, and selfishness, Jerry was a
keener reader of human nature than her lack of training could account
for. She knew just the lines Aunt Jerry had laid, the net spread for
Eugene's feet. But--Oh, things must come out all right. He would change.

This one thought rang up and down her scale of thinking, as if repeating
would make true what Jerry knew was false.

"'If a man went right with himself.' Oh, Eugene, Eugene!" she murmured,
half aloud. "You hitched your wagon to a star, but to what kind of a
star--to what kind of a star?"

Then came a greater query: "Shall I go back to 'Eden,' to Aunt Jerry's
rule, to Eugene, to love, to easy, dependent, purposeless living? Shall
I?"

A blank wall seemed suddenly to be flung across her way. Should she
climb over it, hammer an opening through it, or turn back and run from
it?

With these questions stalking before her she had come out to dinner and
York Macpherson's genial, entertaining conversation, and to Laura
Macpherson's gracious intuition and soothing sympathy.

Early in the evening, as the Macphersons with their guest sat watching
the splendor of the sunset sky, Jerry said, suddenly:

"It has been two weeks to-day since I came here. Quite long enough for a
stranger's first visit."

"A 'stranger,'" Laura Macpherson repeated. "A 'stranger' who asked to be
called 'Jerry' the first thing. We are all so well acquainted with this
'stranger' that we wouldn't want to give her up now."

"But I must give you up pretty soon." Jerry spoke earnestly.

"Why 'must'? Has the East too strong a hold for the West to break?"
York asked.

"I came out here because I believed my land would support me, and I had
all sorts of foolish dreams of what I might find here that would be new
and romantic." Jerry's eyes had a far-away look in them as she recalled
the unrealized picture of her prairie domain.

"You haven't answered my question yet," York reminded her.

Jerry dropped her eyes, the bloom deepened on her fair cheek, and she
clasped her small hands together. For a long time no word was spoken.

"I didn't answer your question. I am not going back to Philadelphia.
There must be something else besides land in the West," Jerry said, at
last.

"Yes, _we_ are here. Do stay right here with us," Laura Macpherson
urged, warmly.

Every day the companionship of this girl had grown upon her, for that
was Jerry's gift. But to the eager invitation of her hostess the girl
only shook her head.