ey would not have neglected to follow up advantages, would not
have persisted in lines of attack that created public sympathy for me.
They would not have so crudely exploited my unconventional marriage and
my financial relations with old Ellersly. But they dared not go near the
battle-field; they had to trust to agents whom their orders and suggestions
reached by the most roundabout ways; and they were busier with their
enterprises that involved immediate and great gain or loss of money.

When Galloway died, they learned that the Coal stocks with which they
thought I was loaded down were part of his estate. They satisfied
themselves that I was in fact as impregnable as I had warned Langdon. They
reversed tactics; Roebuck tried to make it up with me. "If he wants to see
me," was my invariable answer to the intimations of his emissaries, "let
him come to my office, just as I would go to his, if I wished to see him."

"He is a big man--a dangerous big man," cautioned Joe.

"Big--yes. But strong only against his own kind," replied I. "One mouse can
make a whole herd of elephants squeal for mercy."

"It isn't prudent, it isn't prudent," persisted Joe.

"It is not," replied I. "Thank God, I'm at last in the position I've been
toiling to achieve. I don't have to be prudent. I can say and do what I
please, without fear of the consequences. I can freely indulge in the
luxury of being a man. That's costly, Joe, but it's worth all it could
cost."

Joe didn't understand me--he rarely did. "I'm a hen. You're an eagle," said
he.

XXIX. A HOUSEWARMING

Joe's daughter, staying on and on at Dawn Hill, was chief lieutenant, if
not principal, in my conspiracy to drift Anita day by day further and
further into the routine of the new life. Yet neither of us had shown by
word or look that a thorough understanding existed between us. My part was
to be unobtrusive, friendly, neither indifferent nor eager, and I held to
it by taking care never to be left alone with Anita; Alva's part was to
be herself--simple and natural and sensible, full of life and laughter,
mocking at those moods that betray us into the absurdity of taking
ourselves too seriously.

I was getting ready a new house in town as a surprise to Anita, and I took
Alva into my plot. "I wish Anita's part of the house to be exactly to her
liking," said I. "Can't you set her to dreaming aloud what kind of place
she would like to live in, what she would like to open her