existed, between them, none could read between the lines of
his sermons, when he chose to lash her by a savage denunciation of any
mild backsliding, of which she might have been guilty, and himself
cognizant. Her return to the village with the child, who had no
visible father, and no mother, unless the guesses of the gossips were
correct, had afforded him opportunity for a most masterly peroration.
But he belched forth his greatest eloquence on that Sunday morning,
when she had the temerity to bring into the sacred confines of his
sanctuary this fatherless boy, for whose sake she had chosen to live a
lonely life. If his prayer of that morning proved efficacious, then
surely the infant was damned, and the woman's soul consigned to
endless Purgatory. Thus the day to which Leon recurred in thought, was
a landmark in another life beside his, and I have turned aside for a
moment to relate this incident, that the character of Miss Grath may
be better comprehended, for in spite of all that she had suffered
through the animosity of the preacher, she had never omitted
attendance at church, when it was a physical possibility for her to
get there. It must be true that some of her determination and will
descended from her to the boy, because association means more than
heredity.

The next occurrence in his life, which now occupied his thoughts, was
a day long after, when he was nearing his twelfth year. He was off on
a hunting expedition, and had climbed a mountain. Careless in leaping
from crag to crag, he landed upon a loose boulder, which rolled from
under his feet, so that he was thrown. In falling, his foot twisted,
and a moment later, intense pain made him aware that he could not walk
upon it. For four hours he slowly, but pluckily, dragged himself down
the mountain, and at last reached home. It so chanced that a
celebrated physician from New York was spending a vacation in the
neighborhood, attracted perhaps by the brooks, which were full of
fish. This man was Dr. Emanuel Medjora, and having heard of the boy's
hurt, he voluntarily visited the lonely farm-house, and attended upon
him so skilfully that Leon soon was well.

Just why the thought of Dr. Medjora should come to him at this time
was a problem to Leon, but one upon which he did not dwell. After that
summer, he had seen the Doctor again at various times, two or three
years apart, always at vacation-time. But it was now three years since
they had met.

Swiftly his