanturned to Linda, asking: “Why ‘an hour’? I told Eileen a week ago I wasexpecting the boys to-day.” “But that does not prove that Eileen mentioned it to me,” answeredLinda quietly; “so you must find your places from the cards I couldprepare in a hurry.” This same preparation of cards at the round table placed Eileen betweenthe architect and the author, Marian between the author and JohnGilman, and Linda between Gilman and the architect, which added onemore tiny gale to the storm of fury that was raging in the breast ofwhite-faced Eileen. The situation was so strained that without fullyunderstanding it, Marian, who was several years older than either ofthe Strong sisters, knew that although she was tired to the point ofexhaustion she should muster what reserve force she could to the endof making the dinner party particularly attractive, because she wasdeeply interested in drawing to the valley every suitable home seekerit was possible to locate there. It was the unwritten law of the valleythat whenever a home seeker passed through, every soul who belongedexerted the strongest influence to prove that the stars hung lower andshone bigger and in bluer heavens than anywhere else on earth; thatnowhere could be found air to equal the energizing salt breezes fromthe sea, snow chilled, perfumed with almond and orange; that the sunshone brighter more days in the year, and the soil produced a greatervariety of vegetables and fruits than any other spot of the same sizeon God’s wonderful footstool. This could be done with unanimity andenthusiasm by every resident of Lilac Valley for the very simple reasonthat it was the truth. The valley stood with its steep sides rayingblue from myriad wild lilacs; olives and oranges sloped down to theflat floor, where cultivated ranches and gardens were so screened byeucalyptus and pepper trees, palm and live oak, myriads of roses ofevery colour and variety, and gaudy plants gathered there from theentire girth of the tropical world, that to the traveler on the highwaytrees and flowers predominated. The greatest treasure of the valley wasthe enthusiastic stream of icy mountain water that wandered through thenear-by canyon and followed the length of the valley on its singing,chuckling way to the ocean. All the residents of Lilac Valley had to doto entrance strangers with the location was to show any one of a dozenvantage points, and let visitors test for themselves the quality ofthe sunshine and air, and study the picture made by the broad stretchof intensively cultivated valley, walled on either side by mountainswhose highest peaks were often cloud-draped and for ever shifting theirdelicate pastel shades from gray to blue, from lavender to purple, fromtawny yellow to sepia, under the play of the sun and clouds. They had not been seated three minutes before Linda realized from herknowledge of Eileen that the shock had been too great, if such a thingmight be said of so resourceful a creature as Eileen. Evidently shewas going to sulk in the hope that this would prove that any partywas a failure at which she did not exert herself to be gracious. Ithad not been in Linda’s heart to do more than sit quietly in theplace belonging by right to her, but when she realized what was goingto happen, she sent Marian one swift appealing glance, and thendesperately plunged into conversation to cover Eileen’s defection. “I have been told,” she said, addressing the author, “that you arelooking for a home in California. Is this true, or is it merely thatevery good Californian hopes this will happen when any distinguishedEasterner comes our way?” “I can scarcely answer you,” said Peter Morrison, “because my ideas onthe subject are still slightly nebulous, but I am only too willing tosee them become concrete.” “You have struck exactly the right place,” said Linda. “We haveconcrete by the wagon load in this valley and we are perfectly willingto donate the amount required to materialize your ideas. Do you dreamof a whole ranch or only a nest?” “Well, the fact is,” answered Peter Morrison with a most attractivedrawl in his slow speech, “the fact is the dimensions of my dream mustfit my purse. Ever since I finished college I have been in newspaperwork and I have lived in an apartment in New York except while I wasabroad. When I came back my paper sent me to San Francisco and fromthere I motored down to see for myself if the wonderful things that arewritten about Los Angeles County are true.” “That is not much of a compliment to us,” said Linda slowly. “How doyou think we would dare write them if they were not true?” This caused such a laugh that everyone felt much easier. Marian turnedher dark eyes toward Peter Morrison. “Linda and I are busy people,” she said. “We waste little timein indirections, so I hope it’s not out of the way for me to askstraight-forwardly if you are truly in earnest, about wanting a home inLilac Valley?” “Then I’ll have to answer you,” said Peter, “that I have an attractivepart of the ‘makin’s’ and I am in deadly earnest about wanting a homesomewhere. I am sick in my soul of narrow apartments and wheels andthe rush and roar of the city. There was a time when I ate and drankit. It was the very breath of life to me. I charged on Broadway likea caterpillar tank charging in battle; but it is very remarkablehow quickly one changes in this world. I have had some success inmy work, and the higher I go, the better work I feel I can do in aquiet place and among less enervating surroundings. John and I werein college together, room-mates, and no doubt he has told you thatwe graduated with the same class. He has found his location hereand I would particularly enjoy having a home near him. They tell methere are well-trained servants to look after a house and care for abachelor, so I truly feel that if I can find a location I would like,and if Henry can plan me a house, and I can stretch my purse to coverthe investment, that there is a very large possibility that somewherewithin twenty miles of Los Angeles I may find the home of my dreams.” “One would almost expect,” said Marian, “that a writer would saysomething more original. This valley is filled with people who camehere saying precisely what you have said; and the lure of the land wonthem and here they are, shameless boosters of California.” “Why shameless?” inquired Henry Anderson. “Because California so verifies the wildest statement that can be madeconcerning her that one may go the limit of imagination without shame,”laughed Marian. “I try in all my dealings to stick to the straight andnarrow path.” “Oh, Kid, don’t stick to the straight and narrow,” broke in Linda,“there’s no scenery.” Eileen laid down her fork and stared in white-lipped amazement at thetwo girls, but she was utterly incapable of forgetting herself andher neatly arranged plans to have the three cultivated and attractiveyoung men all to herself for the evening. She realized too, from thesatisfaction betrayed in the glances these men were exchanging amongeach other, the ease with which they sat, and the gusto with which theyate the food Katy was deftly serving them, that something was happeningwhich never had happened at the Strong table since she had presided asits head, her sole endeavor having been to flatter her guests or toextract flattery for herself from them. “That is what makes this valley so adorable,” said Marian when at lastshe could make herself heard. “It is neither straight nor narrow. Thewing of a white sea swallow never swept a lovelier curve on the breastof the ocean than the line of this valley. My mother was the dearestlittle woman, and she used to say that this valley was outlined by agracious gesture from the hand of God in the dawn of Creation.” Peter Morrison deliberately turned in his chair, his eyes intent onMarian’s earnest face. “You almost make me want to say, in the language of an old hymn I usedto hear my mother sing, ‘Here will I set up my rest.’ With such a nameas Lilac Valley and with such a thought in the heart concerning it, Iscarcely feel that there is any use in looking further. How about it,Henry? Doesn’t it sound conclusive to you?” “It certainly does,” answered Henry Anderson, “and from what I couldsee as we drove in, it looks as well as it sounds.” Peter Morrison turned to his friend. “Gilman,” he said, “you’re a lawyer; you should know the things I’dlike to. Are there desirable homesites still to be found in the valley,and does the inflation of land at the present minute put it out of myreach?” “Well, that is on a par with the average question asked a lawyer,”answered Gilman, “but part of it I can answer definitely and at once.I think every acre of land suitable for garden or field cultivation istaken. I doubt if there is much of the orchard land higher up remainingand what there is would command a rather stiff price; but if you wouldbe content with some small plateau at the base of a mountain where youcould set any sort of a house and have—say two or three acres, mostlyof sage and boulders and greasewood and yucca around it——” “Why in this world are you talking about stones and sage andgreasewood?” cried Linda. “Next thing they’ll be asking about mountainlions and rattlesnakes.” “I beg your pardon,” said Gilman, “I fear none of us has remembered topresent Miss Linda as a coming naturalist. She got her start from herfather who was one of the greatest nerve specialists the world everhas known. She knows every inch of the mountains, the canyons and thedesert. She always says that she cut her teeth on a chunk of adobe,while her father hunted the nests of trap-door spiders out in Sunland.What should I have said when describing a suitable homesite for Peter,Linda?” “You should have assumed that immediately, Peter,”—Linda lifted hereyes to Morrison’s face with a sparkle of gay challenge, and by way ofapology interjected—“I am only a kid, you know, so I may call John’sfriend Peter—you should have assumed that sage and greasewood wouldsimply have vanished from any home location chosen by Peter, leavingit all lacy blue with lilac, and misty white with lemonade bush, andlovely gold with monkey flower, and purple with lupin, and paintedblood red with broad strokes of Indian paint brush, and beautifullylighted with feathery flames from Our Lord’s Candles, and perfumy asaltar incense with wild almond.” “Oh, my soul,” said Peter Morrison. “Good people, I have located. Ihave come to stay. I would like three acres but I could exist withtwo; an acre would seem an estate to me, and my ideas of a house,Henry, are shriveling. I did have a dream of something that must havebeen precious near a home. There might have been an evanescent hint offlitting draperies and inexperienced feet in it, but for the sake ofliving and working in such a location as Miss Linda describes, I wouldgladly cut my residence to a workroom and a sleeping room and kitchen.” “Won’t do,” said Linda. “A house is not a house in California withouta furnace and a bathroom. We are cold as blue blazes here when the sungoes down and the salty fog creeps up from the sea, and the icy mistrolls down from the mountains to chill our bones; and when it has notrained for six months at a stretch, your own private swimming pool isa comfort. This to add verisimilitude to what everyone else in LilacValley is going to tell you.” “I hadn’t thought I would need a fire,” said Peter, “and I wasdepending on the ocean for my bath tub. I am particularly fond of asalt rub.” So far, Eileen had not deigned to enter the conversation. It was all sohuman, so far from her ideas of entertaining that the disapproval onher lips was not sufficiently veiled to be invisible, and John Gilman,glancing in her direction, realized that he was having the best time hehad ever had in the Strong household since the passing of his friends,Doctor and Mrs. Strong, vaguely wondered why. And it occurred to himthat Linda and Marian were dominating the party. He said the mostirritating thing possible in the circumstances: “I am afraid you arenot feeling well this evening, Eileen.” Eileen laughed shortly. “The one perfect thing about me,” she said with closely cut precision,“is my health. I haven’t the faintest notion what it means to be ill.I am merely waiting for the conversation to take a I turn where I canjoin in it intelligently.” “Why, bless the child!” exclaimed Linda. “Can’t you talk intelligentlyabout a suitable location for a home? On what subject is a womansupposed to be intelligent if she is not at her best on the theme ofhome? If you really are not interested you had better begin to polishup, because it appeals to me that the world goes just so far in onedirection, and then it whirls to the right-about and goes equallyas far in the opposite direction. If Daddy were living I think hewould say we have reached the limit with apartment house homes minusfireplaces, with restaurant dining minus a blessing, with jazz musicminus melody, with jazz dancing minus grace, with national progressminus cradles.” “Linda!” cried Eileen indignantly. “Good gracious!” cried Linda. “Do I get the shillalah for that? Weren’tall of us rocked in cradles? I think that the pendulum has swung farand it is time to swing back to where one man and one woman chooseany little spot on God’s footstool, build a nest and plan their livesin accord with personal desire and inclination instead of aping theirneighbors.” “Bravo!” cried Henry Anderson. “Miss Linda, if you see any suitablespot, and you think I would serve for a bug-catcher, won’t you pleasestake the location?” “Well, I don’t know about that,” said Linda. “Would it be the old caseof ‘I furnish the bread and you furnish the water’?” “No,” said Peter Morrison, “it would not. Henry is doing mighty well. Iguarantee that he would furnish a cow that would produce real cream.” “How joyous!” said Linda. “I feel quite competent to manage the breadquestion. We’ll call that settled then. When I next cast an appraisingeye over my beloved valley, I shan’t select the choicest spot in it forPeter Morrison to write a book in; and I want to warn you people whenyou go hunting to keep a mile away from Marian’s plot. She has had herlocation staked from childhood and has worked on her dream house untilshe has it all ready to put the ice in the chest and scratch the matchfor the living room fire-logs. The one thing she won’t ever tell iswhere her location is, but wherever it is, Peter Morrison, don’t youdare take it.” “I wouldn’t for the world,” said Peter Morrison gravely. “If MissThorne will tell me even on which side of the valley her location lies,I will agree to stay on the other side.” “Well there is one thing you can depend upon,” said the irrepressibleLinda before Marian had time to speak. “It is sure to be on the sunnyside. Every living soul in California is looking for a place in thesun.” “Then I will make a note of it,” said Peter Morrison. “But isn’t thereenough sun in all this lovely valley that I may have a place in it too?” “You go straight ahead and select any location you like,” said Marian.“I give you the freedom of the valley. There’s not one chance in tenthousand that you would find or see anything attractive about the onesecluded spot I have always hoped I might some day own.” “This is not fooling, then?” asked Peter Morrison. “You truly have aplace selected where you would like to live?” “She truly has the spot selected and she truly has the house on paperand it truly is a house of dreams,” said Linda. “I dream about itmyself. When she builds it and lives in it awhile and finds out all thethings that are wrong with it, then I am going to build one like it,only I shall eliminate all the mistakes she has made.” “I have often wondered,” said Henry Anderson, “if such a thing everhappened as that people built a house and lived in it, say ten years,and did not find one single thing about it that they would change ifthey had it to build over again. I never have heard of such a case.Have any of you?” “I am sure no one has,” said John Gilman meditatively, “and it’s aqueer thing. I can’t see why people don’t plan a house the way theywant it before they build.” Marian turned to him—the same Marian he had fallen in love with whenthey were children. “Mightn’t it be,” she asked, “that it is due to changing conditionscaused by the rapid development of science and invention? If one hadbuilt the most perfect house possible five years ago and learned to-daythat infinitely superior lighting and heating and living facilitiescould be installed at much less expense and far greater convenience,don’t you think that one would want to change? Isn’t life a series ofchanges? Mustn’t one be changing constantly to keep abreast of one’sday and age?” “Why, surely,” answered Gilman, “and no doubt therein lies at leastpart of the answer to Anderson’s question.” “And then,” added Marian, “things happen in families. Sometimes morebabies than they expect come to newly married people and they requiremore room.” “My goodness, yes!” broke in Linda. “Just look at Sylvia Townsend—twinsto begin with.” “Linda!” breathed Eileen, aghast. “So glad you like my name, dear,” murmured Linda sweetly. “And then,” continued Marian, “changes come to other people as theyhave to me. I can’t say that I had any fault to find with either thecomforts or the conveniences of Hawthorne House until Daddy and Motherwere swept from it at one cruel sweep; and after that it was nothingto me but a haunted house, and I don’t feel that I can be blamed forwanting to leave it. I will be glad to know that there are peopleliving in it who won’t see a big strong figure meditatively smokingbefore the fireplace and a gray dove of a woman sitting on the armof his chair. I will be glad, if Fate is kind to me and people likemy houses, to come back to the valley when I can afford to and buildmyself a home that has no past—a place, in fact, where I can furnish myown ghost, and if I meet myself on the stairs then I won’t be shockedby me. “I don’t think there is a soul in the valley who blames you for sellingyour home and going, Marian,” said Linda soberly. “I think it would befoolish if you did not.” The return to the living room brought no change. Eileen pouted whileLinda and Marian thoroughly enjoyed themselves and gave the guests amost entertaining evening. So disgruntled was Eileen, when the youngmen had gone, that she immediately went to her room, leaving Lindaand Marian to close the house and make their own arrangements for thenight. Whereupon Linda deliberately led Marian to the carefully dustedand flower-garnished guest room and installed her with every comfortand convenience that the house afforded. Then bringing her brushes fromher own room, she and Marian made themselves comfortable, visiting farinto the night. “I wonder,” said Linda, “if Peter Morrison will go to a real estate manin the morning and look over the locations remaining in Lilac Valley.” “Yes, I think he will,” said Marian conclusively. “It seems to me,” said Linda, “that we did a whole lot of talking abouthomes to-night; which reminds me, Marian, in packing have you put inyour plans? Have you got your last draught with you?” “No,” answered Marian, “it’s in one of the cases. I haven’t anythingbut two or three pencil sketches from which I drew the final plans asI now think I’ll submit them for the contest. Wouldn’t it be a tallfeather in my cap, Linda, if by any chance l I should win that prize?” “It would be more than a feather,” said Linda. “It would be a wholecap, and a coat to wear with it, and a dress to match the coat, andslippers to match the dress, and so forth just like ‘The House ThatJack Built.’ Have you those sketches, Marian?” Opening her case, Marian slid from underneath the garments folded init, several sheets on which were roughly penciled sketches of theexterior of a house—on the reverse, the upstairs and downstairs floorplans; and sitting down, she explained these to Linda. Then she leftthem lying on a table, waiting to be returned to her case before shereplaced her clothes in the morning. Both girls were fast asleep when amischievous wind slipped down the valley, and lightly lifting the topsheet, carried it through the window, across the garden, and dropped itat the foot of a honey dripping loquat. Because they had talked until late in the night of Marian’s plans andprospects in the city, of Peter Morrison’s proposed residence in thevalley, of how lonely Linda would be without Marian, of everythingconcerning their lives except the change in Eileen and John Gilman, thetwo girls slept until late in the morning, so that there were but a fewminutes remaining in which Marian might dress, have a hasty breakfastand make her train. In helping her, it fell to Linda to pack Marian’scase. She put the drawings she found on the table in the bottom, theclothing and brushes on top of them, and closing the case, carriedit herself until she delivered it into the porter’s hands as Marianboarded her train. The last glimpse Marian Thorne had of Linda was as she stood alone,waving her hand, her cheeks flushed, her eyes shining, her final wordcheery and encouraging. Marian smiled and waved in return until thetrain bore her away. Then she sat down wearily and stared unseeinglyfrom a window. Life did such very dreadful things to people. Hergirlhood had been so happy. Then came the day of the Black Shadow, butin her blackest hour she had not felt alone. She had supposed she wasleaning on John Gilman as securely as she had leaned on her father. Shehad learned, with the loss of her father, that one cannot be sure ofanything in this world least of all of human life. Yet in her darkestdays she had depended on John Gilman. She had every reason to believethat it was for her that he struggled daily to gain a footing in hischosen profession. When success came, when there was no reason thatMarian could see why they might not have begun life together, therehad come a subtle change in John, and that change had developed sorapidly that in a few weeks’ time, she was forced to admit that thecompanionship and loving attentions that once had been all hers werenow all Eileen’s. She sat in the train, steadily carrying her mile after mile fartherfrom her home, and tried to think what had happened and how and whyit had happened. She could not feel that she had been wrong in herestimate of John Gilman. Her valuation of him had been taught herby her father and mother and by Doctor and Mrs. Strong and by JohnGilman himself. Dating from the time that Doctor Strong had purchasedthe property and built a home in Lilac Valley beside Hawthorne House,Marian had admired Eileen and had loved her. She was several yearsolder than the beautiful girl she had grown up beside. Age had notmattered; Eileen’s beauty had not mattered. Marian was good lookingherself. She always had known that Eileen had imposed upon her and was selfishwith her, but Eileen’s impositions were so skillfully maneuvered,her selfishness was so adorably taken for granted that Marian inretrospection felt that perhaps she was responsible for at least asmall part of it. She never had been able to see the inner workingsof Eileen’s heart. She was not capable of understanding that whenJohn Gilman was poor and struggling Eileen had ignored him. It hadnot occurred to Marian that when the success for which he struggledbegan to come generously, Eileen would begin to covet the man she hadpreviously disdained. She had always striven to find friends amongpeople of wealth and distinction. How was Marian to know that when Johnbegan to achieve wealth and distinction, Eileen would covet him also? Marian could not know that Eileen had studied her harder than sheever studied any book, that she had deliberately set herself to makethe most of every defect or idiosyncrasy in Marian, at the same timeoffering herself as a charming substitute. Marian was prepared to bethe mental, the spiritual, and the physical mate of a man. Eileen was not prepared to be in truth and honour any of these. Shewas prepared to make any emergency of life subservient to her ownselfish desires. She was prepared to use any man with whom she came incontact for the furtherance of any whim that at the hour possessed her.What she wanted was unbridled personal liberty, unlimited financialresources. Marian, almost numbed with physical fatigue and weeks of mental strain,came repeatedly against the dead wall of ignorance when she tried tofathom the change that had taken place between herself and John Gilmanand between herself and Eileen. Daniel Thorne was an older man than Doctor Strong. He had accumulatedmore property. Marian had sufficient means at her command to make itunnecessary for her to acquire a profession or work for her living, butshe had always been interested in and loved to plan houses and help herfriends with buildings they were erecting. When the silence and theloneliness of her empty home enveloped her, she had begun, at first asa distraction, to work on the drawings for a home that an architect hadmade for one of her neighbors. She had been able to suggest so manycomforts and conveniences, and so to revise these plans that, at firstin a desultory way, later in real earnest, she had begun to draw plansfor houses. Then, being of methodical habit and mathematical mind, shebegan scaling up the plans and figuring on the cost of building, and soshe had worked until she felt that she was evolving homes that could bebuilt for the same amount of money and lived in with more comfort andconvenience than the homes that many of her friends were having plannedfor them by architects of the city. To one spot in the valley she had gone from childhood as a secretplace in which to dream and study. She had loved that retreat until ithad become a living passion with her. The more John Gilman neglectedher, the more she concentrated upon her plans, and when the hour camein which she realized what she had lost and what Eileen had won, shereached the decision to sell her home, go to the city, and study untilshe knew whether she really could succeed at her chosen profession. Then she would come back to the valley, buy the spot she coveted, buildthe house of which she dreamed, and in it she would spend the remainderof her life making homes for the women who knew how to hold the love ofmen. When she reached the city she had decided that if one could nothave the best in life, one must be content with the next best, and forher the next best would be homes for other people, since she might notmaterialize the home she had dreamed for John Gilman and herself. Shehad not wanted to leave the valley. She had not wanted to lose JohnGilman. She had not wanted to part with the home she had been rearedin. Yet all of these things seemed to have been forced upon her. AllMarian knew to do was to square her shoulders, take a deep breath, putregrets behind her, and move steadily toward the best future she coulddevise for herself. She carried letters of introduction to the San Francisco architects,Nicholson and Snow, who had offered a prize for the best house thatcould be built in a reasonable time for fifteen thousand dollars. Shemeant to offer her plans in this competition. Through friends she hadsecured a comfortable place in which to live and work. She need undergono hardships in searching for a home, in clothing herself, in payingfor instruction in the course in architecture she meant to pursue. Concerning Linda she could not resist a feeling of exultation. Lindawas one of the friends in Lilac Valley about whom Marian could thinkwhole-heartedly and lovingly. Sometimes she had been on the point ofmaking a suggestion to Linda, and then she had contented herself withwaiting in the thought that very soon there must come to the girl aproper sense of her position and her rights. The experience of theprevious night taught Marian that Linda had arrived. She would nolonger be the compliant little sister who would run Eileen’s errands,wait upon her guests and wear disreputable clothing. When Linda reacheda point where she was capable of the performance of the previous night,Marian knew that she would proceed to live up to her blue china inevery ramification of life. She did not know exactly how Linda wouldfollow up the assertion of her rights that she had made, but she didknow that in some way she would follow it up, because Linda was a veryclose reproduction of her father. She had been almost constantly with him during his life, very muchalone since his death. She was a busy young person. From Marian’swindows she had watched the business of carrying on the wild flowergarden that Linda and her father had begun. What the occupation wasthat kept the light burning in Linda’s room far into the night Mariandid not know. For a long time she had supposed that her studieswere difficult for her, and when she had asked Linda if it were notpossible for her to prepare her lessons without so many hours ofmidnight study she had caught the stare of frank amazement with whichthe girl regarded her, and in that surprised, almost grieved lookshe had realized that very probably a daughter of Alexander Strong,so resembling him as Linda resembled him, would not be compelled tooverwork to master the prescribed course of any city high school.What Linda was doing during those midnight hours Marian did not know,but she did know that she was not wrestling with mathematics andlanguages—at least not all of the time. So Marian, knowing Linda’sgift with a pencil, had come to the conclusion that she was drawingpictures; but circumstantial evidence was all she had as a basisfor her conviction. Linda went her way silently and alone. She wasacquainted with everyone living in Lilac Valley, frank and friendlywith all of them; aside from Marian she had no intimate friend. Notanother girl in the valley cared to follow Linda’s pursuits or tocultivate the acquaintance of the breeched, booted girl, constantlydevoting herself to outdoor study with her father during his lifetime,afterward alone. For an instant after Marian had boarded her train Linda stood lookingat it, her heart so heavy that it pained acutely. She had not said oneword to make Marian feel that she did not want her to go. Not once hadshe put forward the argument that Marian’s going would leave her todepend entirely for human sympathy upon the cook, and her guardian,also administrator of the Strong estate, John Gilman. So long as he wasMarian’s friend Linda had admired John Gilman. She had gone to him forsome measure of the companionship she had missed in losing her father.Since Gilman had allowed himself to be captivated by Eileen, Linda hadharbored a feeling concerning him almost of contempt. Linda was sofamiliar with every move that Eileen made, so thoroughly understoodthat there was a motive back of her every action, that she could notsee why John Gilman, having known her from childhood, should notunderstand her also. She had decided that the time had come when she would force Eileen togive her an allowance, however small, for her own personal expenses,that she must in some way manage to be clothed so that she was not amatter of comment even among the boys of her school, and she could seeno reason why the absolute personal liberty she always had enjoyed solong as she disappeared when Eileen did not want her and appeared whenshe did, should not extend to her own convenience as well as Eileen’s. Life was a busy affair for Linda. She had not time to watch Marian’strain from sight. She must hurry to the nearest street car and make allpossible haste or she would be late for her classes. Throughout the dayshe worked with the deepest concentration, but she could not keep downthe knowledge that Eileen would have things to say, possibly things todo, when they met that evening, for Eileen was capable of disconcertinghysteria. Previously Linda had remained stubbornly silent during anytirade in which Eileen chose to indulge. She had allowed herself tobe nagged into doing many things that she despised, because she wouldnot assert herself against apparent injustice. But since she had comefully to realize the results of Eileen’s course of action for Marianand for herself, she was deliberately arriving at the conclusion thathereafter she would speak when she had a defense, and she would make ither business to let the sun shine on any dark spot that she discoveredin Eileen. Linda knew that if John Gilman were well acquainted with Eileen, hecould not come any nearer to loving her than she did. Such an idea asloving Eileen never had entered Linda’s thoughts. To Linda, Eileen wasnot lovable. That she should be expected to love her because they hadthe same parents and lived in the same home seemed absurd. She wasslightly disappointed, on reaching home, to find that Eileen was notthere. “Will the lady of the house dine with us this evening?” she asked asshe stood eating an apple in the kitchen. “She didn’t say,” answered Katy. “Have ye had it out about last nightyet?” “No,” answered Linda. “That is why I was asking about her. I want toclear the atmosphere before I make my new start in life.” “Now, don’t ye be going too far, lambie,” cautioned Katy “Ye youngthings make such an awful serious business of life these days. In yourscramble to wring artificial joy out of it you miss all the natural joythe good God provided ye.” “It seems to me, Katy,” said Linda slowly, “that you should put thatstatement the other way round. It seems that life makes a mightyserious business for us young things, and it seems to me that if wedon’t get the right start and have a proper foundation, life Is goingto be spoiled for us. One life is all I’ve got to live in this world;and I would like it to be the interesting and the beautiful kind oflife that Father lived.” Linda dropped to a chair. “Katy,” she said, leaning forward and looking intently into the earnestface of the woman before her, “Katy, I have been thinking an awful lotlately. There is a question you could answer for me if you wanted to.” “Well, I don’t see any raison,” said Katy, “why I shouldn’t answer yeany question ye’d be asking me.” Linda’s eyes narrowed as they did habitually in deep thought She waslooking past Katy down the sunlit spaces of the wild garden that washer dearest possession, and then her eyes strayed higher to where theblue walls that shut in Lilac Valley ranged their peaks against the sky. “Katy,” she said, scarcely above her breath, “was Mother like Eileen?” Katy stiffened. Her red face paled slightly. She turned her back andslowly slid into the oven the pie she was carrying. She closed the doorwith more force than was necessary and then turned and deliberatelystudied Linda from the top of her shining black head to the tip of hershoe. “Some,” she said tersely. “Yes, I know ‘some’,” said Linda, “but you know I was too young to paymuch attention, and Daddy managed always to make me so happy that Inever realized until he was gone that he not only had been my fatherbut my mother as well. You know what I mean, Katy.” “Yes,” said Katy deliberately, “I know what ye mean, lambie, and I’lltell ye the truth as far as I know it. She managed your father, shepampered him, but she deceived him every day, just about little things.She always made the household accounts bigger than they were, and usedthe extra money for Miss Eileen and herself—things like that. I’mthinkin’ he never knew it. I’m thinking he loved her deeply and trustedher complete. I know what ye’re getting at. She was not enough likeEileen to make him unhappy with her. He might have been if he had knownall there was to know, but for his own sake I was not the one to giveher away, though she constantly made him think that I was extravagantand wasteful in me work.” Linda’s eyes came back from the mountains and met Katy’s straightly. “Katy,” she said, “did you ever see sisters as different as Eileen andI are?” “No, I don’t think I ever did,” said Katy. “It puzzles me,” said Linda slowly. “The more I think about it, theless I can understand why, if we are sisters, we would not accidentallyresemble each other a tiny bit in some way, and I must say I can’t seethat we do physically or mentally.” “No,” said Katy, “ye were just as different as ye are now when I cameto this house new and ye were both little things.” “And we are going to be as different and to keep on growing moredifferent every day of our lives, because red war breaks out the minuteEileen comes home. I haven’t a notion what she will say to me for whatI did last night and what I am going to do in the future, but I have adefinite idea as to what I am going to say to her.” “Now, easy; ye go easy, lambie,” cautioned Katy. “I wouldn’t regret it,” said Linda, “if I took Eileen by theshoulders and shook her till I shook the rouge off her cheek, and thebrilliantine off her hair, and a million mean little subterfuges outof her soul. You know Eileen is lovely when she is natural, and ifshe would be straight-off-the-bat square, I would be proud to be hersister. As it is, I have my doubts, even about this sister business.” “Why, Linda, child, ye are just plain crazy,” said Katy. “What kind ofnotions are you getting into your head?” “I hear the front door,” said Linda, “and I am going to march straightto battle. She’s going up the front stairs. I did mean to short-cut upthe back, but, come to think of it, I have served my apprenticeshipon the back stairs. I believe I’ll ascend the front myself. Good-bye,darlin’, wish me luck.” Linda swung Katy around, hugged her tight, and dropped a kiss on thetop of her faithful head. “Ye just stick right up for your rights,” Katy advised her. “Ye’re agreat big girl. ’Tain’t going to be long till ye’re eighteen. But mindyour old Katy about going too far. If ye lose your temper and cat-spit,it won’t get ye anywhere. The fellow that keeps the coolest can alwaysdo the best headwork.” “I get you,” said Linda, “and that is good advice for which I thankyou.” Then Linda walked down the hall, climbed the front stairs, andpresented herself at Eileen’s door, there to receive one of theseverest shocks of her young life. Eileen had tossed her hat and furupon a couch, seated herself at her dressing table, and was studyingher hair in the effort to decide whether she could fluff it upsufficiently to serve for the evening or whether she must take it downand redress it. At Linda’s step in the doorway she turned a smilingface upon her and cried: “Hello, little sister, come in and tell me thenews.” Linda stopped as if dazed. The wonderment in which she looked at Eileenwas stamped all over her. A surprised braid of hair hung over one ofher shoulders. Her hands were surprised, and the skirt of her dress,and her shoes flatly set on the floor. “Well, I’ll be darned!” she ejaculated, and then walked to where shecould face Eileen, and seated herself without making any attempt toconceal her amazement. “Linda,” said Eileen sweetly, “you would stand far better chanceof being popular and making a host of friends if you would not beso coarse. I am quite sure you never heard Mama or me use such anexpression.” For one long instant Linda was too amazed to speak. Then she recoveredherself. “Look here, Eileen, you needn’t try any ‘perfect lady’ business on me,”she said shortly. “Do you think I have forgotten the extent of yourvocabulary when the curling iron gets too hot or you fail to receive aninvitation to the Bachelors’ Ball?” Linda never had been capable of understanding Eileen. At that minuteshe could not know that Eileen had been facing facts through the longhours of the night and all through the day, and that she had reachedthe decision that for the future her only hope of working Linda to herwill was to conciliate her, to ignore the previous night, to try to puttheir relationship upon the old basis by pretending that there neverhad been a break. She laughed softly. “On rare occasions, I grant it. Of course a little swear slips outsometimes. What I am trying to point out is that you do too much of it.” “How did you ever get the idea,” said Linda, “that I wanted to bepopular and have hosts of friends? What would I do with them if I hadthem?” “Why, use them, my child, use them,” answered Eileen promptly. “Let’s cut this,” said Linda tersely. “I am not your child. I’m gettingto the place where I have serious doubt as to whether I am your sisteror not. If I am, it’s not my fault, and the same clay never made twoobjects quite so different. I came up here to fight, and I’m going tosee it through. I’m on the war-path, so you may take your club andproceed to battle.” “What have we to fight about?” inquired Eileen. “Every single thing that you have done that was unfair to me all mylife,” said Linda. “Since all of it has been deliberate you probablyknow more about the details than I do, so I’ll just content myself withtelling you that for the future, last night marked a change in therelations between us. I am going to be eighteen before so very long,and I have ceased to be your maid or your waitress or your dupe. Youare not going to work me one single time when I have got brains tosee through your schemes after this. Hereafter I take my place in myfather’s house and at my father’s table on an equality with you.” Eileen looked at Linda steadily, trying to see to the depths of hersoul. She saw enough to convince her that the young creature in frontof her was in earnest. “Hm,” she said, “have I been so busy that I have failed to notice whata great girl you are getting?” “Busy!” scoffed Linda. “Tell that to Katy. It’s a kumquat!” “Perhaps you are too big,” continued Eileen, “to be asked to wait onthe table any more.” “I certainly am,” retorted Linda, “and I am also too big to wear suchshoes or such a dress as I have on at the present minute. I know allabout the war and the inflation of prices and the reduction in income,but I know also that if there is enough to run the house, and dressyou, and furnish you such a suite of rooms as you’re enjoying rightnow, there is enough to furnish me suitable clothes, a comfortablebedroom and a place where I can leave my work without putting awayeverything I am doing each time I step from the room. I told you fouryears ago that you might take the touring car and do what you pleasedwith it. I have never asked what you did or what you got out of it, soI’ll thank you to observe equal silence about anything I choose to donow with the runabout, which I reserved for myself. I told you to takethis suite, and this is the first time that I have ever mentioned toyou what you spent on it.” Linda waved an inclusive hand toward the fully equipped, daintydressing table, over rugs of pale blue, and beautifully decoratedwalls, including the sleeping room and bath adjoining. “So now I’ll ask you to keep off while I do what I please about thelibrary and the billiard room. I’ll try to get along without much moneyin doing what I desire there, but I must have some new clothes. I wantmoney to buy me a pair of new shoes for school. I want a pair of pumpssuitable for evenings when there are guests to dinner. I want a coupleof attractive school dresses. This old serge is getting too hot and tooworn for common decency. And I also want a couple of dresses somethinglike you are wearing, for afternoons and evenings.” Eileen stared aghast at Linda. “Where,” she inquired politely, “is the money for all this to comefrom?” “Eileen,” said Linda in a low tense voice, “I have reached the placewhere even the boysof the high school are twitting me about howI am dressed, and that is the limit. I have stood it for three yearsfrom the girls. I am an adept in pretending that I don’t see, and Idon’t hear. I have got to the point where I am perfectly capable ofwalking into your wardrobe and taking out enough of the clothes thereand selling them at a second-hand store to buy me what I require todress me just plainly and decently. So take warning. I don’t know whereyou are going to get the money, but you are going to get it. If youwould welcome a suggestion from me, come home only half the times youdine yourself and your girl friends at tearooms and cafes in the city,and you will save my share that way. I am going to give you a chanceto total your budget, and then I demand one half of the income fromFather’s estate above household expenses; and if I don’t get it, on theday I am eighteen I shall go to John Gilman and say to him what I havesaid to you, and I shall go to the bank and demand that a division bemade there, and that a separate bank book be started for me.” Linda’s amazement on entering the room had been worthy of note.Eileen’s at the present minute was beyond description. Dumbfounded wasa colourless word to describe her state of mind. “You don’t mean that,” she gasped in a quivering voice when at last shecould speak. “I can see, Eileen, that you are taken unawares,” said Linda. “I havehad four long years to work up to this hour. Hasn’t it even dawned onyou that this worm was ever going to turn? You know exquisite moths andbutterflies evolve in the canyons from very unprepossessing and lowlyliving worms. You are spending your life on the butterfly stunt. Have Ibeen such a weak worm that it hasn’t ever occurred to you that I mightwant to try a plain, every-day pair of wings sometime myself?” Eileen’s face was an ugly red, her hands were shaking, her voice wasunnatural, but she controlled her temper. “Of course,” she said, “I have always known that the time would come,after you finished school and were of a proper age, when you would wantto enter society.” “No, you never knew anything of the kind,” said Linda bluntly, “becauseI have not the slightest ambition to enter society either now or then.All I am asking is to enter the High School in a commonly decent,suitable dress; to enter our dining room as a daughter; to enter aworkroom decently equipped for my convenience. You needn’t be surprisedif you hear some changes going on in the billiard room and see somechanges going on in the library. And if I feel that I can muster thenerve to drive the runabout, it’s my car, it’s up to me.” “Linda!” wailed Eileen, “how can you think of such a thing? Youwouldn’t dare.” “Because I haven’t dared till the present is no reason why I shoulddeprive myself of every single pleasure in life,” said Linda. “Youspend your days doing exactly what you please; driving that runaboutfor Father was my one soul-satisfying diversion. Why shouldn’t I do thething I love most, if I can muster the nerve?” Linda arose, and walking over to a table, picked up a magazine lyingamong some small packages that Eileen evidently had placed there onentering her room. “Are you subscribing to this?” she asked. She turned in her hands and leafed through the pages of a mostattractive magazine, Everybody’s Home. It was devoted topoetry, good fiction, and everything concerning home life from beef tobiscuits, and from rugs to roses. “I saw it on a news-stand,” said Eileen. “I was at lunch with somegirls who had a copy and they were talking about some articles bysomebody named something—Meredith, I think it was—Jane Meredith, maybeshe’s a Californian, and she is advocating the queer idea that we goback to nature by trying modern cooking on the food the aboriginesate. If we find it good then she recommends that we specialize on thegrowing of these native vegetables for home use and for export—as a newindustry.” “I see,” said Linda. “Out-Burbanking Burbank, as it were.” “No, not that,” said Eileen. “She is not proposing to evolve new forms.She is proposing to show us how to make delicious dishes for luncheonor dinner from wild things now going to waste. What the girls said wasso interesting that I thought I’d get a copy and if I see anything goodI’ll turn it over to Katy.” “And where’s Katy going to get the wild vegetables?” asked Lindasceptically. “Why you might have some of them in your wild garden, or you couldeasily find enough to try—all the prowling the canyons you do ought toresult in something.” “So it should,” said Linda. “I quite agree with you. Did I understandyou to say that I should be ready to go to the bank with you to arrangeabout my income next week?” Again the colour deepened in Eileen’s face, again she made a visibleeffort at self-control. “Oh, Linda,” she said, “what is the use of being so hard? You will makethem think at the bank that I have not treated you fairly.” “I?” said Linda, “Iwill make them think? Don’t you thinkit is youwho will make them think? Will you kindly answer myquestion?” “If I show you the books,” said Eileen, “if I divide what is left afterthe bills are paid so that you say yourself that it is fair, what morecan you ask?” Linda hesitated. “What I ought to do is exactly what I have said I would do,” she saidtersely, “but if you are going to put it on that basis I have no desireto hurt you or humiliate you in public. If you do that, I can’t seethat I have any reason to complain, so we’ll call it a bargain andwe’ll say no more about it until the first of the month, unless thespirit moves you, after taking a good square look at me, to producesome shoes and a school dress instanter.” “I’ll see what I can do,” answered Eileen. “All right then,” said Linda. “See you at dinner.” She went to her own room, slipped off her school dress, brushed herhair, and put on the skirt and blouse she had worn the previousevening, these being the only extra clothing she possessed. As shestraightened her hair she looked at herself intently. “My, aren’t you coming on!” she said to the figure in the glass.“Dressing for dinner! First thing you know you’ll be a perfect lady.” When Eileen came down to dinner that evening Linda understood at aglance that an effort was to be made to efface thoroughly from themind of John Gilman all memory of the Eileen of the previous evening.She had decided on redressing her hair, while she wore one of her mostbecoming and attractive gowns. To Linda and Katy during the dinner shewas simply charming. Having said what she wanted to say and receivedthe assurance she desired, Linda accepted her advances cordiallyand displayed such charming proclivities herself that Eileen begancovertly to watch her, and as she watched there slowly grew in herbrain the conviction that something had happened to Linda. At once shebegan studying deeply in an effort to learn what it might be. Therewere three paramount things in Eileen’s cosmos that could happen to agirl: She could have lovely clothing. Linda did not have it. She couldhave money and influential friends. Since Marian’s going Linda hadpractically no friend; she was merely acquainted with almost everyoneliving in Lilac Valley. She could have a lover. Linda had none. Butstay! Eileen’s thought halted at the suggestion. Maybe she had! Shehad been left completely to her own devices when she was not wantedabout the house. She had been mingling with hundreds of boys and girlsin High School. She might have met some man repeatedly on the streetcars, going to and from school. In school she might have attractedthe son of some wealthy and influential family; which was the onlykind of son Eileen chose to consider in connection with Linda. ThroughEileen’s brain ran bits of the conversation of the previous evening.She recalled that the men she had intended should spend the eveningwaiting on her and paying her pretty compliments had spent it eatinglike hungry men, laughing and jesting with Linda and Marian, givingevery evidence of a satisfaction with their entertainment that neverhad been evinced with the best brand of attractions she had to offer. Eileen was willing to concede that Marian Thorne had been a beautifulgirl, and she had known, previous to the disaster, that it was quiteas likely that any man might admire Marian’s flashing dark beauty asher blonde loveliness. Between them then it would have been merely aquestion of taste on the part of the man. Since Marian’s dark head hadturned ashen, Eileen had simply eliminated her at one sweep. That whitehair would brand Marian anywhere as an old woman. Very likely no manever would want to marry her. Eileen was sure she would not want to ifshe were a man. No wonder John Gilman had ceased to be attracted by agirl’s face with a grandmother setting. As for Linda, Eileen never had considered her at all except as aconvenience to serve her own purposes. Last night she had learned thatLinda had a brain, that she had wit, that she could say things to whichmen of the world listened with interest. She began to watch Linda. Sheappraised with deepest envy the dark hair curling naturally on hertemples. She wondered how hair that curled naturally could be so thickand heavy, and she thought what a crown of glory would adorn Linda’shead when the day came to coil those long dark braids around it andfasten them with flashing pins. She drew some satisfaction from thesunburned face and lean figure before her, but it was not satisfactionof soul-sustaining quality. There was beginning to be somethingdisquieting about Linda. A roundness was creeping over her lean frame;a glow was beginning to colour her lips and cheek bones; a dewy lookcould be surprised in her dark eyes occasionally. She had the effect ofa creature with something yeasty bottled inside it that was beginningto ferment and might effervesce at any minute. Eileen had been sosurprised the previous evening and again before dinner, that she madeup her mind that hereafter one might expect almost anything from Linda.She would no longer follow a suggestion unless the suggestion accordedwith her sense of right and justice. It was barely possible that itmight be required to please her inclinations. Eileen’s mind worked withunbelievable swiftness. She tore at her subject like a vulture tearingat a feast, and like a vulture she reached the vitals swiftly. Sheprefaced her question with a dry laugh. Then she leaned forward andasked softly: “Linda, dear, why haven’t you told me?” Linda’s eyes were so clear and honest as they met Eileen’s that shealmost hesitated. “A little more explicit, please,” said the girl quietly. “Who is he?” asked Eileen abruptly. “Oh, I haven’t narrowed to an individual,” said Linda largely. “Youhave noticed a flock of boys following me from school and hangingaround the front door? I have such hosts to choose from that it’s goingto take a particularly splendid knight on a snow-white charger—I think‘charger’ is the proper word—to capture my young affections.” Eileen was satisfied. There wasn’t any he. She might for a shorttime yet cut Linda’s finances to the extreme limit. Whenever a manappeared on the horizon she would be forced to make a division at leastapproaching equality. Linda followed Eileen to the living room and sat down with a bookuntil John Gilman arrived. She had a desire to study him for a fewminutes. She was going to write Marian a letter that night. She wantedto know if she could honestly tell her that Gilman appeared lonelyand seemed to miss her. Katy had no chance to answer the bell when itrang. Eileen was in the hall. Linda could not tell what was happeningfrom the murmur of voices. Presently John and Eileen entered the room,and as Linda greeted him she did have the impression that he appearedunusually thoughtful and worried. She sat for half an hour, takingslight part in the conversation. Then she excused herself and went toher room, and as she went she knew that she could not honestly writeMarian what she had hoped, for in thirty minutes by the clock Eileen’sblandishments had worked, and John Gilman was looking at her as if shewere the most exquisite and desirable creature in existence. Slowly Linda climbed the stairs and entered her room. She slid thebolt of her door behind her, turned on the lights, unlocked a drawer,and taking from it a heap of materials she scattered them over a smalltable, and picking up her pencil, she sat gazing at the sheet beforeher for some time. Then slowly she began writing: It appeals to me that, far as modern civilization has gone inculinary efforts, we have not nearly reached the limits availableto us as I pointed out last month. We consider ourselves capableof preparing and producing elaborate banquets, yet at no time arewe approaching anything even to compare in lavishness and delicacywith the days of Lucullus. We are not feasting on baked swans,peacock tongues and drinking our pearls. I am not recommendingthat we should revive the indulgence of such lavish and uselessexpenditure, but I would suggest that if we tire with the samenessof our culinary efforts, we at least try some of the new dishesdescribed in this department, established for the sole purpose oftheir introduction. In so doing we accomplish a multiple purpose.We enlarge the resources of the southwest. We tease stale appetiteswith a new tang. We offer the world something different, yet nativeto us. We use modern methods on Indian material and the resultsare most surprising. In trying these dishes I would remind youthat few of us cared for oysters, olives, celery—almost any fruitor vegetable one could mention on first trial. Try several timesand be sure you prepare dishes exactly right before condemningthem as either fad or fancy. These are very real, nourishing anddelicious foods that are being offered you. Here is a salad thatwould have intrigued the palate of Lucullus, himself. If you donot believe me, try it. The vegetable is slightly known by a fewnative mountaineers and ranchers. Botanists carried it abroad whereunder the name of winter-purslane it is used in France and Englandfor greens or salad, while remaining practically unknown at home.Boiled and seasoned as spinach it makes equally good greens. But itis in salad that it stands pre-eminent. Go to any canyon—I shall not reveal the name of my particularcanyon—and locate a bed of miner’s lettuce (Montiaperfoliata). Growing in rank beds beside a cold, clean stream,you will find these pulpy, exquisitely shaped, pungent roundleaves from the center of which lifts a tiny head of misty whitelace, sending up a palate-teasing, spicy perfume. The crisp,pinkish stems snap in the fingers. Be sure that you wash theleaves carefully so that no lurking germs cling to them. Fill yoursalad bowl with the crisp leaves, from which the flowerhead hasbeen plucked. For dressing, dice a teacup of the most deliciousbacon you can obtain and fry it to a crisp brown together witha small sliced onion. Add to the fat two tablespoons of sugar,half a teaspoon of mustard; salt will scarcely be necessary, thebacon will furnish that. Blend the fat, sugar, and mustard, andpour in a measure of the best apple vinegar, diluted to taste.Bring this mixture to the boiling point, and when it has cooledslightly pour it over the lettuce leaves, lightly turning with asilver fork. Garnish the edge of the dish with a deep border ofthe fresh leaves, bearing their lace of white bloom intact, aroundthe edge of the bowl, and sprinkle on top the sifted yolks of twohard-boiled eggs, heaping the diced whites in the center. Linda paused and read this over carefully. “That is all right,” she said. “I couldn’t make that much better.” She made a few corrections here and there, and picking up a colouredpencil, she deftly sketched in a head piece of delicate sprays ofminers’ lettuce tipped at differing angles, fringy white with bloom.Below she printed: “A delicious Indian salad. The second of a seriesof new dishes to be offered made from materials used by the Indians.Compounded and tested in her own diet kitchen by the author.” Swiftlyshe sketched a tail piece representing a table top upon which sat atempting-looking big salad bowl filled with fresh green leaves, rimmedwith a row of delicate white flowers, from which you could almost scenta teasing delicate fragrance arising; and beneath, in a clear, firmhand, she stroked in the name, Jane Meredith. She went over her workcarefully, then laid it flat on a piece of cardboard, shoved it into anenvelope, directed it to the editor of Everybody’s Home, laid itinside her geometry, and wrote her letter to Marian before going to bed. In the morning on her way to the street car she gaily waved to apassing automobile going down Lilac Valley, in which sat John Gilmanand Peter Morrison and his architect, and as they were driving inthe direction from which she had come, Linda very rightly surmisedthat they were going to pick up Eileen and make a tour of the valley,looking for available building locations; and she wondered why Eileenhad not told her that they were coming. Linda had been right about thedestination of the car. It turned in at the Strong driveway and stoppedat the door. John Gilman went to ring the bell and learn if Eileen wereready. Peter followed him. Henry Anderson stepped from the car andwandered over the lawn, looking at the astonishing array of bushes,vines, flowers, and trees. From one to another he went, fingering the waxy leaves, studying thebrilliant flower faces. Finally turning a corner and crossing thewild garden, to which he paid slight attention, he started down theother side of the house. Here an almost overpowering odour greeted hisnostrils, and he went over to a large tree covered with rough, darkgreen, almost brownish, lance-shaped leaves, each branch terminating ina heavy spray of yellowish-green flowers, whose odour was of cloyingsweetness. The bees were buzzing over it. It was not a tree with whichhe was familiar, and stepping back, he looked at it carefully. Then atits base, wind-driven into a crevice between the roots, his attentionwas attracted to a crumpled sheet of paper, upon which he could seelines that would have attracted the attention of any architect. He wentforward instantly, picked up the sheet, and straightening it out hestood looking at it. “Holy smoke!” he breathed softly. “What a find!” He looked at the reverse of the sheet, his face becoming more intentevery minute. When he heard Peter Morrison’s voice calling him hehastily thrust the paper into his coat pocket; but he had gone onlya few steps when he stopped, glanced keenly over the house and lawn,turned his back, and taking the sheet from his pocket, he smoothedit out, folded it carefully, and put it in an inside pocket. Then hejoined the party. At once they set out to examine the available locations that yetremained in Lilac Valley. Nature provided them a wonderful day ofsnappy sunshine and heady sea air. Spring favoured them with lilacwalls at their bluest, broken here and there with the rose-misted whitemahogany. The violet nightshade was beginning to add deeper colour tothe hills in the sunniest wild spots. The panicles of mahonia bloomwere showing their gold colour. Wild flowers were lifting leaves offeather and lace everywhere, and most agreeable on the cool morningair was a faint breath of California sage. Up one side of the valley,weaving in and out, up and down, over the foothills they worked theirway. They stopped for dinner at one of the beautiful big hotels,practically filled with Eastern tourists. Eileen never had known aprouder moment than when she took her place at the head of the tableand presided over the dinner which was served to three most attractivespecimens of physical manhood, each of whom was unusually well endowedwith brain, all flattering her with the most devoted attention. Thistriumph she achieved in a dining room seating hundreds of people, itsmirror-lined walls reflecting her exquisite image from many angles, tothe click of silver, and the running accompaniment of many voices. Whatshe had expected to accomplish in her own dining room had come to herbefore a large audience, in which, she had no doubt, there were manyenvious women. Eileen rayed loveliness like a Mariposa lily, and purredin utter contentment like a deftly stroked kitten. When they parted in the evening Peter Morrison had memoranda of threelocations that he wished to consider. That he might not seem to beunduly influenced or to be giving the remainder of Los Angeles Countyits just due, he proposed to motor around for a week before reachingan ultimate decision, but in his heart he already had decided thatsomewhere near Los Angeles he would build his home, and as yet he hadseen nothing nearly so attractive as Lilac Valley. On her way to school that morning Linda stopped at the post office andpasted the required amount of stamps upon the package that she wasmailing to New York. She hurried from her last class that afternoon tothe city directory to find the street and number of James Brothers,figuring that the firm with whom Marian dealt would be the properpeople for her to consult. She had no difficulty in finding the placefor which she was searching, and she was rather agreeably impressedwith the men to whom she talked. She made arrangements with their buyerto call at her home in Lilac Valley at nine o’clock the followingSaturday morning to appraise the articles with which she wished to part. Then she went to one of the leading book stores of the city and madeinquiries which guided her to a reliable second-hand book dealer, andshe arranged to be ready to receive his representative at ten o’clockon Saturday. Reaching home she took a note book and pencil, and studied the billiardroom and the library, making a list of the furniture which she did notactually need. After that she began on the library shelves, listingsuch medical works as were of a technical nature. Books of fiction,history, art, and biography, and those books written by her father shedid not include. She found that she had a long task which would occupyseveral evenings. Her mind was methodical and she had been with herfather through sufficient business transactions to understand that inorder to drive a good bargain she must know how many volumes she had tooffer and the importance of their authors as medical authorities; sheshould also know the exact condition of each set of books. Since shehad made up her mind to let them go, and she knew the value of many ofthe big, leather-bound volumes, she determined that she would not sellthem until she could secure the highest possible price for them. Two months previously she would have consulted John Gilman and askedhim to arrange the transaction for her. Since he had allowed himself tobe duped so easily—or at least it had seemed easy to Linda; for, muchas she knew of Eileen, she could not possibly know the weeks of secretplotting, the plans for unexpected meetings, the trumped-up businessproblems necessary to discuss, the deliberate flaunting of her physicalcharms before him, all of which had made his conquest extremely hardfor Eileen, but Linda, seeing only results, had thought it contemptiblyeasy—she would not ask John Gilman anything. She would go ahead on thebasis of her agreement with Eileen and do the best she could alone. She counted on Saturday to dispose of the furniture. The books mightgo at her leisure. Then the first of the week she could select suchfurniture as she desired in order to arrange the billiard room for herstudy. If she had a suitable place in which to work in seclusion, thereneed be no hurry about the library. She conscientiously prepared allthe lessons required in her school course for the next day and then,stacking her books, she again unlocked the drawer opened the previousevening, and taking from it the same materials, set to work. She wrote: Botanists have failed to mention that there is any connectionbetween asparagus, originally a product of salt marshes, andYucca, a product of the alkaline desert. Very probably there is nobotanical relationship, but these two plants are alike in flavor.From the alkaline, sunbeaten desert where the bayonet plant thrustsup a tender bloom head six inches in height, it slowly increases instature as it travels across country more frequently rain washed,and winds its way beside mountain streams to where in more fertilesoil and the same sunshine it develops magnificent specimens fromten to fifteen and more feet in height. The plant grows a numberof years before it decides to flower. When it reaches maturity itthrows up a bloom stem as tender as the delicate head of asparagus,thick as one’s upper arm, and running to twice one’s height.This bloom stem in its early stages is coloured the pale pink ofasparagus, with faint touches of yellow, and hints of blue. Atmaturity it breaks into a gorgeous head of lavender-tinted, creamypendent flowers covering the upper third of its height, billowingout slightly in the centre, so that from a distance the waxentorch takes on very much the appearance of a flaming candle. Forthis reason, in Mexico, where the plant flourishes in even greaterabundance than in California, with the exquisite poetry commonto the tongue and heart of the Spaniard, Yucca Whipplei has beencommonly named “Our Lord’s Candle.” At the most delicate time oftheir growth these candlesticks were roasted and eaten by theIndians. Based upon this knowledge, I would recommend two dishes,almost equally delicious, which may be prepared from this plant. Take the most succulent young bloom stems when they have exactlythe appearance of an asparagus head at its moment of deliciousperfection. With a sharp knife, cut them in circles an inch indepth. Arrange these in a shallow porcelain baking dish, sprinklewith salt, dot them with butter, add enough water to keep themfrom sticking and burning. Bake until thoroughly tender. Use apancake turner to slide the rings to a hot platter, and garnishwith circles of hard-boiled egg. This you will find an extremelydelicate and appetizing dish. The second recipe I would offer is to treat this vegetableprecisely as you would creamed asparagus. Cut the stalks insix-inch lengths, quarter them to facilitate cooking and handling,and boil in salted water. Drain, arrange in a hot dish, and pourover a carefully made cream sauce. I might add that one stalk wouldfurnish sufficient material for several families. This dish shouldbe popular in southwestern states where the plant grows profusely;and to cultivate these plants for shipping to Eastern marketswould be quite as feasible as the shipping of asparagus, rhubarb,artichokes, or lettuce. I have found both these dishes peculiarly appetizing, but I shouldbe sorry if, in introducing Yucca as a food, I became instrumentalin the extermination of this universal and wonderfully beautifulplant. For this reason I have hesitated about including Yucca amongthese articles; but when I see the bloom destroyed ruthlessly bythousands who cut it to decorate touring automobiles and fruit andvegetable stands beside the highways, who carry it from its nativelocation and stick it in the parching sun of the seashore as atemporary shelter, I feel that the bloom stems might as well beused for food as to be so ruthlessly wasted. The plant is hardy in the extreme, growing in the most unfavourableplaces, clinging tenaciously to sheer mountain and canyon walls.After blooming and seeding the plant seems to have thrown everyparticle of nourishment it contains into its development, it driesout and dies (the spongy wood is made into pin-cushions for the artstores); but from the roots there spring a number of young plants,which, after a few years of growth, mature and repeat their lifecycle, while other young plants develop from the widely scatteredseeds. The Spaniards at times call the plant Quiota. This wordseems to be derived from quiotl, which is the Aztec name forAgave, from which plant a drink not unlike beer is produced, andsuggests the possibility that there might have been a time when thesucculent flower stem of the Yucca furnished drink as well as foodfor the Indians. After carefully re-reading and making several minor corrections, Lindapicked up her pencil, and across the top of a sheet of heavy papersketched the peaks of a chain of mountains. Across the base she drew astretch of desert floor, bristling with the thorns of many differentcacti brilliant with their gold, pink, and red bloom, intermingled withfine grasses and desert flower faces. At the left she painstakinglydrew a huge plant of yucca with a perfect circle of bayonets, from thecenter of which uprose the gigantic flower stem the length of her page,and on the misty bloom of the flaming tongue she worked quite as lateas Marian Thorne had ever seen a light burning in her window. When shehad finished her drawing she studied it carefully a long time, adding atouch here and there, and then she said softly: “There, Daddy, I feelthat even you would think that a faithful reproduction To-morrow nightI’ll paint it.” John Gilman saw the light from Linda’s window when he brought Eileenhome that night, and when he left he glanced that way again, and wassurprised to see the room still lighted, and the young figure bendingover a work table. He stood very still for a few minutes, wonderingwhat could keep Linda awake so far into the night, and while histhoughts were upon her he wondered, too, why she did not care tohave beautiful clothes such as Eileen wore; and then he went furtherand wondered why, when she could be as entertaining as she had beenthe night she joined them at dinner, she did not make her appearanceoftener; and then, because the mind is a queer thing, and he hadwondered about a given state of affairs, he went a step further, andwondered whether the explanation lay in Linda’s inclinations or inEileen’s management, and then his thought fastened tenaciously upon thesubject of Eileen’s management. He was a patient man. He had allowed his reason and better judgmentto be swayed by Eileen’s exquisite beauty and her blandishments. Hedid not regret having discovered before it was too late that MarianThorne was not the girl he had thought her. He wanted a wife cut afterthe clinging-vine pattern. He wanted to be the dominating figure inhis home. It had not taken Eileen long to teach him that Marian wasself-assertive and would do a large share of dominating herself. He hadthought that he was perfectly satisfied and very happy with Eileen; yetthat day he repeatedly had felt piqued and annoyed with her. She hadopenly cajoled and flirted with Henry Anderson past a point which wasagreeable for any man to see his sweetheart go with another man. WithPeter Morrison she had been unspeakably charming in a manner with whichJohn was very familiar. He turned up his coat collar, thrust his hands in his pockets, andswore softly. Looking straight ahead of him, he should have seen astretch of level sidewalk, bordered on one hand by lacy, tropicalfoliage, on the other, by sheets of level green lawn, broken everywhereby the uprising boles of great trees, clumps of rare vines, and rowsof darkened homes, attractive in architectural design, vine covered,hushed for the night. What he really saw was a small plateau, sunillumined, at the foot of a mountain across the valley, where the lilacwall was the bluest, where the sun shone slightly more golden thananywhere else in the valley, where huge live oaks outstretched ruggedarms, where the air had a tang of salt, a tinge of sage, an odour oforange, shot through with snowy coolness, thrilled with bird song, andthe laughing chuckle of a big spring breaking from the foot of themountain. They had left the road and followed a narrow, screened pathby which they came unexpectedly into this opening. They had stood uponit in wordless enchantment, looking down the slope beneath it, acrossthe peace of the valley, to the blue ranges beyond. “Just where are we?” Peter Morrison had asked at last. John Gilman had been looking at a view which included Eileen. Shelifted her face, flushed and exquisite, to Peter Morrison and answeredin a breathless undertone, yet John had distinctly heard her: “How wonderful it would be if we were at yourhouse. Oh, I envythe woman who shares this with you!” It had not been anything in particular, yet all day it had teased JohnGilman’s sensibilities. He felt ashamed of himself for not being moreenthusiastic as he searched records and helped to locate the owner ofthat particular spot. To John, there was a new tone in Peter’s voice,a possessive light in his eyes as he studied the location, and madeexcursions in several directions, to fix in his mind the exact positionof the land. He had indicated what he considered the topographical location for ahouse—stood on it facing the valley, and stepped the distance suitablyfar away to set a garage and figured on a short private road down tothe highway. He very plainly was deeply prepossessed with a locationJohn Gilman blamed himself for not having found first. Certainly naturehad here grown and walled a dream garden in which to set a house ofdreams. So, past midnight, Gilman stood in the sunshine, looking atthe face of the girl he had asked to marry him and who had said thatshe would; and a small doubt crept into his heart, and a feeling thatperhaps life might be different for him if Peter Morrison decided tocome to Lilac Valley to build his home. Then the sunlight faded, nightclosed in, but as he went his homeward way John Gilman was thinking,thinking deeply and not at all happily. Linda was chanting happily as she entered the kitchen early Saturdaymorning. “Katy, me blessing,” she said gaily, “did I ever point out to you theinteresting fact that I was born on Saturday? And a de’ilish piece ofluck it was, for I have been hustling ever since. It’s bad enough tohave been born on Monday and spoiled wash day, but I call Saturday thevanishing point, the end of the extreme limit.” Katy laughed, and, as always, turned adoring eyes on Linda. “I am not needing ye, lambie,” she said. “Is it big business in thecanyon ye’re having to-day? Shall I be ready to be cooking up one ofthem God-forsaken Red Indian messes for ye when ye come back?” Linda held up a warning finger. “Hist, Katy,” she said. “That is a dark secret. Don’t you be forgettingyourself and saying anything like that before anyone, or I would beruined entirely.” “Well, I did think when ye began it,” said Katy, “that of all the wildfoolishness ye and your pa had ever gone through with, that was theworst, but that last mess ye worked out was so tasty to the tongue thatI thought of it a lot, and I’m kind o’ hankering for more.” Linda caught Katy and swung her around the kitchen in a wild war dance.Her gayest laugh bubbled clear from the joy peak of her soul. “Katy,” she said, “if you had lain awake all night trying to saysomething that would particularly please me, you couldn’t have donebetter. That was a quaint little phrase and a true little phrase, and Iknow a little spot that it will fit exactly. What am I doing the day?Well, several things, Katy. First, anything you need about the house.Next, I am going to empty the billiard room and sell some of the excessfurniture of the library, and with the returns I am going to buy me arug and a table and some tools to work with, so I won’t have to clutterup my bedroom with my lessons and things I bring in that I want tosave. And then I am going to sell the technical stuff from the libraryand use that money where it will be of greatest advantage to me. Andthen, Katy, I am going to manicure the Bear-cat and I am going to driveit again.” Linda hesitated. Katy stood very still, thinking intently, but finallyshe said: “That’s all right; ye have got good common sense; your nervesare steady; your pa drilled ye fine. Many’s the time he has braggedto me behind your back what a fine little driver he was making of ye.I don’t know a girl of your age anywhere that has less enjoyment thanye. If it would be giving ye any happiness to be driving that car, yejust go ahead and drive it, lambie, but ye promise me here and now thatye will be mortal careful. In all my days I don’t think I have seen ameaner looking little baste of a car.” “Of course I’ll be careful, Katy,” said Linda. “That car was not boughtfor its beauty. Its primal object in this world was to arrive. Gee,how we shot curves, and coasted down the canyons, and gassed up on thelevel when some poor soul went batty from nerve strain! The truth is,Katy, that you can’t drive very slowly. You have got to go the speedfor which it was built. But I have had my training. I won’t forget. Iadore that car, Katy, and I don’t know how I have ever kept my fingersoff it this long. To-day it gets a bath and a facial treatment, andwhen I have thought up some way to meet my big problem, you’re going tohave a ride, Katy, that will quite uplift your soul. We’ll go scootingthrough the canyons, and whizzing around the mountains, and roaringalong the beach, as slick as a white sea swallow.” “Now, easy, lambie, easy,” said Katy. “Ye’re planning to speed thatthing before ye’ve got it off the jacks.” “No, that was mere talk,” said Linda. “But, Katy, this is my great day.I feel in my bones that I shall have enough money by night to get mesome new tires, which I must have before I can start out in safety.” “Of course ye must, honey. I would just be tickled to pieces to let yehave what ye need.” Linda slid her hand across Katy’s lips and gathered her close in herarms. “You blessed old darling,” she said. “Of course you would, but I don’tneed it, Katy. I can sit on the floor to work, if I must, and insteadof taking the money from the billiard table to buy a work table, Ican buy tires with that. But here’s another thing I want to tell you,Katy. This afternoon a male biped is coming to this house, and he’s notcoming to see Eileen. His name is Donald Whiting, and when he tellsyou it is, and stands very straight and takes off his hat, and looksyou in the eye and says, ‘Calling on Miss Linda Strong,’ walk him intothe living room, Katy, and seat him in the best chair and put a bookbeside him and the morning paper; and don’t you forget to do it with aflourish. He is nothing but a high-school kid, but he’s the first boythat ever in all my days asked to come to see me so it’s a big event;and I wish to my soul I had something decent to wear.” “Well, with all the clothes in this house,” said Katy; and then shestopped and shut her lips tight and looked at Linda with belligerentIrish eyes. “I know it,” nodded Linda in acquiescence; “I know what you think; butnever mind. Eileen has agreed to make me a fair allowance the first ofthe month, and if that isn’t sufficient, I may possibly figure up someway to do some extra work that will bring me a few honest pennies, soI can fuss up enough to look feminine at times, Katy. In the meantime,farewell, oh, my belovedest. Call me at half-past eight, so I will beready for business at nine.” Then Linda went to the garage and began operations. She turned thehose on the car and washed the dust from it carefully. Then she driedit with the chamois skins as she often had done before. She carefullyexamined the cushioning, and finding it dry and hard, she gave it abath of olive oil and wiped and manipulated it. She cleaned the enginewith extreme care. At one minute she was running to Katy for keroseneto pour through the engine to loosen the carbon. At another she wastelephoning for the delivery of oil, gasoline, and batteries for whichshe had no money to pay, so she charged them to Eileen, ordering thebill to be sent on the first of the month. It seemed to her that shehad only a good start when Katy came after her. The business of appraising the furniture was short, and Linda was wellsatisfied with the price she was offered for it. After the man hadgone she showed Katy the pieces she had marked to dispose of, and toldher when they would be called for. She ate a few bites of lunch whilewaiting for the book man, and the results of her business with himquite delighted Linda. She had not known that the value of books hadrisen with the price of everything else. The man with whom she dealthad known her father. He had appreciated the strain in her nature whichmade her suggest that he should number and appraise the books, but shemust be allowed time to go through each volume in order to remove anyscraps of paper or memoranda which her father so frequently left inbooks to which he was referring. He had figured carefully and he hadmade Linda a far higher price than could have been secured by a man. Asthe girl went back to her absorbing task in the garage, she could seeher way clear to the comforts and conveniences and the material thatshe needed for her work. When she reached the car she patted it as ifit had been a living creature. “Cheer up, nice old thing,” she said gaily. “I know how to get newtires for you, and you shall drink all the gasoline and oil your tummycan hold. Now let me see. What must I do next? I must get you off yourjacks; and oh, my gracious! there are the grease cups, and that’s anasty job, but it must be done; and what is the use of Saturday if Ican’t do it? Daddy often did.” Linda began work in utter absorption. She succeeded in getting the caroff the jacks. She was lying on her back under it, filling some of themost inaccessible grease cups, and she was softly singing as she worked: “The shoes I wear are common-sense shoes——” At that minute Donald Whiting swung down the street, turned in at theStrong residence, and rang the bell. Eileen was coming down the stairs,dressed for the street. She had inquired for Linda, and Katy had toldher that she thought Miss Linda had decided to begin using her car, andthat she was in the garage working on it. To Eileen’s credit it may besaid that she had not been told that a caller was expected. Linda neverbefore had had a caller and, as always, Eileen was absorbed in her ownconcerns. Had she got the rouge a trifle brighter on one cheek thanon the other? Was the powder evenly distributed? Would the veil holdthe handmade curls in exactly the proper place? When the bell rang herone thought might have been that some of her friends were calling forher. She opened the door, and when she learned that Linda was beingasked for, it is possible that she mistook the clean, interesting, andwell-dressed youngster standing before her for a mechanician. What shesaid was: “Linda’s working on her car. Go around to the left and youwill find her in the garage, and for heaven’s sake, get it right beforeyou let her start out, for we’ve had enough horror in this family frommotor accidents.” Then she closed the door before him and stood buttoning her gloves; awicked and malicious smile spreading over her face. “Just possibly,” she said, “that youngster is from a garage, but if heis, he’s the best imitation of the real thing that I have seen in thesechaotic days.” Donald Whiting stopped at the garage door and looked in, before Lindahad finished her grease cups, and in time to be informed that he mightwear common-sense shoes if he chose. At his step, Linda rolled herblack head on the cement floor and raised her eyes. She dropped thegrease cup, and her face reddened deeply. “Oh, my Lord!” she gasped breathlessly. “I forgot to tell Katy when tocall me!” In that instant she also forgot that the stress of the previous fouryears had accustomed men to seeing women do any kind of work in anykind of costume; but soon Linda realized that Donald Whiting was notpaying any particular attention either to her or to her occupation. Hewas leaning forward, gazing at the car with positively an enrapturedexpression on his eager young face. “Shades of Jehu!” he cried. “It’s a Bear-cat!” Linda felt around her head for the grease cup. “Why, sure it’s a Bear-cat,” she said with the calmness of completerecovery. “And it’s just about ready to start for its very own cave inthe canyon.” Donald Whiting pitched his hat upon the seat, shook off his coat, andsent it flying after the hat. Then he began unbuttoning and turningback his sleeves. “Here, let me do that,” he said authoritatively. “Gee! I have never yetridden in a Bear-cat. Take me with you, will you, Linda?” “Sure,” said Linda, pressing the grease into the cup with a littlepaddle and holding it up to see if she had it well filled. “Sure, butthere’s no use in you getting into this mess, because I have only gottwo more. You look over the engine. Did you ever grind valves, and doyou think these need it?” “Why, they don’t need it,” said Donald, “if they were all right when itwas jacked up.” “Well, they were,” said Linda. “It was running like a watch when itwent to sleep. But do we dare take it out on these tires?” “How long has it been?” asked Donald, busy at the engine. “All of four years,” answered Linda. Donald whistled softly and started a circuit of the car, kicking thetires and feeling them. “Have you filled them?” he asked. “No,” said Linda. “I did not want to start the engine until I hadfinished everything else.” “All right,” he said, “I’ll look at the valves first and then, ifit is all ready, there ought to be a garage near that we can run tocarefully, and get tuned up.” “There is,” said Linda. “There is one only a few blocks down the streetwhere Dad always had anything done that he did not want to do himself.” “That’s that, then,” said Donald. Linda crawled from under the car and stood up, wiping her hands on abit of waste. “Do you know what tires cost now?” she asked anxiously. “They have ’em at the garage,” answered Donald, “and if I were you,I wouldn’t get a set; I would get two. I would put them on the rearwheels. You might be surprised at how long some of these will last.Anyway, that would be the thing to do.” “Of course,” said Linda, in a relieved tone. “That wouldbe thething to do.” “Now,” she said, “I must be excused a few minutes till I clean up so Iam fit to go on the streets. I hope you won’t think I forgot you werecoming.” Donald laughed drily. “When ‘shoes’ was the first word I heard,” he said, “I did not for aminute think you had forgotten.” “No, I didn’t forget,” said Linda. “What I did do was to become soexcited about cleaning up the car that I let time go faster than Ithought it could. That was what made me late.” “Well, forget it!” said Donald. “Run along and jump into something, andlet us get our tires and try Kitty out.” Linda reached up and released the brakes. She stepped to one side ofthe car and laid her hands on it. “Let us run it down opposite the kitchen door,” she said, “then you goaround to the front, and I’ll let you in, and you can read something afew minutes till I make myself presentable.” “Oh, I’ll stay out here and look around the yard and go over the caragain,” said the boy. “What a bunch of stuff you have got growing here;I don’t believe I ever saw half of it before.” “It’s Daddy’s and my collection,” said Linda. “Some day I’ll show yousome of the things, and tell you how we got them, and why they arerare. To-day I just naturally can’t wait a minute until I try my car.” “Is it really yours?” asked Donald enviously. “Yes,” said Linda. “It’s about the only thing on earth that ispeculiarly and particularly mine. I haven’t a doubt there are improvedmodels, but Daddy had driven this car only about nine months. It wasgoing smooth as velvet, and there’s no reason why it should not keepit up, though I suspect that by this time there are later models thatcould outrun it.” “Oh, I don’t know,” said the boy. “It looks like some little old car tome. I bet it can just skate.” “I know it can,” said Linda, “if I haven’t neglected something. We’llstart carefully, and we’ll have the inspector at the salesrooms look itover.” Then Linda entered the kitchen door to find Katy with everything ediblethat the house afforded spread before her on the table. “Why, Katy, what are you doing?” she asked. “I was makin’ ready,” explained Katy, “to fix ye the same kind of lunchI would for Miss Eileen. Will ye have it under the live oak, or in theliving room?” “Neither,” said Linda. “Come upstairs with me, and in the storeroomyou’ll find the lunch case and the thermos bottles; and don’t stintyourself, Katy. This is a rare occasion. It never happened before.Probably it will never happen again. Let’s make it high altitude whilewe are at it.” “I’ll do my very best with what I happen to have,” said Katy; “but Iwarn you right now I am making a good big hole in the Sunday dinner.” “I don’t give two whoops,” said Linda, “if there isn’t any Sundaydinner. In memory of hundreds of times that we have eaten bread andmilk, make it a banquet, Katy, and we’ll eat bread and milk to-morrow.” Then she took the stairway at a bound, and ran to her room. In a veryshort time she emerged, clad in a clean blouse and breeches’ herclimbing boots, her black hair freshly brushed and braided. “I ought to have something,” said Linda, “to shade my eyes. The glare’shard on them facing the sun.” Going down the hall she came to the storeroom, opened a drawer, andpicked out a fine black felt Alpine hat that had belonged to herfather. She carried it back to her room and, standing at the glass,tried it on, pulling it down on one side, turning it up at the other,and striking a deep cleft across the crown. She looked at herselfintently for a minute, and then she reached up and deliberatelyloosened the hair at her temples. “Not half bad, all things considered, Linda,” she said. “But, oh, howyou do need a tich of colour.” She ran down the hall and opened the door to Eileen’s room, and goingto her chiffonier, pulled out a drawer containing an array of gloves,veils, and ribbons. At the bottom of the ribbon stack, her eye caughtthe gleam of colour for which she was searching, and she deftly slippedout a narrow scarf of Roman stripes with a deep black fringe at theend. Sitting down, she fitted the hat over her knee, picked up thedressing-table scissors, and ripped off the band. In its place shefitted the ribbon, pinning it securely and knotting the ends so thatthe fringe reached her shoulder. Then she tried the hat again. Theresult was blissfully satisfactory. The flash of orange, the blaze ofred, the gleam of green, were what she needed. “Thank you very much, sister mine,” she said, “I know you would beperfectly delighted to loan me this.” Then she went downstairs and walked into the kitchen, prepared for whatshe would see, by what she heard as she approached. With Katy’s apron tied around his waist, Donald Whiting was occupied insqueezing orange, lemon, and pineapple juice over a cake of ice in abig bowl, preparatory to the compounding of Katy’s most delicious brandof fruit punch. Without a word, Linda stepped to the bread board andbegan slicing the bread and building sandwiches, while Katy hurried herpreparations for filling the lunch box. A few minutes later Katy packedthem in the car, kissed Linda good-bye, and repeatedly cautioned Donaldto make her be careful. As the car rolled down the driveway and into the street, Donald lookedappraisingly at the girl beside him. “Is it the prevailing custom in Lilac Valley for young ladies to kissthe cook?” inquired Donald laughingly. “Now, you just hush,” said Linda. “Katy is notthe cook, alone.Katy’s my father, and my mother, and my family, and my best friend——” “Stop right there,” interposed Donald. “That is quite enough for anyhuman to be. Katy’s a multitude. She came out to the car with thecanteen, and when I offered to help her, without any ‘polly foxin’,’she just said: ‘Sure. Come in and make yourself useful.’ So I went, andI am expecting amazing results from the job she gave me.” “Come to think of it,” said Linda, “I have small experience withanybody’s cooking except Katy’s and my own, but so far as I know, shecan’t very well be beaten.” Carefully she headed the car into the garage adjoining the salesrooms.There she had an ovation. The manager and several of the men rememberedher. The whole force clustered around the Bear-cat and began to examineit, and comment on it, and Linda climbed out and asked to have thecarburetor adjusted, while the mechanician put on a pair of tires. Wheneverything was satisfactory, she backed to the street, and after a fewblocks of experimental driving, she headed for the Automobile Club toarrange for her license and then turned straight toward MultifloresCanyon, but she did not fail to call Donald Whiting’s attention toevery beauty of Lilac Valley as they passed through. When they hadreached a long level stretch of roadway leading to the canyon, Lindaglanced obliquely at the boy beside her. “It all comes back as natural as breathing,” she said. “I couldn’tforget it any more than I could forget how to walk, or to swim. Sittight. I am going to step on the gas for a bit, just for old sake’ssake.” “That’s all right,” said Donald, taking off his hat and giving his heada toss so that the wind might have full play through his hair. “Butremember our tires are not safe. Better not go the limit until we getrid of these old ones, and have a new set all around.” Linda settled back in her seat, took a firm grip on the wheel, andstarted down the broad, smooth highway, gradually increasing the speed.The colour rushed to her cheeks. Her eyes were gleaming. “Listen to it purr!” she cried to Donald. “If you hear it begin togrowl, tell me.” And then for a few minutes they rode like birds on the path of thewind. When they approached the entrance to the canyon, gradually Lindaslowed down. She turned an exultant flashing face to Donald Whiting. “That was a whizzer,” said the boy. “I’ll tell you I don’t know whatI’d give to have a car like this for my very own. I’ll bet not anothergirl in Los Angeles has a car that can go like that.” “And I don’t believe I have any business with it,” said Linda; “butsince circumstances make it mine, I am going to keep it and I am goingto drive it.” “Of course you are,” said Donald emphatically. “Don’t you ever letanybody fool you out of this car, because if they wanted to, it wouldbe just because they are jealous to think they haven’t one that will goas fast.” “There’s not the slightest possibility of my giving it up so long as Ican make the engine turn over,” she said. “I told you how Father alwaystook me around with him, and there’s nothing in this world I am so sureof as I am sure that I am spoiled for a house cat. I have probablyless feminine sophistication than any girl of my age in the world, andI probably know more about camping and fishing and the scientific whyand wherefore of all outdoors than most of them. I just naturally hadsuch a heavenly time with Daddy that it never has hurt my feelings tobe left out of any dance or party that ever was given. The one thingthat has hurt is the isolation. Since I lost Daddy I haven’t any onebut Katy. Sometimes, when I see a couple of nice, interesting girlsvisiting with their heads together, a great feeling of envy wells up inmy soul, and I wish with all my heart that I had such a friend.” “Ever try to make one?” asked Donald. “There are mighty fine girls inthe High School.” “I have seen several that I thought I would like to be friends with,”said Linda, “but I am so lacking in feminine graces that I haven’tknown how to make advances, in the first place, and I haven’t had thecourage, in the second.” “I wish my sister were not so much older than you,” said Donald. “How old is your sister?” inquired Linda. “She will be twenty-three next birthday,” said Donald; “and of all thenice girls you ever saw, she is the queen.” “Yes,” she assented, “I am sure I have heard your sister mentioned. Butdidn’t you tell me she had been reared for society?” “No, I did not,” said Donald emphatically. “I told you Mother believedin dressing her as the majority of other girls were dressed, but Ididn’t say she had been reared for society. She has been reared with aneye single to making a well-dressed, cultured, and gracious woman.” “I call that fine,” said Linda. “Makes me envious of you. Now forgeteverything except your eyes and tell me what you see. Have you everbeen here before?” “I have been through a few times before, but seems to me I never saw itlooking quite so pretty.” Linda drove carefully, but presently Donald uttered an exclamation asshe swerved from the road and started down what appeared to be quite asteep embankment and headed straight for the stream. “Sit tight,” she said tersely. “The Bear-cat just loves its cave. Itknows where it is going.” She broke through a group of young willows and ran the car into a tinyplateau, walled in a circle by the sheer sides of the canyon reachingupward almost out of sight, topped with great jagged overhangingboulders. Crowded to one side, she stopped the car and sat quietly,smiling at Donald Whiting. “How about it?” she asked in a low voice. The boy looked around him, carefully examining the canyon walls, andthen at the level, odorous floor where one could not step withoutcrushing tiny flowers of white, cerise, blue, and yellow. Big fernsgrew along the walls, here and there “Our Lord’s Candles” lifted hightorches not yet lighted, the ambitious mountain stream skipped andcircled and fell over its rocky bed, while many canyon wrens weresinging. “Do you think,” she said, “that anyone driving along here at anordinary rate of speed would see that car?” “No,” said Donald, getting her idea, “I don’t believe they would.” “All right, then,” said Linda. “Toe up even and I’ll race YoU to thethird curve where you see the big white sycamore.” Donald had a fleeting impression of a flash of khaki, a gleam of red,and a wave of black as they started. He ran with all the speed he hadever attained at a track meet. He ran with all his might. He ran untilhis sides strained and his breath came short; but the creature besidehim was not running; she was flying; and long before they neared thesycamore he knew he was beaten, so he laughingly cried to her to stopit. Linda turned to him panting and laughing. “I make that dash every time I come to the canyon, to keep my muscleup, but this is the first time I have had anyone to race with in a longtime.” Then together they slowly walked down the smooth black floor betweenthe canyon walls. As they crossed a small bridge Linda leaned over andlooked down. “Anyone at your house care about ‘nose twister’?” she asked lightly. “Why, isn’t that watercress?” asked Donald. “Sure it is,” said Linda. “Anyone at your house like it?” “Every one of us,” answered Donald. “We’re all batty about cresssalad—and, say, that reminds me of something! If you know so much aboutthis canyon and everything in it, is there any place in it where afellow could find a plant, a kind of salad lettuce, that the Indiansused to use?” “Might be,” said Linda carelessly. “For why?” “Haven’t you heard of the big sensation that is being made in femininecircles by the new department in Everybody’s Home?” inquiredDonald. “Mother and Mary Louise were discussing it the other day atlunch, and they said that some of the recipes for dishes to be madefrom stuff the Indians used sounded delicious. One reminded them ofcress, and when we saw the cress I wondered if I could get them some ofthe other.” “Might,” said Linda drily, “if you could give me a pretty good idea ofwhat it is that you want.” “When you know cress, it’s queer that you wouldn’t know other things inyour own particular canyon,” said Donald. Linda realized that she had overdone her disinterestedness a trifle. “I suspect it’s miners’ lettuce you want,” she said. “Of course I knowwhere there’s some, but you will want it as fresh as possible if youtake any, so we’ll finish our day first and gather it the last thingbefore we leave.” How it started neither of them noticed, but they had not gone farbefore they were climbing the walls and hanging to precarious footings.Her cheeks flushed, her eyes brilliant, her lips laughing, Linda wasshowing Donald thrifty specimens of that Cotyledon known as “old henand chickens,” telling him of the rare Echeveria of the same family,and her plunge down the canyon side while trying to uproot it, exultingthat she had brought down the plant without a rift in the exquisitebloom on its leaves. Linda told about her fall, and the two men who had passed at thatinstant, and how she had met them later, and who they were, and whatthey were doing. Then Donald climbed high for a bunch of larkspur, andLinda showed him how to turn his back to the canyon wall and come downwith the least possible damage to his person and clothing. When at lastboth of them were tired they went back to the car. Linda spread anold Indian blanket over the least flower-grown spot she could select,brought out the thermos bottles and lunch case, and served their lunch.With a glass of fruit punch in one hand and a lettuce sandwich in theother, Donald smiled at Linda. “I’ll agree about Katy. She knows how,” he said appreciatively. “Katy is more than a cook,” said Linda quietly. “She is a human being.She has the biggest, kindest heart. When anybody’s sick or in troubleshe’s the greatest help. She is honest; she has principles; she isintelligent. In her spare time she reads good books and magazines. Sheknows what is going on in the world. She can talk intelligently onalmost any subject. It’s no disgrace to be a cook. If it were, Katywould be unspeakable. Fact is, at the present minute there’s no one inall the world so dear to me as Katy. I always talk Irish with her.” “Well, I call that rough on your sister,” said Donald. “Maybe it is,” conceded Linda. “I suspect a lady wouldn’t have saidthat, but Eileen and I are so different. She never has made theslightest effort to prove herself lovable to me, and so I have neverlearned to love her. Which reminds me—how did you happen to come to thegarage?” “The very beautiful young lady who opened the door mistook me for amechanician. She told me I would find you working on your car and forgoodness’ sake to see that it was in proper condition before you droveit.” Linda looked at him with wide, surprised eyes in which a trace ofindignation was plainly discernible. “Now listen to me,” she said deliberately. “Eileen is a mostsophisticated young lady. If she saw you, she never in this world,thought you were a mechanic sent from a garage presenting yourself atour front door.” “There might have been a spark of malice in the big blue-gray I eyesthat carefully appraised me,” said Donald. “Your choice of words is good,” said Linda, refilling the punch glass.“‘Appraise’ fits Eileen like her glove. She appraises every thing on amonetary basis, and when she can’t figure that it’s going to be worthan appreciable number of dollars and cents to her—‘to the garage widit,’ as Katy would say.” When they had finished their lunch Linda began packing the box andDonald sat watching her. “At this point,” said Linda, “Daddy always smoked. Do you smoke?” There was a hint of deeper colour in the boy’s cheeks. “I did smoke an occasional cigarette,” he said lightly, “up to the day,not a thousand years ago, when a very emphatic young lady who shouldhave known, insinuated that it was bad for the nerves, and going onthe presumption that she knew, I haven’t smoked a cigarette since andI’m not going to until I find out whether I can do better work withoutthem.” Linda folded napkins and packed away accessories thoughtfully. Then shelooked into the boy’s eyes. “Now we reach the point of our being here together,” she said. “It’stime to fight, and I am sorry we didn’t go at it gas and bomb theminute we met. You’re so different from what I thought you were. Ifanyone had told me a week ago that you would take off your coat andmess with my automobile engine, or wear Katy’s apron and squeeze lemonsin our kitchen I would have looked him over for Daddy’s high sign ofhysteria, at least. It’s too bad to I have such a good time as I havehad this afternoon, and then end with a fight.” “That’s nothing,” said Donald. “You couldn’t have had as good a time asI have had. You’re like another boy. A fellow can be just a fellow withyou, and somehow you make everything you touch mean something it nevermeant before. You have made me feel that I would be about twice the manI am if I had spent the time I have wasted in plain jazzing around,hunting Cotyledon or trap-door spiders’ nests.” “I get you,” said Linda. “It’s the difference between a girl reared inan atmosphere of georgette and rouge, and one who has grown up in thecanyons with the oaks and sycamores. One is natural and the other isartificial. Most boys prefer the artificial.” “I thought I did myself,” said Donald, “but to-day has taught me that Idon’t. I think, Linda, that you would make the finest friend a fellowever had. I firmly and finally decline to fight with you; but for God’ssake, Linda, tell me how I can beat that little cocoanut-headed Jap.” Linda slammed down the lid to the lunch box. Her voice was smooth andeven but there was battle in her eyes and she answered decisively:“Well, you can’t beat him calling him names. There is only one way onGod’s footstool that you can beat him. You can’t beat him legislatingagainst him. You can’t beat him boycotting him. You can’t beat him withany tricks. He is as sly as a cat and he has got a whole bag full oftricks of his own, and he has proved right here in Los Angeles thathe has got a brain that is hard to beat. All you can do, and be a mancommendable to your own soul, is to take his subject and put your brainon it to such purpose that you cut pigeon wings around him. What areyou studying in your classes, anyway?” “Trigonometry, Rhetoric, Ancient History, Astronomy,” answered Donald. “And is your course the same as his?” inquired Linda. “Strangely enough it is,” answered Donald. “We have been in the sameclasses all through high school. I think the little monkey——” “Man, you mean,” interposed Linda. “‘Man,’” conceded Donald. “Has waited until I selected my course allthe way through, and then he has announced what he would take. Heprobably figured that I had somebody with brains back of the course Iselected, and that whatever I studied would be suitable for him.” “I haven’t a doubt of it,” said Linda. “They are quick; oh! they arequick; and they know from their cradles what it is that they have inthe backs of their heads. We are not going to beat them driving them toMexico or to Canada, or letting them monopolize China. That is merelytemporizing. That is giving them fertile soil on which to take the bestof their own and the level best of ours, and by amalgamating the two,build higher than we ever have. There is just one way in all this worldthat we can beat Eastern civilization and all that it intends to do tous eventually. The white man has dominated by his colour so far in thehistory of the world, but it is written in the Books that when the menof colour acquire our culture and combine it with their own methods ofliving and rate of production, they are going to bring forth greaternumbers, better equipped for the battle of life, than we are. When theyhave got our last secret, constructive or scientific, they will takeit, and living in a way that we would not, reproducing in numbers wedon’t, they will beat us at any game we start, if we don’t take warningwhile we are in the ascendancy, and keep there.” “Well, there is something to think about,” said Donald Whiting, staringpast Linda at the side of the canyon as if he had seen the samehandwriting on the wall that dismayed Belshazzar at the feast thatpreceded his downfall. “I see what you’re getting at,” he said. “I had thought that theremight be some way to circumvent him.” “There is!” broke in Linda hastily. “There is. You can beat him, butyou have got to beat him in an honourable way and in a way that is opento him as it is to you.” “I’ll do anything in the world if you will only tell me how,” saidDonald. “Maybe you think it isn’t grinding me and humiliating meproperly. Maybe you think Father and Mother haven’t warned me. Maybeyou think Mary Louise isn’t secretly ashamed of me. How can I beat him,Linda?” Linda’s eyes were narrowed to a mere line. She was staring at the wallback of Donald as if she hoped that Heaven would intercede in herfavour and write thereon a line that she might translate to the boy’sbenefit. “I have been watching pretty sharply,” she said. “Take them as a race,as a unit—of course there are exceptions, there always are—but thegreat body of them are mechanical. They are imitative. They are notdeveloping anything great of their own in their own country. Theyare spreading all over the world and carrying home sewing machinesand threshing machines and automobiles and cantilever bridges andsubmarines and aeroplanes—anything from eggbeaters to telescopes. Theyare not creating one single thing. They are not missing imitatingeverything that the white man can do anywhere else on earth. They arejust like the Germans so far as that is concerned.” “I get that, all right enough,” said Donald. “Now go on. What is yourdeduction? How the devil am I to beat the best? He is perfect, rightstraight along in everything.” The red in Linda’s cheeks deepened. Her eyes opened their widest. Sheleaned forward, and with her closed fist, pounded the blanket beforehim. “Then, by gracious,” she said sternly, “you have got to do somethingnew. You have got to be perfect, plus.” “‘Perfect, plus?’” gasped Donald. “Yes, sir!” said Linda emphatically. “You have got to be perfect, plus.If he can take his little mechanical brain and work a thing out till hehas got it absolutely right, you have got to go further than that anddiscover something pertaining to it not hitherto thought of and startsomething new. I tell you you must use your brains. You shouldbe more than an imitator. You must be a creator!” Donald started up and drew a deep breath. “Well, some job I call that,” he said. “Who do you think I am, theAlmighty?” “No,” said Linda quietly, “you are not. You are merely His son, createdin His own image, like Him, according to the Book, and you have gotto your advantage the benefit of all that has been learned down theages. We have got to take up each subject in your course, and to findsome different books treating this same subject. We have got to getat it from a new angle. We must dig into higher authorities. We havegot to coach you till, when you reach the highest note possible forthe parrot, you can go ahead and embellish it with a few mocking-birdflourishes. All Oka Sayye knows how to do is to learn the lesson inhis book perfectly, and he is 100 per cent. I have told you what youmust do to add the plus, and you can do it if you are the boy I takeyou for. People have talked about the ‘yellow peril’ till it’s got tobe a meaningless phrase. Somebody must wake up to the realization thatit’s the deadliest peril that ever has menaced white civilization. Whyshouldn’t you have your hand in such wonderful work?” “Linda,” said the boy breathlessly, “do you realize that you have beensaying ‘we’? Can you help me? Will you help me?” “No,” said Linda, “I didn’t realize that I had said ‘we.’ I didn’t meantwo people, just you and me. I meant all the white boys and girls ofthe High School and the city and the state and the whole world. If weare going to combat the ‘yellow peril’ we must combine against it. Wehave got to curb our appetites and train our brains and enlarge ourhearts till we are something bigger and finer and numerically greaterthan this yellow peril. We can’t take it and pick it up and push itinto the sea. We are not Germans and we are not Turks. I never wantedanything in all this world worse than I want to see you graduate aheadof Oka Sayye. And then I want to see the white boys and girls of Canadaand of England and of Norway and Sweden and Australia, and of the wholeworld doing exactly what I am recommending that you do in your classand what I am doing personally in my own. I have had Japs in my classesever since I have been in school, but Father always told me to studythem, to play the game fairly, but to beatthem in some way, insome fair way, to beat them at the game they are undertaking.” “Well, there is one thing you don’t take into consideration,” saidDonald. “All of us did not happen to be fathered by Alexander Strong.Maybe we haven’t all got your brains.” “Oh, pother!” said Linda. “I know of a case where a little Indian waspicked up from a tribal battlefield in South America and brought tothis country and put into our schools, and there was nothing that anywhite pupil in the school could do that he couldn’t, so long as it wasimitative work. You have got to be constructive. You have got to workout some way to get ahead of them; and if you will take the historyof the white races and go over their great achievements in mechanics,science, art, literature—anything you choose—when a white man isconstructive, when he does create, he can simply cut circles aroundthe coloured races. The thing is to get the boys and girls of to-dayto understand what is going on in the world, what they must do astheir share in making the world safe for their grandchildren. Life isa struggle. It always has been. It always will be. There is no betterstudy than to go into the canyons or the deserts and efface yourselfand watch life. It’s an all-day process of the stronger annihilatingthe weaker. The one inexorable thing in the world is Nature. The eagledominates the hawk; the hawk, the falcon; the falcon, the raven; and soon down to the place where the humming bird drives the moth from hisparticular trumpet flower. The big snake swallows the little one. Thebig bear appropriates the desirable cave.” “And is that what you are recommending people to do?” “No,” said Linda, “it is not. That is wild. We go a step ahead of thewild, or we ourselves become wild. We have brains, and with our brainswe must do in a scientific way what Nature does with tooth and claw.In other words, and to be concrete, put these things in the car whileI fold the blanket. We’ll gather our miners’ lettuce and then we’ll gohome and search Daddy’s library and see if there is anything bearing ina higher way on any subject you are taking, so that you can get fromit some new ideas, some different angle, some higher light, somethingthat will end in speedily prefacing Oka Sayye’s perfect with yourpluperfect!” Linda delivered Donald Whiting at his door with an armload of booksand a bundle of miners’ lettuce and then drove to her home in LilacValley—in the eye of the beholder on the floor-level macadam road; inher own eye she scarcely grazed it. The smooth, easy motion of the car,the softly purring engine were thrilling. The speed at which she wasgoing was like having wings on her body. The mental stimulus she hadexperienced in concentrating her brain on Donald Whiting’s problem hadstimulated her imagination. The radiant colour of spring; the chilled,perfumed, golden air; the sure sense of having found a friend, hadruffled the plumes of her spirit. On the home road Donald had plainlyindicated that he would enjoy spending the morrow with her, and shehad advised him to take the books she had provided and lock himself inhis room and sweat out some information about Monday’s lessons whichwould at least arrest his professor’s attention, and lead his mindto the fact that something was beginning to happen. And then she hadlaughingly added: “To-morrow is Katy’s turn. I told the old dear Iwould take her as soon as I felt the car was safe. Every day she doesmany things that she hopes will give me pleasure. This is one thing Ican do that I know will delight her.” “Next Saturday, then?” questioned Donald. And Linda nodded. “Sure thing. I’ll be thinking up some place extra interesting. Come inthe morning if you want, and we’ll take a lunch and go for the day.Which do you like best, mountains or canyons or desert or sea?” “I like it best wherever what you’re interested in takes you,” saidDonald simply. “All right, then,” answered Linda, “we’ll combine business andpleasure.” So they parted with another meeting arranged. When she reached home she found Katy tearfully rejoicing, plainlyrevealing how intensely anxious she had been. But when Linda toldher that the old tires had held, that the car ran wonderfully, thateverything was perfectly safe, that she drove as unconsciously as shebreathed, and that to-morrow Katy was to go for a long ride, her joywas incoherent. Linda laughed. She patted Katy and started down the hallway, when shecalled back: “What is this package?” “A delivery boy left it special only a few minutes ago. Must besomething Miss Eileen bought and thought she would want to-morrow, andthen afterward she got this invitation and went on as she was.” Linda stood gazing at the box. It did look so suspiciously like a dressbox. “Katy,” she said, “I have just about got an irresistible impulse topeep. I was telling Eileen last night of a dress I saw that I thoughtperfect. It suited me better than any other dress I ever did see.It was at ‘The Mode.’ This box is from ‘The Mode.’ Could there be apossibility that she sent it up specially for me?” “I think she would put your name on it if she meant it for ye,” saidKaty. “One peep would show me whether it is my dress or not,” said Linda,“and peep I’m going to.” She began untying the string. “There’s one thing,” said Katy, “Miss Eileen’s sizes would never fitye.” “Might,” conceded Linda. “I am taller than she is, but I could wearher waists if I wanted to, and she always alters her skirts herselfto save the fees. Glory be! This is my dress, and there’s a petticoatand stockings to match it. Why, the nice old thing! I suggested hardenough, but in my heart I hardly thought she would do it. Oh, dear, nowif I only had some shoes, and a hat.” Linda was standing holding the jacket in one hand, the stockings in theother, her face flaming. Katy drew herself to full height. She reachedover and picked the things from Linda’s fingers. “If ye know that is your dress, lambie,” she said authoritatively, “yego right out and get into that car and run to town and buy ye a pair ofshoes.” “But I have no credit anywhere and I have no money, yet,” said Linda. “Well, I have,” said Katy, “and this time ye’re going to stop yourstubbornness and take enough to get ye what you need. Ye go to the beststore in Los Angeles and come back here with a pair of shoes that justmatch those stockings, and ye go fast, before the stores close. Ifye’ve got to speed a little, do it in the country and do it judacious.” “Katy, you’re arriving!” cried Linda. “‘Judicious speeding’ is onething I learned better than any other lesson about driving a motorcar. Three fourths of the driving Father and I did we were speedingjudiciously.” Katy held the skirt to Linda’s waist. “Well, maybe it’s a little shorter than any you have been wearing, butit ain’t as short as Eileen and all the rest of the girls your age havethem, so that’s all right, honey. Slip on your coat.” Katy’s fingers were shaking as she lifted the jacket and Linda slippedinto it. “Oh, Lord,” she groaned, “ye can’t be wearing that! The sleeves don’tcome much below your elbows.” “You will please to observe,” said Linda, “that they are flowingsleeves and they are not intended to come below the elbows; but it’s apiece of luck I tried it on, for it reminds me that it’s a jacket suitand I must have a blouse. When you get the shoe money, make it enoughfor a blouse—two blouses, Katy, one for school and one to fuss up in alittle.” Without stopping to change her clothing, Linda ran to the garage andhurried back to the city. It was less than an hour’s run, but she madeit in ample time to park her car and buy the shoes. She selected a pairof low oxfords of beautiful colour, matching the stockings. Then shehurried to one of the big dry-goods stores and bought the two waistsand an inexpensive straw hat that would harmonize with the suit; a hatsmall enough to stick, in the wind, with brim enough to shade her eyes.In about two hours she was back with Katy and they were in her roomtrying on the new clothing. “It dumbfounds me,” said Linda, “to have Eileen do this for me.” She had put on the shoes and stockings, a plain georgette blouse of asoft, brownish wood-gray, with a bit of heavy brown silk embroiderydecorating the front, and the jacket. The dress was of silky changeabletricolette, the skirt plain. Where a fold lifted and was stronglylighted, it was an exquisite silver-gray; where a shadow fell deeplyit was gray-brown. The coat reached half way to the knees. It had arippling skirt with a row of brown embroidery around it, a deep beltwith double buttoning at the waistline, and collar and sleeves in amore elaborate pattern of the same embroidery as the skirt. Lindaperched the hat on her head, pulled it down securely, and faced Katy. “Now then!” she challenged. “And it’s a perfect dress!” said Katy proudly, “and you’re just thecolleen to wear it. My, but I wisht your father could be seeing ye thenow.” With almost reverent hands Linda removed the clothing and laid it away.Then she read a letter from Marian that was waiting for her, tellingKaty scraps of it in running comment as she scanned the sheets. “She likes her boarding place. There are nice people in it. She has gota wonderful view from the windows of her room. She is making friends.She thinks one of the men at Nicholson and Snow’s is just fine; he ishelping her all he can, on the course she is taking. And she wants usto look carefully everywhere for any scrap of paper along the hedge oraround the shrubbery on the north side of the house. One of her threesheets of plans is missing. I don’t see where in the world it couldhave gone, Katy.” Katy spread out her hands in despair. “There was not a scrap of a sheet of paper in the room when I cleanedit,” she said, “not a scrap. And if I had seen a sheet flying aroundthe yard I would have picked it up. She just must be mistaken abouthaving lost it here. She must have opened her case on the train andlost it there.” Linda shook her head. “I put that stuff in the case myself,” she said, “and the clothes ontop of it, and she wouldn’t have any reason for taking those thingsout on the train. I can’t understand, but she did have three roughsketches. She had her heart set on winning that prize and it would bea great help to her, and certainly it was the most comprehensive andconvenient plan for a house of that class that I ever have seen. If Iever have a house, she is going to plan it, even if she doesn’t get toplan John Gilman’s as he always used to say that she should. And by theway, Katy, isn’t it kind of funny for Eileen to go away over Sundaywhen it’s his only holiday?” “Oh, she’ll telephone him,” said Katy, “and very like, he’ll go down,or maybe he is with her. Ye needn’t waste any sympathy on him. Eileenwill take care that she has him so long as she thinks she wants him.” Later it developed that Eileen had secured the invitation because shewas able to produce three most eligible men. Not only was John Gilmanwith the party, but Peter Morrison and Henry Anderson were there aswell. It was in the nature of a hastily arranged celebration, becausethe deal for three acres of land that Peter Morrison most coveted onthe small plateau, mountain walled, in Lilac Valley, was in escrow.He had made a payment on it. Anderson was working on his plans.Contractors had been engaged, and on Monday work would begin. The housewas to be built as soon as possible, and Peter Morrison had arrangedthat the garage was to be built first. This he meant to occupy as aresidence so that he could be on hand to superintend the constructionof the new home and to protect, as far as possible, the natural beautyand the natural growth of the location. Early Sunday morning Linda and Katy, with a full lunch box and a fullgasolene tank, slid from the driveway and rolled down the main streetof Lilac Valley toward the desert. “We’ll switch over and strike San Fernando Road,” said Linda, “and I’llscout around Sunland a bit and see if I can find anything that willfurnish material for another new dish.” That day was wonderful for Katy. She trotted after Linda over sandydesert reaches, along the seashore, up mountain trails, and throughcanyons connected by long stretches of motoring that was more likeflying than riding. She was tired but happy when she went to bed.Monday morning she was an interested spectator as Linda dressed forschool. “Sure, and hasn’t the old chrysalis opened up and let out the nicestlittle lady-bird moth, Katy?” inquired Linda as she smoothed hergray-gold skirts. “I think myself that this dress is a trifle too goodfor school. When I get my allowance next week I think I’ll buy me acloth skirt and a couple of wash waists and save this for better; butit really was good of Eileen to take so much pains and send it to me,when she was busy planning a trip.” Katy watched Linda go, and she noted the new light in her eyes, the newlift of her head, and the proud sureness of her step, and she wonderedif a new dress could do all that for a girl; she scarcely believed thatit could. And, too, she had very serious doubts about the dress. Shekept thinking of it during the day, and when Eileen came, in the middleof the afternoon, at the first words on her lips: “Has my dress come?”Katy felt a wave of illness surge through her. She looked at Eileenso helplessly that that astute reader of human nature immediatelySuspected something. “I sent it special,” she said, “because I didn’t know at the time thatI was going to Riverside and I wanted to work on it. Isn’t it here yet?” Then Katy prepared to do battle for the child of her heart. “Was the dress ye ordered sent the one Miss Linda was telling yeabout?” she asked tersely. “Yes, it was,” said Eileen. “Linda has got mighty good taste. Any dressshe admired was sure to be right. She said there was a beautiful dressat ‘The Mode’. I went and looked, and sure enough there was, a perfectbeauty.” “But she wanted the dress for herself,” said Katy. “It was not a suitable dress for school,” said Eileen. “Well, it strikes me,” said Katy, “that it was just the spittin’ imageof fifty dresses I’ve seen ye wear to school. “What do you know about it?” demanded Eileen. “I know just this,” said Katy with determination. “Ye’ve had one newdress in the last few days and you’re not needin’ another. The blessedVirgin only knows when Miss Linda’s had a dress. She thought ye’d doneyourself proud and sent it for her, and she put it on, and a becomingand a proper thing it was too! I advanced her the money myself and senther to get some shoes to match it since she had her car fixed and couldgo in a hurry. A beautiful dress it is, and on her back this minute itis!” Eileen was speechless with anger. Her face was a sickly white and therouge spots on her cheeks stood a glaring admission. “Do you mean to tell me?——” she gasped. “Not again,” said the daughter of Erin firmly, “because I have alreadytold ye wance. Linda’s gone like a rag bag since the Lord knows when.She had a right to the dress, and she thought it was hers, and she tookit. And if ye ever want any more respect or obedience or love from thekiddie, ye better never let her know that ye didn’t intend it for her,for nothing was ever quite so fair and right as that she should haveit; and while you’re about it you’d better go straight to the storeand get her what she is needin’ to go with it, or better still, ye hadbetter give her a fair share of the money of which there used to besuch a plenty, and let her get her things herself, for she’s that tastynobody can beat her when she’s got anything to do with.” Eileen turned on Katy in a gust of fury. “Katherine O’Donovan,” she said shrilly, “pack your trunk and see howquick you can get out of this house. I have stood your insolence foryears, and I won’t endure it a minute longer!” Katy folded her red arms and lifted her red chin, and a steel-bluelight flashed from her steel-gray eyes. “Humph!” she said, “I’ll do nothing of the sort. I ain’t working forye and I never have been no more than I ever worked for your mother.Every lick I ever done in this house I done for Linda and Doctor Strongand for nobody else. Half of this house and everything in it belongsto Linda, and it’s a mortal short time till she’s of age to claim it.Whichever is her half, that half I’ll be staying in, and if ye manageso as she’s got nothing to pay me, I’ll take care of her without paytill the day comes when she can take care of me. Go to wid ye, yetriflin’, lazy, self-possessed creature. Ten years I have itched totell ye what I thought of ye, and now ye know it.” As Katy’s rage increased, Eileen became intimidated. Like everyextremely selfish person she was a coward in her soul. “If you refuse to go on my orders,” she said, “I’ll have John Gilmanissue his.” Then Katy set her left hand on her left hip, her lower jaw shot pastthe upper, her doubled right fist shook precious near the tip ofEileen’s exquisite little nose. “I’m darin’ ye,” she shouted. “I’m just darin’ ye to send John Gilmanin the sound of my voice. If ye do, I’ll tell him every mean andselfish thing ye’ve done to me poor lambie since the day of the BlackShadow. Send him to me? Holy Mither, I wish ye would! If ever I getmy chance at him, don’t ye think I won’t be tellin’ him what he haslost, and what he has got? And as for taking orders from him, I amtaking my orders from the person I am working for, and as I told yebefore, that’s Miss Linda. Be off wid ye, and primp up while I get mysupper, and mind ye this, if ye tell Miss Linda ye didn’t mean thatgown for her and spoil the happy day she has had, I won’t wait for yeto send John Gilman to me; I’ll march straight to him. Put that in yourcigarette and smoke it! Think I’ve lost me nose as well as me sense?” Then Katy started a triumphal march to the kitchen and cooled down bythe well-known process of slamming pots and pans for half an hour. Soonher Irish sense of humor came to her rescue. “Now, don’t I hear myself telling Miss Linda a few days ago to kape hertemper, and to kape cool, and to go aisy. Look at the aise of me when Igot started. By gracious, wasn’t I just itching to wallop her?” Then every art that Katy possessed was bent to the consummation ofpreparing a particularly delicious dinner for the night. Linda came in softly humming something to herself about the kind ofshoes that you might wear if you chose. She had entered the high schoolthat morning with an unusually brilliant colour. Two or three girls,who never had noticed her before, had nodded to her that morning, andone or two had said: “What a pretty dress you have!” She had caught theflash of approval in the eyes of Donald Whiting, and she had noted theflourish with which he raised his hat when he saw her at a distance,and she knew what he meant when he held up a book, past the covers ofwhich she could see protruding a thick fold of white paper. He hadforesworn whatever pleasure he might have thought of for Sunday. Hehad prepared notes on some subject that he thought would further him.The lift of his head, the flourish of his hat, and the book all toldLinda that he had struggled, and that he felt the struggle had broughtan exhilarating degree of success. That had made the day particularlybright for Linda. She had gone home with a feeling of uplift andexultation in her heart. As she closed the front door she cried up thestairway: “Eileen, are you there?” “Yes,” answered a rather sulky voice from above. Linda ascended, two steps at a bound. “Thank you over and over, old thing!” she cried as she raced down thehallway. “Behold me! I never did have a more becoming dress, and Katyloaned me money, till my income begins, to get shoes and a little scuffhat to go with it. Aren’t I spiffy?” She pirouetted in the doorway. Eileen gripped the brush she waswielding, tight. “You have good taste,” she said. “It’s a pretty dress, but You’realways howling about things being suitable. Do you call that suitablefor school?” “It certainly is an innovation for me,” said Linda, “but there aredozens of dresses of the same material, only different cut and coloursin the High School to-day. As soon as I get my money I’ll buy a skirtand some blouses so I won’t have to wear this all the time; but Isurely do thank you very much, and I surely have had a lovely day. Didyou have a nice time at Riverside?” Eileen slammed down the brush and turned almost a distorted face toLinda. She had temper to vent. In the hour’s reflection previous toLinda’s coming, she realized that she had reached the limit with Katy.If she antagonized her by word or look, she would go to John Gilman,and Eileen dared not risk what she would say. “No, I did not have a lovely time,” she said. “I furnished the men forthe party and I expected to have a grand time, but the first thingwe did was to run into that inflated egotist calling herself MaryLouise Whiting, and like a fool, Janie Brunson introduced her to PeterMorrison. I had paired him with Janie on purpose to keep my eye on him.” Linda tried hard but she could not suppress a chuckle: “Of course youwould!” she murmured softly. Eileen turned her back. That had been her first confidence toLinda. She was so aggrieved at that moment that she could have toldunanswering walls her tribulations. It would have been better if shehad done so. She might have been able to construe silence as sympathy.Linda’s laughter she knew exactly how to interpret. “Served you right,”was what it meant. “I hadn’t the least notion you would take an interest in anythingconcerning me,” she said. “People can talk all they please about MaryLouise Whiting being a perfect lady but she is a perfect beast. I havemet her repeatedly and she has always ignored me, and yesterday shesingled out for her special attention the most desirable man in myparty——” “‘Most desirable,’” breathed Linda. “Poor John! I see his secondfiasco. Lavender crystals, please!” Eileen caught her lip in mortification. She had not intended to saywhat she thought. “Well, you can’t claim,” she hurried on to cover her confusion, “thatit was not an ill-bred, common trick for her to take possession of aman of my party, and utterly ignore me. She has everything on earththat I want; she treats me like a dog, and she could give me a glorioustime by merely nodding her head.” “I am quite sure you are mistaken,” said Linda. “From what I’ve heardof her, she wouldn’t mistreat anyone. Very probably what she doesis merely to feel that she is not acquainted with you. You have anunfortunate way, Eileen, of defeating your own ends. If you wanted toattract Mary Louise Whiting, you missed the best chance you ever couldhave had, at three o’clock Saturday afternoon, when you maliciouslytreated her only brother as you would a mechanic, ordered him to ourgarage, and shut our door in his face.” Eileen turned to Linda. Her mouth fell open. A ghastly greenish whiteflooded her face. “What do you mean?” she gasped. “I mean,” said Linda, “that Donald Whiting was calling on me, and youpurposely sent him to the garage.” Crash down among the vanities of Eileen’s dressing table went herlovely head, and she broke into deep and violent sobs. Linda stoodlooking at her a second, slowly shaking her head. Then she turned andwent to her room. Later in the evening she remembered the Roman scarf and told Eileen ofwhat she had done, and she was unprepared for Eileen’s reply: “Thatscarf always was too brilliant for me. You’re welcome to it if you wantit.” “Thank you,” said Linda gravely, “I want it very much indeed.” Linda went to the library to see to what state of emptiness it had beenreduced by the removal of several pieces of furniture she had orderedtaken away that day. As she stood on the threshold looking over theroom as usual, a throb of loving appreciation of Katy swept throughher heart. Katy had been there before her. The room had been freshlyswept and dusted, the rugs had been relaid, the furniture rearrangedskilfully, and the table stood at the best angle to be lighted eitherby day or night. On the table and the mantel stood big bowls of lovelyfresh flowers. Linda was quite certain that anyone entering the roomfor the first time would have felt it completely furnished, and shedoubted if even Marian would notice the missing pieces. Cheered inher heart, she ran up to the billiard room, and there again Katy hadpreceded her. The windows were shining. The walls and floor had beencleaned. Everything was in readiness for the new furniture. Her heartfull of gratitude, Linda went to her room, prepared her lessons for thenext day, and then drew out her writing materials to answer Marian’sletter. She wrote: I have an acute attack of enlargement of the heart. So many thingshave happened since your leaving. But first I must tell you aboutyour sketch. We just know you did not leave it here. Katy saysthere was not a scrap in our bedroom when she cleaned it; andas she knows you make plans and how precious they are to you, Iguarantee she would have saved it if she had found anything lookinglike a parallelogram on a piece of paper. And I have very nearlycombed the lawn, not only the north side, but the west, south, andeast; and then I broke the laws and went over to your house andcrawled through a basement window and worked my way up, and I havehunted every room in it, but there is nothing there. You must havelost that sketch after you reached San Francisco. I hope to allthat’s peaceful you did not lay it down in the offices of Nicholsonand Snow, or where you take your lessons. I know nothing aboutarchitecture, but I do know something about comfort in a home, andI thought that was the most comfortable and convenient-lookinghouse I ever had seen. Now I’ll go on and tell you all the news, and I don’t know whichis the bigger piece to burst on you first. Would you be moreinterested in knowing that Peter Morrison has bought three acreson the other side of the valley from us and up quite a way, or inthe astonishing fact that I have a new dress, a perfect love of adress, really too good for school? You know there was blood in myeye when you left, and I didn’t wait long to start action. I havemanaged to put the fear of God into Eileen’s heart so that she hasagreed to a reasonable allowance for me from the first of nextmonth; but she must have felt at least one small wave of contritionwhen I told her about a peculiarly enticing dress I had seen atThe Mode. She sent it up right away, and Katy, blessed be herloving footprints, loaned me money to buy a blouse and some shoesto match, so I went to school to-day looking very like the GreatGeneral Average, minus rouge, lip-stick, hair-dress, and Frenchheels. I do hope you will approve of two things I have done. Then Linda recounted the emptying of the billiard room, the inroads inthe library, the listing of the technical books, and what she proposedto do with the money. And then, her face slightly pale and her fingersslightly trembling, she wrote: And, Marian dear, I hope you won’t be angry with me when I tell youthat I have put the Bear-cat into commission and driven it threetimes already. It is running like the feline it is, and I am beingas careful as I can. I know exactly how you will feel. It is thesame feeling that has held me all these months, when I wouldn’teven let myself think of it. But something happened at school oneday, Marian. You know the Whitings? Mary Louise Whiting’s brotheris in the senior class. He is a six-footer, and while he is nothandsome he is going to be a real man when he is fully developed,and steadied down to work. One day last week he made it hisbusiness to stop me in the hall and twit me about my shoes, andincidentally to ask me why I didn’t dress like the other girls; andsome way it came rougher than if it had been one of the girls. Themore I thought about it the more wronged I felt, so I ended in ayoung revolution that is to bring me an income, a suitable placeto work in and has brought me such a pretty dress. I think it hasbrought Eileen to a sense of at least partial justice about money,and it brought me back the Bear-cat. You know the proudest momentof my life was when Father would let me drive the little beast,and it all came back as natural as breathing. Please don’t worry,Marian. Nothing shall happen, I promise you. It won’t be necessary to tell you that Katy is her darling oldself, loyal and steadfast as the sun, and quite as necessary and ascomforting to me. And I have a couple of other interests in lifethat are going to—I won’t say make up for your absence, becausenothing could do that—but they are going to give me somethinginteresting to think about, something agreeable to work at, whileyou are gone. But, oh, Marian, do hurry. Work all day and part ofthe night. Be Saturday’s child yourself if you must, just so youget home quick, and where your white head makes a beacon light forthe truest, lovingest pal you will ever have, Linda. Linda laid down the pen, slid down in her chair, and looked from thewindow across the valley, and she wondered if in her view lay thelocation that had been purchased by Peter Morrison. She glanced back ather letter and sat looking at the closing lines and the signature. “Much good that will do her,” she commented. “When a woman loves a manand loves him with all her heart, as Marian loved John, and when sheloses him, not because she has done a single unworthy thing herself,but because he is so rubber spined that he will let another womansuccessfully intrigue him, a lot of comfort she is going to get fromthe love of a schoolgirl!” Linda’s eyes strayed to the window again, and traveled down to thecity and up the coast, all the way to San Francisco, and out of thethousands of homes there they pictured a small, neat room, full ofMarian’s belongings, and Marian herself bending over a work table,absorbed in the final draft of her precious plans. Linda could seeMarian as plainly as she ever had seen her, but she let her imaginationrun, and she fancied that when Marian was among strangers and where noone knew of John Gilman’s defection, that hers might be a very heavyheart, that hers might be a very sad face. Then she went to planning.She had been desolate, heart hungry, and isolated herself. First shehad endured, then she had fought; the dawn of a new life was breakingover her hill. She had found work she was eager to do. She could putthe best of her brain, the skill of her fingers, the creative impulseof her heart, into it. She was almost sure that she had found a friend. She had a feelingthat when the coming Saturday had been lived Donald Whiting would beher friend. He would want her advice and her help in his work. Shewould want his companionship and the stimulus of his mind, in hers.What Linda had craved was a dear friend among the girls, but no girlhad offered her friendship. This boy had, so she would accept what thegods of time and circumstance provided. It was a very wonderful thingthat had happened to her. Now why could not something equally wonderfulhappen to Marian? Linda wrinkled her brows and thought deeply. “It’s the worst thing in all this world to work and work with nobody toknow about it and nobody to care,” thought Linda. “Marian could break arecord if she thought John Gilman cared now as he used to. It’s almosta necessary element to her success. If he doesn’t care, she ought to bemade to feel that somebody cares. This thing of standing alone, sinceI have found a friend, appeals to me as almost insupportable. Let methink.” It was not long until she had worked out a scheme for putting aninterest in Marian’s life and giving her something for which to work,until a more vital reality supplanted it. The result was that she tooksome paper, went down to the library, and opening the typewriter,wrote a letter. She read it over, making many changes and corrections,and then she copied it carefully. When she came to addressing it shewas uncertain, but at last she hit upon a scheme of sending it in thecare of Nicholson and Snow because Marian had told her that she meantto enter their contest immediately she reached San Francisco, and shewould have left them her address. On the last reading of the lettershe had written, she decided that it was a manly, straightforwardproduction, which should interest and attract any girl. But how was sheto sign it? After thinking deeply for a long time, she wrote “PhilipSanders, General Delivery,” and below she added a postscript: To save you the trouble of inquiring among your friends as to whoPhilip Sanders is, I might as well tell you in the beginning thathe isn’t. He is merely an assumption under which I shall hide mypersonality until you let me know whether it is possible that youcould become even slightly interested in me, as a small return forthe very deep and wholesome interest abiding in my heart for you. “Abiding,” said Linda aloud. “It seems to me that there is nothingin all the world quite so fine as a word. Isn’t ‘abiding’ a goodword? Doesn’t it mean a lot? Where could you find one other wordthat means being with you and also means comforting you and lovingyou and sympathizing with you and surrounding you with firm wallsand a cushioned floor and a starry roof? I love that word. I hope itimpresses Marian with all its wonderful meaning.” She went back to her room, put both letters into her Geometry, and inthe morning mailed them. She stood a long time hesitating with thetypewritten letter in her hand, but finally dropped it in the letterbox also. “It will just be something,” she said, “to make her think that some manappreciates her lovely face and doesn’t care if her hair is white, andsees how steadfast and fine she is.” And then she slowly repeated, “‘steadfast,’ that is another fine word.It has pearls and rubies all over it.” After school that evening she visited James Brothers’ and was paid thefull amount of the appraisement of her furniture. Then she went to anart store and laid in a full supply of the materials she needed for thework she was trying to do. Her fingers were trembling as she handledthe boxes of water colours and selected the brushes and pencils forher work, and sheets of drawing paper upon which she could do herselfjustice. When the transaction was finished, she had a few dollarsremaining. As she put them in her pocket she said softly: “That’s gasolene. Poor Katy! I’m glad she doesn’t need her money,because she is going to have to wait for the allowance or the sale ofthe books or on Jane Meredith. But it’s only a few days now, so that’llbe all right.” Linda entered the street car for her daily ride to Lilac Valley. Shenoticed Peter Morrison and Henry Anderson sitting beside each other,deeply engrossed in a drawing. She had been accustomed to ride in theopen section of the car as she liked the fresh air. She had a fleetingthought of entering the body of the car and sitting where they wouldsee her; and then a perverse spirit in Linda’s heart said to her: “That is precisely what Eileen would do. You sit where you belong.” Whereupon Linda dropped into the first vacant seat she could reach,but it was only a few moments before Peter Morrison, looking up fromthe plans he was studying, saw her, and lifting his hat, beckoned herto come and sit with him. They made room for her between them andspreading the paper across her lap, all three of them began to discussthe plans for the foundation for Peter’s house. Anderson had roughlyoutlined the grounds, sketching in the trees that were to be saved,the spring, and the most available route for reaching the road. Thediscussion was as to where the road should logically enter the grounds,and where the garage should stand. “Which reminds me,” said Linda—“haven’t you your car with you? Or wasthat a hired one you were touring in?” “Mine,” said Peter Morrison, “but we toured so far, it’s in the shopfor a general overhauling to-day.” “That being the case,” said Linda, “walk home with me and I’ll take youto your place in mine and bring you back to the cars, if you only wantto stay an hour or two.” “Why, that would be fine,” said Peter. “You didn’t mention, the otherevening, that you had a car.” “No,” said Linda, “I had been trying to keep cars out of my thought fora long time, but I could endure it no longer the other day, so I gotmine out and tuned it up. If you don’t mind stacking up a bit, threecan ride in it very comfortably.” That was the way it happened that Linda walked home after school thatafternoon between Peter Morrison and his architect, brought out theBear-cat, and drove them to Peter’s location. All that day, workmen had been busy under the management of awell-instructed foreman, removing trees and bushes and stonesand clearing the spot that had been selected for the garage andapproximately for the house. The soft brownish gray of Linda’s dress was exactly the colour tointensify the darker brown of her eyes. There was a fluctuating red inher olive cheeks, a brilliant red framing her even white teeth. Oncedressed so that she was satisfied with the results, Linda immediatelyforgot her clothes, and plunged into Morrison’s plans. “Peter,” she said gravely, with Peter perfectly cognizant of thetwinkle in her dark eyes, “Peter, you may save money in a straight-lineroad, but you’re going to sin against your soul if you build it. You’llhave to economize in some other way, and run your road around thebase of those boulders, then come in straight to the line here, andthen you should swing again and run out on this point, where guestscan have one bewildering glimpse of the length of our blue valley,and then whip them around this clump of perfumy lilac and elders, runthem to your side entrance, and then scoot the car back to the garage.I think you should place the front of your house about here.” Lindaindicated where. “So long as you’re buying a place like this you don’twant to miss one single thing; and you do want to make the very mostpossible out of every beauty you have. And you mustn’t fail to open upand widen the runway from that energetic, enthusiastic spring. Carryit across your road, sure. It will cost you another little somethingfor a safe bridge, but there’s nothing so artistic as a bridge with acold stream running under it. And think what a joyful time I’ll have,gathering specimens for you of every pretty water plant that grows inmy particular canyon. Any time when you’re busy in your library and youhear my car puffing up the incline and around the corner and rattlingacross the bridge, you’ll know that I am down here giving you a startof watercress and miners’ lettuce and every lovely thing you couldmention that likes to be nibbled or loved-up, while it dabbles its toesin the water.” Peter Morrison looked at Linda reflectively. He looked for such a longmoment that Henry Anderson reached a nebulous conclusion. “Fine!” hecried. “Every one of those suggestions is valuable to an inexperiencedman. Morrison, shan’t I make a note of them?” “Yes, Henry, you shall,” said Peter. “I am going to push this thingas fast as possible, so far as building the garage is concerned andgetting settled in it. After that I don’t care if I live on this spotuntil we know each other by the inch, before I begin building my home.At the present minute it appeals to me that ‘home’ is about the bestword in the language of any nation. I have a feeling that what I buildhere is going to be my home, very possibly the only one I shall everhave. We must find the spot on which the Lord intended that a houseshould grow on this hillside, and then we must build that house so thatit has a room suitable for a workshop in which I may strive, underthe best conditions possible, to get my share of the joy of life andto earn the money that I shall require to support me and entertain myfriends; and that sounds about as selfish as anything possibly could.It seems to be mostly ‘me’ and ‘mine,’ and it’s not the real truthconcerning this house. I don’t believe there is a healthy, normalman living who has not his dream. I have no hesitation whatever inadmitting that I have mine. This house must be two things. It has gotto be a concrete workshop for me, and it has got to be an abstractabiding place for a dream. It’s rather difficult to build a dream housefor a dream lady, so I don’t know what kind of a fist I am going tomake of it.” Linda sat down on a boulder and contemplated her shoes for a minute.Then she raised her ever-shifting, eager, young eyes to Peter, and itseemed to him as he looked into them that there were little gold lightsflickering at the bottom of their darkness. “Why, that’s just as easy,” she said. “A home is merely a home. Itincludes a front porch and a back porch and a fireplace and a bathtuband an ice chest and a view and a garden around it; all the rest isincidental. If you have more money, you have more incidentals. If youdon’t have so much, you use your imagination and think you have just asmuch on less.” “Now, I wonder,” said Peter, “when I find my dream lady, if she willhave an elastic imagination.” “Haven’t you found her yet?” asked Linda casually. “No,” said Peter, “I haven’t found her, and unfortunately she hasn’tfound me. I have had a strenuous time getting my start in life. It’smostly a rush from one point of interest to another, dropping atany wayside station for refreshment and the use of a writing table.Occasionally I have seen a vision that I have wanted to follow, but Inever have had time. So far, the lady of this house is even more of adream than the house.” “Oh, well, don’t worry,” said Linda comfortingly. “The world is full ofthe nicest girls. When you get ready for a gracious lady I’ll find youone that will have an India-rubber imagination and a great big lovingheart and Indian-hemp apron strings so that half a dozen babies canswing from them.” Morrison turned to Henry Anderson. “You hear, Henry?” he said. “I’m destined to have a large family. Youmust curtail your plans for the workroom and make that big room back ofit into a nursery.” “Well, what I am going to do,” said Henry Anderson, “is to build aplace suitable for your needs. If any dream woman comes to it, she willhave to fit herself to her environment.” Linda frowned. “Now, that isn’t a bit nice of you,” she said, “and I don’t believePeter will pay the slightest attention to you. He’ll let me make youbuild a lovely room for the love of his heart, and a great big brightnursery on the sunny side for his small people.” “I never believed,” said Henry Anderson, “in counting your chickensbefore they are hatched. There are a couple of acres around Peter’shouse, and he can build an addition as his needs increase.” “Messy idea,” said Linda promptly. “Thing to do, when you build ahouse, is to build it the way you want it for the remainder of yourlife, so you don’t have to tear up the scenery every few years,dragging in lumber for expansion. And I’ll tell you another thing. Ifthe homemakers of this country don’t get the idea into their headspretty soon that they are not going to be able to hold their own withthe rest of the world, with no children, or one child in the family,there’s a sad day of reckoning coming. With the records at the patentoffice open to the world, you can’t claim that the brain of the whiteman is not constructive. You can look at our records and compare themwith those of countries ages and ages older than we are, which neverdiscovered the beauties of a Dover egg-beater or a washing machineor a churn or a railroad or a steamboat or a bridge. We are headand shoulders above other nations in invention, and just as fast aspossible, we are falling behind in the birth rate. The red man andthe yellow man and the brown man and the black man can look at ouregg-beaters and washing machines and bridges and big guns, and go homeand copy them; and use them while rearing even bigger families thanthey have now. If every home in Lilac Valley had at least six sturdyboys and girls growing up in it with the proper love of country and theproper realization of the white man’s right to supremacy, and if allthe world now occupied by white men could make an equal record, wherewould be the talk of the yellow peril? There wouldn’t be any yellowperil. You see what I mean?” Linda lifted her frank eyes to Peter Morrison. “Yes, young woman,” said Peter gravely, “I see what you mean, but thisis the first time I ever heard a high-school kid propound such ideas.Where did you get them?” “Got them in Multiflores Canyon from my father to start with,” saidLinda, “but recently I have been thinking, because there is a boy inHigh School who is making a great fight for a better scholarship recordthan a Jap in his class. I brood over it every spare minute, day ornight, and when I say my prayers I implore high Heaven to send him anidea or to send me one that I can pass on to him, that will help him tobeat that Jap.” “I see,” said Peter Morrison. “We’ll have to take time to talk thisover. It’s barely possible I might be able to suggest something.” “You let that kid fight his own battles,” said Henry Anderson roughly.“He’s no proper bug-catcher. I feel it in my bones.” For the first time, Linda’s joy laugh rang over Peter Morrison’spossession. “I don’t know about that,” she said gaily. “He’s a wide-awake specimen;he has led his class for four years when the Jap didn’t get ahead ofhim. But, all foolishness aside, take my word for it, Peter, you’ll besorry if you don’t build this house big enough for your dream lady andfor all the little dreams that may spring from her heart.” “Nightmares, you mean,” said Henry Anderson. “I can’t imagine a bunchof kids muddying up this spring and breaking the bushes and usingslingshots on the birds.” “Yes,” said Linda with scathing sarcasm, “and wouldn’t our governmentbe tickled to death to have a clear spring and a perfect bush and asinging bird, if it needed six men to go over the top to handle aregiment of Japanese!” Then Peter Morrison laughed. “Well, your estimate is too low, Linda,” he said in his nicest drawlingtone of voice. “Believe me, one U. S. kid will never march in a wholeregiment of Japanese. They won’t lay down their guns and walk tosurrender as bunches of Germans did. Nobody need ever think that. Theyare as good fighters as they are imitators. There’s nothing for youto do, Henry, but to take to heart what Miss Linda has said. Plan thehouse with a suite for a dream lady, and a dining room, a sleepingporch and a nursery big enough for the six children allotted to me.” “You’re not really in earnest?” asked Henry Anderson in doubtingastonishment. “I am in the deepest kind of earnest,” said Peter Morrison. “What MissLinda says is true. As a nation, our people are pampering themselvesand living for their own pleasures. They won’t take the trouble orendure the pain required to bear and to rear children; and the day isrolling toward us, with every turn of the planet one day closer, whenwe are going to be outnumbered by a combination of peoples who can takeour own tricks and beat us with them. We must pass along the good wordthat the one thing America needs above every other thing on earth ishomes and hearts big enough for children, as were the homes ofour grandfathers, when no joy in life equaled the joy of a new childin the family, and if you didn’t have a dozen you weren’t doing yourmanifest duty.” “Well, if that is the way you see the light, we must enlarge thishouse. As designed, it included every feminine convenience anyway. Butwhen I build my house I am going to build it for myself.” “Then don’t talk any more about being my bug-catcher,” said Lindapromptly, “because when I build my house it’s going to be a nest thatwill hold six at the very least. My heart is perfectly set on a broodof six.” Linda was quite unaware that the two men were studying her closely, butif she had known what was going on in their minds she would have hadnothing to regret, because both of them found her very attractive, andboth of them were wondering how anything so superficial as Eileen couldbe of the same blood as Linda. “Are we keeping you too late?” inquired Peter. “No,” said Linda, “I am as interested as I can be. Finish everythingyou want to do before we go. I hope you’re going to let me come overoften and watch you with your building. Maybe I can get an idea forsome things I want to do. Eileen and I have our house divided by aMason and Dixon line. On her side is Mother’s suite, the dining room,the living room and the front door. On mine there’s the garage and thekitchen and Katy’s bedroom and mine and the library and the billiardroom. At the present minute I am interested in adapting the library tomy requirements instead of Father’s, and I am emptying the billiardroom and furnishing it to make a workroom. I have a small talent witha brush and pencil, and I need some bare walls to tack my prints on todry, and I need numerous places for all the things I am always draggingin from the desert and the canyons; and since I have the Bear-catrunning, what I have been doing in that line with a knapsack won’t beworthy of mention.” “How did it come,” inquired Henry Anderson, “that you had that carjacked up so long?” “Why, hasn’t anybody told you,” asked Linda, “about our day of theBlack Shadow?” “John Gilman wrote me when it happened,” said Peter softly, “but Idon’t believe it has been mentioned before Henry. You tell him.” Linda turned to Henry Anderson, and with trembling lips and palingcheeks, in a few brief sentences she gave him the details. Then shesaid to Peter Morrison in a low voice: “And that is the why of MarianThorne’s white head. Anybody tell you that?” “That white head puzzled me beyond anything I ever saw,” he said. “Imeant to ask John about it. He used to talk to me and write to me oftenabout her, and lately he hasn’t; when I came I saw the reason, and soyou see I felt reticent on the subject.” “Well, there’s nothing the matter with my tongue,” said Linda. “It’sloose at both ends. Marian was an expert driver. She drove with thesame calm judgment and precision and graceful skill that she doeseverything else, but the curve was steep and something in the brakeswas defective. It broke with a snap and there was not a thing she coulddo. Enough was left of the remains of the car to prove that. Ten daysafterward her head was almost as white as snow. Before that it was asdark as mine. But her body is just as young and her heart is just asyoung and her face is even more beautiful. I do think that a whitecrown makes her lovelier than she was before. I have known Marian eversince I can remember, and I don’t know one thing about her that I couldnot look you straight in the eye and tell you all about. There is not asubterfuge or an evasion or a small mean deceit in her soul. She is thebrainiest woman and the biggest woman I know.” “I haven’t a doubt of it,” said Peter Morrison. “And while you aretalking about nice women, we met a mighty fine one at Riverside onSunday. Her name is Mary Louise Whiting. Do you know her?” “Not personally,” said Linda. “I don’t recall that I ever saw her. Iknow her brother, Donald. He is the high-school boy who is having thewrestle with the Jap.” “I liked her too,” said Henry Anderson. “And by the way, Miss Linda,haven’t bug-catchers any reputation at all as nest builders? Is it truethat among feathered creatures the hen builds the home?” “No, it’s not,” said Linda promptly. “Male birds make a splendid recordcarrying nest material. What is true is that in the majority of casesthe female does the building.” “Well, what I am getting at,” said Henry Anderson, “is this. Is thereanything I can do to help you with that billiard room that you’re goingto convert to a workroom? What do you lack in it that you would like tohave? Do you need more light or air, or a fireplace, or what? When youtake us to the station, suppose you drive us past your house and giveme a look at that room and let me think over it a day or two. I mightbe able to make some suggestion that would help you.” “Now that is positively sweet of you,” said Linda. “I never thoughtof such a thing as either comfort or convenience. I thought I had totake that room as it stands and do the best I could with it, but sinceyou mention it, it’s barely possible that more air might be agreeableand also more light, and if there could be a small fireplace built infront of the chimney where it goes up from the library fireplace, itcertainly would be a comfort, and it would add something to the roomthat nothing else could. “No workroom really has a soul if you can’tsmell smoke and see red when you go to it at night.” “You little outdoor heathen,” laughed Peter Morrison. “One would thinkyou were an Indian.” “I am a fairly good Indian,” said Linda. “I have been scouting aroundwith my father a good many years. How about it, Peter? Does the road gocrooked?” “Yes,” said Peter, “the road goes crooked.” “Does the bed of the spring curve and sweep across the lawn and dropoff to the original stream below the tree-tobacco clump there?” “If you say so, it does,” said Peter. “Including the bridge?” inquired Linda. “Including the bridge,” said Peter. “I’ll have to burn some midnightoil, but I can visualize the bridge.” “And is this house where you ‘set up your rest,’ as you so beautifullysaid the other night at dinner, going to lay its corner stone and growto its roof a selfish house, or is it going to be generous enough for agracious lady and a flight of little footsteps?” Peter Morrison took off his hat. He turned his face toward the lengthof Lilac Valley and stood, very tall and straight, looking far awaybefore him. Presently he looked down at Linda. “Even so,” he said softly. “My shoulders are broad enough; I have abrain; and I am not afraid to work. If my heart is not quite big enoughyet, I see very clearly how it can be made to expand.” “I have been told,” said Linda in a low voice, “that Mary LouiseWhiting is a perfect darling.” Peter looked at her from the top of her black head to the tips of herbrown shoes. He could have counted the freckles bridging her nose. Thesunburn on her cheeks was very visible; there was something arrestingin the depth of her eyes, the curve of her lips, the lithe slendernessof her young body; she gave the effect of something smoldering insidethat would leap at a breath. “I was not thinking of Miss Whiting,” he said soberly. Henry Anderson was watching. Now he turned his back and commencedtalking about plans, but in his heart he said: “So that’s the lay ofthe land. You’ve got to hustle yourself, Henry, or you won’t have theghost of a show.” Later, when they motored down the valley and stopped at the Strongresidence, Peter refused to be monopolized by Eileen. He climbed thetwo flights of stairs with Henry Anderson and Linda and exhausted hisfund of suggestions as to what could be done to that empty billiardroom to make an attractive study of it. Linda listened quietly to alltheir suggestions, and then she said: “It would be fine to have another window, and a small skylight would bea dream, and as for the fireplace you mention, I can’t even conceivehow great it would be to have that; but my purse is much more limitedthan Peter’s, and while I have my school work to do every day, myearning capacity is nearly negligible. I can only pick up a bit hereand there with my brush and pencil—place cards and Easter cards andvalentines, and once or twice magazine covers, and little things likethat. I don’t see my way clear to lumber and glass and bricks andchimney pieces.” Peter looked at Henry, and Henry looked at Peter, and a male high sign,ancient as day, passed between them. “Easiest thing in the world,” said Peter. “It’s as sure as shootingthat when my three or four fireplaces, which Henry’s present plans callfor, are built, there is going to be all the material left that canbe used in a light tiny fireplace such as could be built on a thirdfloor, and when the figuring for the house is done it could very easilyinclude the cutting of a skylight and an extra window or two here,and getting the material in with my stuff, it would cost you almostnothing.” Linda’s eyes opened wide and dewy with surprise and pleasure. “Why, you two perfectly nice men!” she said. “I haven’t felt as I dothis minute since I lost Daddy. It’s wonderful to be taken care of.It’s better than cream puffs with almond flavoring.” Henry Anderson looked at Linda keenly. “You’re the darndest kid!” he said. “One minute you’re smacking yourlips over cream puffs, and the next you’re going to the bottom of theyellow peril. I never before saw your combination in one girl. What’sthe explanation?” For the second time that evening Linda’s specialty inrapture floated free. “Bunch all the component parts into the one paramount fact that I amSaturday’s child,” she said, “so I am constantly on the job of workingfor a living, and then add to that the fact that I was reared by anerve specialist.” Then they went downstairs, and the men refused both Eileen’s andLinda’s invitation to remain for dinner. When they had gone Eileenturned to Linda with a discontented and aggrieved face. “In the name of all that’s holy, what are you doing or planning to do?”she demanded. “Not anything that will cost you a penny beyond my natural rights,”said Linda quietly. “That is not answering my question,” said Eileen. “You’re not of ageand you’re still under the authority of a guardian. If you can’t answerme, possibly you can him. Shall I send John Gilman to ask what I wantto know of you?” “When did I ever ask you any questions about what you chose todo?” asked Linda. “I am merely following the example that you havepreviously set me. John Gilman and I used to be great friends. It mighthelp both of us to have a family reunion. Send him by all means.” “You used to take pride,” suggested Eileen, “in leading your class.” “And has anyone told you that I am not leading my class at the presentminute?” asked Linda. “No,” said Eileen, “but what I want to point out to you is that theminute you start running with the boys you will quit leading yourclass.” “Don’t you believe it,” said Linda quietly. “I’m not built that way.I shan’t concentrate on any boy to the exclusion of chemistry andgeometry, never fear it.” Then she thoughtfully ascended the stairs and went to work. Eileen went to her room and sat down to think; and the more shethought, the deeper grew her anger and chagrin; and to the indifferencethat always had existed in her heart concerning Linda was added in thatmoment a new element. She was jealous of her. How did it come that alanky, gangling kid in her tees had been paid a visit by the son ofpossibly the most cultured and influential family of the city, peopleof prestige, comfortable wealth, and unlimited popularity? For fouryears she had struggled to gain an entrance in some way into LouiseWhiting’s intimate circle of friends, and she had ended by shuttingthe door on the only son of the family. And why had she ever allowedLinda to keep the runabout? It was not proper that a young girl shouldown a high powered car like that. It was not proper that she shoulddrive it and go racing around the country, heaven knew where, and withheaven knew whom. Eileen bit her lip until it almost bled. Her eyeswere hateful and her hands were nervous as she reviewed the past week.She might think any mean thing that a mean brain could conjure up, butwhen she calmed down to facts she had to admit that there was not areason in the world why Linda should not drive the car she had drivenfor her father, or why she should not take with her Donald Whitingor Peter Morrison or Henry Anderson. The thing that rankled was thatthe car belonged to Linda. The touring car which she might have ownedand driven, had she so desired, lay in an extremely slender string ofpearls around her neck at that instant. She reflected that if she hadkept her car and made herself sufficiently hardy to drive it, she mighthave been the one to have taken Peter Morrison to his home location andto have had many opportunities for being with him. “I’ve been a fool,” said Eileen, tugging at the pearls viciously. “Theyare nothing but a little bit of a string that looks as if I were tryingto do something and couldn’t, at best. What I’ve got to do is to thinkmore of myself. I’ve got to plan some way to prevent Linda from beingtoo popular until I really get my mind made up as to what I want to do.” “‘A house that is divided against itself cannot stand,’” quoted Linda.“I must keep in mind what Eileen said, not that there is the slightestdanger, but to fall behind in my grades is a thing that simply must nothappen. If it be true that Peter and Henry can so easily and so cheaplyadd a few improvements in my workroom in connection with Peter’sbuilding, I can see no reason why they shouldn’t do it, so long as Ipay for it. I haven’t a doubt but that there will be something I cando for Peter, before he finishes his building, that he would greatlyappreciate, while, since I’m handy with my pencil, I mightbeable to make a few head and tail pieces for some of his articles thatwould make them more attractive. I don’t want to use any friend ofmine: I don’t want to feel that I am not giving quite as much as I get,but I think I see my way clear, between me and the Bear-cat, to pay forall the favours I would receive in altering my study. “First thing I do I must go through Father’s books and get the moneyfor them, so I’ll know my limitation when I come to select furniture.And I don’t know that I am going to be so terribly modest when itcomes to naming the sum with which I’ll be satisfied for my allowance.Possibly I shall exercise my age-old prerogative and change my mind;I may just say ‘half’ right out loud and stick to it. And there’sanother thing. Since the editor of Everybody’s Homehas startedmy department and promised that if it goes well he will give it to mepermanently, I can certainly depend on something from that. He has usedmy Introduction and two instalments now. I should think it might befair to talk payments pretty soon. He should give me fifty dollars fora recipe with its perfectly good natural history and embellished withmy own vegetable and floral decorations. “In the meantime I think I might buy my work table and possibly aneasel, so I can have real room to spread out my new material and seehow it would feel to do one drawing completely unhampered. I’ll orderthe table to-night, and then I’ll begin on the books, because I musthave Saturday free; and I must be thinking about the most attractiveand interesting place I can take Donald to. I just have to keep himinterested until he gets going of his own accord, because he shall beatOka Sayye. I wouldn’t let Donald say it but I don’t mind saying myselfto myself with no one present except myself that in all my life I havenever seen anything so mask-like as the stolid little square head onthat Jap. I have never seen anything I dislike more than the oily,stiff, black hair standing up on it like menacing bristles. I havenever had but one straight look deep into his eyes, but in that lookI saw the only thing that ever frightened me in looking into a man’seyes in my whole life. And there is one thing that I have to rememberto caution Donald about. He must carry on this contest in a perfectlyopen, fair, and above-board way, and he simply must not antagonize OkaSayye. There are so many of the Japs. They all look so much alike, andthere’s a blood brotherhood between them that will make them protecteach other to the death against any white man. It wouldn’t be safe forDonald to make Oka Sayye hate him. He had far better try to make himhis friend and put a spirit of honest rivalry into his heart; but cometo think of it, there wasn’t anything like that in my one look intoOka Sayye’s eyes. I don’t know what it was, but whatever it was it wassomething repulsive.” With this thought in her mind Linda walked slowly as she approachedthe High School the next time. Far down the street, over the walksand across the grounds, her eyes were searching eagerly for the tallslender figure of Donald Whiting. She did not see him in the morning,but at noon she encountered him in the hall. “Looking for you,” he cried gaily when he saw her. “I’ve got my pry inon Trig. The professor’s interested. Dad fished out an old Trig thathe used when he was a boy and I have some new angles that will keep myesteemed rival stirring up his gray matter for some little time.” “Good for you! Joyous congratulations! You’ve got the idea!” criedLinda. “Go to it! Start something all along the line, but make itsomething founded on brains and reason and common sense. But, Donald, Iwas watching for you. I wanted to say a word.” Donald Whiting bent toward her. The faintest suspicion of a tinge ofcolour crept into his cheeks. “That’s fine,” he said. “What was it you wanted?” “Only this,” she said in almost a breathless whisper. “There is nothingin California I am afraid of except a Jap, and I am afraid of them, notpotentially, not on account of what all of us know they are planningin the backs of their heads for the future, but right here and now,personally and physically. Don’t antagonize Oka Sayye. Don’t be tooprecipitate about what you’re trying to do. Try to make it appear thatyou’re developing ideas for the interest and edification of the wholeclass. Don’t incur his personal enmity. Use tact.” “You think I am afraid of that little jiu-jitsu?” he scoffed. “Ican lick him with one hand.” “I haven’t a doubt of it,” said Linda, measuring his height andapparent strength and fitness. “I haven’t a doubt of it. But let meask you this confidentially: Have you got a friend who would slip inand stab him in the back in case you were in an encounter and he wasgetting the better of you?” Donald Whiting’s eyes widened. He looked at Linda amazed. “Wouldn’t that be going rather far?” he asked. “I think I have somefairly good friends among the fellows, but I don’t know just whom Iwould want to ask to do me that small favour.” “That is precisely the point,” cried Linda. “You haven’t a friend youwould ask; and you haven’t a friend who would do it, if you did. Butdon’t believe for one second that Oka Sayye hasn’t half a dozen whowould make away with you at an unexpected time and in a secluded place,and vanish, if it would in any way further Oka Sayye’s ambition, orhelp establish the supremacy of the Japanese in California.” “Um-hm,” said Donald Whiting. He was looking far past Linda and now his eyes were narrowed inthought. “I believe you’re rightabout it.” “I’ve thought of you so often since I tried to spur you to beat OkaSayye,” said Linda. “I feel a sort of responsibility for you. It’s tothe honour and glory of all California, and the United States, and thewhite race everywhere for you to beat him, but if any harm should cometo you I would always feel that I shouldn’t have urged it.” “Now that’s foolishness,” said Donald earnestly. “If I am such a dubthat I didn’t have the ambition to think up some way to beat a Japmyself, no matter what happens you shouldn’t regret having been the oneto point out to me my manifest duty. Dad is a Harvard man, you know,and that is where he’s going to send me, and in talking about it theother night I told him about you, and what you had said to me. He’s thegreatest old scout, and was mightily interested. He went at once andopened a box of books in the garret and dug out some stuff that will bea big help to me. He’s going to keep posted and see what he can do; hesaid even worse things to me than you did; so you needn’t feel that youhave any responsibility; besides that, it’s not proved yet that I canbeat Oka Sayye.” “Yes, it is!” said Linda, sending a straight level gaze deep into hiseyes. “Yes, it is! Whenever a white man makes up his mind what he’sgoing to do, and puts his brain to work, he beats any man, of any othercolour. Sure you’re going to beat him.” “Fat chance I have not to,” said Donald, laughing ruefully. “If I don’tbeat him I am disgraced at home, and with you; before I try very longin this highly specialized effort I am making, every professor in theHigh School and every member of my class is bound to become aware ofwhat is going on. You’re mighty right about it. I have got to beat himor disgrace myself right at the beginning of my nice young career.” “Of course you’ll beat him,” said Linda. “At what hour did you say I should come, Saturday?” “Oh, come with the lark for all I care,” said Linda. “Early morning inthe desert is a mystery and a miracle, and the larks have been therejust long enough to get their voices properly tuned for their purestnotes.” Then she turned and hurried away. Her first leisure minute afterreaching home she went to the library wearing one of Katy’s big aprons,and carrying a brush and duster. Beginning at one end of each shelf,she took down the volumes she intended to sell, carefully dusted them,wiped their covers, and the place on which they had stood, and thenopened and leafed through them so that no scrap of paper containingany notes or memoranda of possible value should be overlooked. It waswhile handling these volumes that Linda shifted several of the bookswritten by her father, to separate them from those with which she meantto part. She had grown so accustomed to opening each book she handledand looking through it, that she mechanically opened the first one shepicked up and from among its leaves there fell a scrap of loose paper.She picked it up and found it was a letter from the publishers of thebook. Linda’s eyes widened suddenly as she read: Sending you a line of congratulations. You have gone to the headof the list of “best sellers” among medical works, and the chequeI draw you for the past six months’ royalties will be considerablylarger than that which goes to your most esteemed contemporary onyour chosen subject. Very truly yours, The signature was that of Frederic Dickman, the editor of one of thebiggest publishing houses of the country. “Hm,” she said to herself softly. “Now that is a queer thing. Thatletter was written nearly five years ago. I don’t know why I neverthought of royalties since Daddy went. I frequently heard himmention them before. I suppose they’re being paid to John Gilman asadministrator, or to the Consolidated Bank, and cared for with Father’sother business. There’s no reason why these books should not keep onselling. There are probably the same number of young men, if not agreater number, studying medicine every year. I wonder now, about theseroyalties. I must do some thinking.” Then Linda began to examine books more carefully than before. Theletter she carried with her when she went to her room; but she madea point of being on the lawn that evening when John Gilman came, andafter talking to him a few minutes, she said very casually: “John, asFather’s administrator, does a royalty from his medical books come toyou?” “No,” said Gilman. “It is paid to his bank.” “I don’t suppose,” said Linda casually, “it would amount to enough tokeep one in shoes these inflated days.” “Oh, I don’t know about that,” said John testily. “I have seen a few ofthose cheques in your Father’s time. You should be able to keep fairlywell supplied with shoes.” “So I should,” said Linda drily. “So I should.” Then she led him to the back of the house and talked the incidentout of his mind as cleverly as possible by giving him an intensivebotanical study of Cotyledon. But she could not interest him quite sodeeply as she had hoped, for presently he said: “Eileen tells me thatyou’re parting with some of the books.” “Only technical ones for which I could have no possible use,” saidLinda. “I need clothes, and have found that had I a proper place towork in and proper tools to work with, I could earn quite a bit withmy brush and pencil, and so I am trying to get enough money togetherto fit up the billiard room for a workroom, since nobody uses it foranything else.” “I see,” said John Gilman. “I suppose running a house is extremelyexpensive these days, but even so the income from your estate shouldbe sufficient to dress a schoolgirl and provide for anything you wouldwant in the way of furnishing a workroom.” “That’s what I have always thought myself,” said Linda; “but Eileendoesn’t agree with me, and she handles the money. When the first of themonth comes, we are planning to go over things together, and she isgoing to make me a proper allowance.” “That is exactly as it should be,” said Gilman. “I never realized tillthe other night at dinner that you have grown such a great girl, Linda.That’s fine! Fix your workroom the way you would like to have it, andif there’s anything I can do to help you in any way, you have only tocommand me. I haven’t seen you often lately.” “No,” said Linda, “but I don’t feel that it is exactly my fault. Marianand I were always pals. When I saw that you preferred Eileen, I keptwith Marian to comfort her all I could. I don’t suppose she cared,particularly. She couldn’t have, or she would at least have made someeffort to prevent Eileen from monopolizing you. She probably was mightyglad to be rid of you; but since you had been together so much, Ithought she might miss you, so I tried to cover your defection.” John Gilman’s face flushed. He stood very still, while he seemed deeplythoughtful. “Of course you were free to follow your inclinations, or Eileen’smachinations, whichever you did follow,” Linda said lightly, “but ‘themas knows’ could tell you, John, as Katy so well puts it, that you havemade the mistake of your young life.” Then she turned and went to the garage, leaving John to his visit withEileen. The Eileen who took possession of John was an Eileen with whom he wasnot acquainted. He had known, the night of the dinner party, thatEileen was pouting, but there had been no chance to learn from herwhat her grievance was, and by the next time they met she was a bundleof flashing allurement, so he ignored the occurrence. This evening,for the first time, it seemed to him that Eileen was not so beautifula woman as he had thought her. Something had roiled the blood in herdelicate veins until it had muddied the clear freshness of her smoothsatiny skin. There was discontent in her eyes, which were her mostconvincing attraction. They were big eyes, wide open and candid. Shehad so trained them through a lifetime of practice that she could meetother eyes directly while manipulating her most dextrous evasion.Whenever Eileen was most deceptively subtle, she was looking straightat her victim with the innocent appeal of a baby in her gaze. John Gilman had had his struggle. He had succeeded. He had watched, andwaited, and worked incessantly, and when his opportunity came he wasready. Success had come to such a degree that in a short time he hadassured himself of comfort for any woman he loved. He knew that hisappearance was quite as pleasing as that of his friend. He knew thatin manner and education they were equals. He was now handling largebusiness affairs. He had made friends in high places. Whenever Eileenwas ready, he would build and furnish a home he felt sure would beequal, if not superior, to what Morrison was planning. Why had Eileenfelt that she would envy any woman who shared life with Peter Morrison? All that day she had annoyed him, because there must have been in thevery deeps of his soul “a still, small voice” whispering to him that hehad not lived up to the best traditions of a gentleman in his coursewith Marian. While no definite plans had been made, there had beenendless assumption. Many times they had talked of the home they wouldmake together. When he reached the point where he decided that he neverhad loved Marian as a man should love the woman he marries, he feltjustified in turning to Eileen, but in his heart he knew that if he hadbeen the man he was pleased to consider himself, he would have gone toMarian Thorne and explained, thereby keeping her friendship, while henow knew that he must have earned her contempt. The day at Riverside had been an enigma he could not solve. Eileen wasgay to a degree that was almost boisterous. She had attracted attentionand comment which no well-bred woman would have done. The growing discontent in John’s soul had increased under Linda’sdirect attack. He had known Linda since she was four years old andhad been responsible for some of her education. He had been a largeinfluence in teaching Linda from childhood to be a good sport, to besure she was right and then go ahead, and if she hurt herself in thegoing, to rub the bruise, but to keep her path. A thing patent to the eye of every man who turned an appraising lookupon Linda always had been one of steadfast loyalty. You could dependupon her. She was the counterpart of her father; and Doctor Strong hadbeen loved by other men. Wherever he had gone he had been surrounded.His figure had been one that attracted attention. When he had spoken,his voice and what he had to say had commanded respect. And then therehad emanated from him that peculiar physical charm which gives suchpleasing and distinguished personality to a very few people in thisworld. This gift too had descended to Linda. She could sit and lookstraight at you with her narrow, interested eyes, smile faintly, andmake you realize what she thought and felt without opening her lips.John did not feel very well acquainted with the girl who had dominatedthe recent dinner party, but he did see that she was attractive, thatboth Peter Morrison and Henry Anderson had been greatly amused and verymuch entertained by her. He had found her so interesting himself thathe had paid slight attention to Eileen’s pouting. To-night he was forced to study Eileen, for the sake of his own comfortto try to conciliate her. He was uncomfortable because he was unableto conduct himself as Eileen wished him to, without a small sickeningdisgust creeping into his soul. Before the evening was over he becameexasperated, and ended by asking flatly: “Eileen, what in the dickensis the matter with you?” It was a new tone and a new question on nerves tensely strung. “If you weren’t blind you’d know without asking,” retorted Eileen hotly. “Then I am ‘blind,’ for I haven’t the slightest notion. What have Idone?” “Isn’t it just barely possible,” asked Eileen, “that there might beother people who would annoy and exasperate me? I have not hinted thatyou have done anything, although I don’t know that it’s customary for aman calling on his betrothed to stop first for a visit with her sister.” “For the love of Mike!” said John Gilman. “Am I to be found fault withfor crossing the lawn a minute to see how Linda’s wild garden is comingon? I have dug and helped set enough of those plants to justify someinterest in them as they grow.” “And the garden was your sole subject of conversation?” inquiredEileen, implied doubt conveyed nicely. “No, it was not,” answered Gilman, all the bulldog in his nature comingto the surface. “As I knew perfectly,” said Eileen. “I admit that I’m not feelingmyself. Things began going wrong recently, and everything has gonewrong since. I think it all began with Marian Thorne’s crazy idea ofselling her home and going to the city to try to ape a man.” “Marian never tried to ape a man in her life,” said John, instantlyyielding to a sense of justice. “She is as strictly feminine as anywoman I ever knew.” “Do you mean to say that you think studying architecture is a woman’swork?” sneered Eileen. “Yes, I do,” said Gilman emphatically. “Women live in houses. They’rein them nine tenths of the time to a man’s one tenth. Next to rockinga cradle I don’t know of any occupation in this world more distinctlyfeminine than the planning of comfortable homes for homekeeping people.” Eileen changed the subject swiftly. “What was Linda saying to you?” sheasked. “She was showing me a plant, a rare Echeveria of the Cotyledon family,that she tobogganed down one side of Multiflores Canyon and deliveredsafely on the roadway without its losing an appreciable amount of‘bloom’ from its exquisitely painted leaves.” Eileen broke in rudely. “Linda has missed Marian. There’s not apossible thing to make life uncomfortable for me that she is not doing.You needn’t tell me you didn’t see and understand her rude forwardnessthe other night!” “No, I didn’t see it,” said John, “because the fact is I thought thekid was positively charming, and so did Peter and Henry because bothof them said so. There’s one thing you must take into consideration,Eileen. The time has come when she should have clothes and liberty andopportunity to shape her life according to her inclinations. Let metell you she will attract attention in georgette and laces.” “And where are the georgette and laces to come from?” inquired Eileensarcastically. “All outgo and no income for four years is leaving theStrong finances in mighty precarious shape, I can tell you.” “All right,” said Gilman, “I’m financially comfortable now. I’m ready.Say the word. We’ll select our location and build our home, and letLinda have what there is of the Strong income till she is settled inlife. You have pretty well had all of it for the past four years.” “Yes,” said Eileen furiously, “I have ‘pretty well’ had it, in a fewlittle dresses that I have altered myself and very frequently madeentirely. I have done the best I could, shifting and skimping, and it’snot accomplished anything that I have really wanted. According to men,the gas and the telephone and the electric light and the taxes andfood and cook pay for themselves. All a woman ever spends money on isclothes!” “Eileen,” chuckled John Gilman, “this sounds exactly as if we weremarried, and we’re not, yet.” “No,” said Eileen, “thank heaven we’re not. If it’s come to the placewhere you’re siding with everybody else against me, and where you’remore interested in what my kid sister has to say to you than you are inme, I don’t think we ever shall be.” Then, from stress of nerve tension and long practice, some big tearsgushed up and threatened to overflow Eileen’s lovely eyes. That nevershould happen, for tears are salt water and they cut little riversthrough even the most carefully and skillfully constructed complexion,while Eileen’s was looking its worst that evening. She hastily appliedher handkerchief, and John Gilman took her into his arms; so theremainder of the evening it was as if they were not married. But whenJohn returned to the subject of a home and begged Eileen to announcetheir engagement and let him begin work, she evaded him, and put himoff, and had to have time to think, and she was not ready, and therewere many excuses, for none of which Gilman could see any sufficientreason. When he left Eileen that night, it was with a heavy heart. Throughout the week Linda had worked as never during her lifepreviously, in order to save Saturday for Donald Whiting. She ran theBear-cat down to the garage and had it looked over once more to be surethat everything was all right. Friday evening, on her way from school,she stopped at a grocery where she knew Eileen kept an account, and forthe first time ordered a few groceries. These she carried home withher, and explained to Katy what she wanted. Katy fully realized that Linda was still her child, with no thought inher mind save standing at the head of her classes, carrying on the workshe had begun with her father, keeping up her nature study, and gettingthe best time she could out of life in the open as she had been taughtto do from her cradle. Katy had not the slightest intention of opening her lips to say oneword that might put any idea into the head of her beloved child, butshe saw no reason why she herself should not harbor all the ideas shepleased. Whereupon, actuated by a combination of family pride, love, ambition inher chosen profession, Katy made ready to see that on the morrow theson of Frederick Whiting should be properly nourished on his outingwith Linda. At six o’clock Saturday morning Linda ran the Bear-cat to the backdoor, where she and Katy packed it. Before they had finished, DonaldWhiting came down the sidewalk, his cheeks flushed with the exercise ofwalking, his eyes bright with anticipation, his cause forever won—incase he had a cause—with Katy, because she liked the wholesome, heartymanner in which he greeted Linda, and she was dumbfounded when he heldout his hand to her and said laughingly: “Blessed among women, did youput in a fine large consignment of orange punch?” “No,” said Katy, “I’ll just tell ye flat-footed there ain’t going to beany punch, but, young sir, you’re eshcortin’ a very capable young lady,and don’t ye bewail the punch, because ye might be complimenting yourface with something ye would like a hape better.” “Can’t be done, Katy,” cried Donald. “Ye must have a poor opinion of us,” laughed Katy, “if ye are thinkingye can get to the end of our limitations in one lunch. Fourteen yearsme and Miss Linda’s been on this lunch-box stunt. Don’t ye be thinkin’ye can exhaust us in any wan trip, or in any wan dozen.” So they said good-bye to Katy and rolled past Eileen’s room on the wayto the desert. Eileen stood at the window watching them, and never hadher heart been so full of discontent and her soul the abiding placeof such envy or her mind so busy. Just when she had thought life wasgoing to yield her what she craved, she could not understand how or whythings should begin to go wrong. As the Bear-cat traversed Lilac Valley, Linda was pointing out PeterMorrison’s location. She was telling Donald Whiting where to findPeter’s articles, and what a fine man he was, and that he had promisedto think how he could help with their plan to make of Donald a betterscholar than was Oka Sayye. “Well, I call that mighty decent of a stranger,” said Donald. “But he is scarcely more of a stranger than I am,” answered Linda. “Heis a writer. He is interested in humanity. It’s the business of everyman in this world to reach out and help every boy with whom he comes incontact into the biggest, finest manhood possible. He only knows thatyou’re a boy tackling a big job that means much to every white boy tohave you succeed with, and for that reason he’s just as interested as Iam. Maybe, when we come in this evening, I’ll run up to his place, andyou can talk it over with him. If your father helped you at one angle,it’s altogether probable that Peter Morrison could help you at another.” Donald Whiting rubbed his knee reflectively. He was sitting half turnedin the wide seat so that he might watch Linda’s hands and her facewhile she drove. “Well, that’s all right,” he said heartily. “You can write me down aswilling and anxious to take all the help I can get, for it’s going tobe no microscopic job, that I can tell you. One week has waked up theJap to the fact that there’s something doing, and he’s digging in andhas begun, the last day or two, to speak up in class and suggest thingshimself. Since I’ve been studying him and watching him, I have come tothe conclusion that he is much older than I am. Something he said inclass yesterday made me think he had probably had the best schoolingJapan could give him before he came here. The next time you meet himlook for a suspicion of gray hairs around his ears. He’s too blamedcomprehensive for the average boy of my age. You said the Japs were thebest imitators in the world and I have an idea in the back of my headthat before I get through with him, Oka Sayye is going to prove yourproposition.” Linda nodded as she shot the Bear-cat across the streetcar tracks andheaded toward the desert. The engine was purring softly as it warmedup. The car was running smoothly. The sun of early morning was shiningon them through bracing, salt, cool air, and even in the valley thelarks were busy, and the mocking birds, and from every wayside bush therosy finches were singing. All the world was coming to the exquisitebloom of a half-tropical country. Up from earth swept the heavy odorsof blooming citrus orchards, millions of roses, and the overpowerHER
BY
FATHER’S
DAUGHTER
GENE STRATTON-PORTERContents
I. “What Kind of Shoes are best musical plush toys for 18 months under 10 dollarsthe Shoes You Wear?” II. Cotyledon of Multiflores Canyon III. The House of Dreams IV. Linda Starts a Revolution V. The Smoke of Battle VI. Jane Meredith VII. Trying Yucca VIII. The Bear-cat IX. One Hundred Per Cent Plus X. Katy to the Rescue XI. Assisting Providence XII. The Lay of the Land XIII. Leavening the Bread of Life XIV. Saturday’s Child XV. Linda’s Hearthstone XVI. Producing the Evidence XVII. A Rock and a Flame XVIII. Spanish Iris XIX. The Official Bug-Catcher XX. The Cap Sheaf XXI. Shifting the Responsibility XXII. The End of Marian’s Contest XXIII. The Day of Jubilee XXIV. Linda’s First Party XXV. Buena Moza XXVI. A Mouse Nest XXVII. The Straight and Narrow XXVIII. Putting It Up to Peter XXIX. Katy Unburdens Her Mind XXX. Peter’s Release XXXI. The End of Donald’s Contest XXXII. How the Wasp Built Her Nest XXXIII. The Lady of the Iris List of Characters
CHAPTER I
“What Kind of Shoes Are the Shoes You Wear?”CHAPTER II
Cotyledon of Multiflores CanyonCHAPTER III
The House of DreamsCHAPTER IV
Linda Starts a RevolutionCHAPTER V
The Smoke of BattleCHAPTER VI
Jane MeredithCHAPTER VII
Trying YuccaCHAPTER VIII
The Bear-cat “Friday’s child is loving and giving, But Saturday’s child must work for a living,” CHAPTER IX
One Hundred Per Cent PlusCHAPTER X
Katy to the RescueCHAPTER XI
Assisting ProvidenceCHAPTER XII
The Lay of the LandCHAPTER XIII
Leavening the Bread of LifeMy dear Strong:
CHAPTER XIV
Saturday’s Child