doesn't Brooks see it? He was down here for a week
recently, and he didn't seem to realize that anything was wrong. Perhaps
she is always so radiant when he comes that she dazzles his eyes.

"She and Miss Sulie are a pathetic pair. I meet them on the road on their
errands of mercy. They are like two sisters of charity in their long
capes and little bonnets. Evidently Mrs. Brooks feels that if her son
cannot doctor the community she can at least nurse it. The country folks
adore her, and go to her for advice, so that Crossroads still opens wide
its doors to the people, as it did in the days of old Dr. Brooks.

"And now, does the Princess still serve? I can see you with your blue
bowl on your way to Peggy, and stopping on the stairs to light for me the
torch of inspiration. And now all of this service and inspiration is
being spilled at the feet of--Marie-Louise! Will you give her greetings,
and ask her how soon I may come and worship at the shrine of her grinning
old god?"

Anne, carrying his letter to Marie-Louise, asked, "Shall I tell him to
come?"

"Yes. I didn't want him to go away, but he said he must--that he couldn't
write here. But I knew why he went, and you knew."

"You needn't look at me so reproachfully, Marie-Louise. It isn't my
fault."

"It is your fault," Marie-Louise accused her, "for being like a flame.
Father says that people hold out their hands to you as they do to a
fire."

"And what," Anne demanded, "has all this to do with Geoffrey Fox?"

"You know," Marie-Louise told her bluntly, "he loves you and looks up to
you--and I--sit at his feet."

There was something of tenseness in the small face framed by the red
hair. Anne touched Marie-Louise's cheek with a tender finger. "Dear
heart," she said, "he is just a man."

For a moment the child stood very still, then she said, "Is he? Or is he
a god, like my Pan in the garden?"

Later she decided that Geoffrey should come in May. "When there are
roses. And I'll have some people out."

* * * * *

It was in May that Rose Acres justified its name. The marble Pan piping
on his reeds faced a garden abloom with beauty. At the right, a grass
walk led down to a sunken fountain approached by wide stone steps.

It was on these steps that Marie-Louise sat one morning, weaving a
garland.

"I am going to tie it with gold ribbon," she said. "Tibbs got the laurel
for me."

"Who is it for?"

"It may be for--Pan," Marie