t the picture which the
girl with whom he was in love had given him. He sat silent for a moment
or two, and then stood up.

"When I hear from Mrs. Hastings, I'll drive around again. Candidly, the
thing has somewhat astonished me. I always had a fancy it would be
Sally."

Hawtrey laughed. "Sally?" he replied. "We're first-rate friends, but I
never had the faintest notion of marrying her."

Wyllard went out to harness his team, and he did not notice that Sally,
who had approached the door with a tray in her hands a moment or two
earlier, drew back before him softly. When he had crossed the room she
set down the tray and, with her cheeks burning, leaned upon the table.
Then, feeling that she could not stay in the stove-heated room, she went
out, and stood in the slushy snow. One of her hands was tightly closed,
and all the color had vanished from her cheeks. However, she contrived
to give Hawtrey his supper by and by, and soon afterwards drove away.

CHAPTER IV

A CRISIS

While Wyllard made arrangements for his journey, and Sally Creighton
went very quietly about her work on the lonely prairie farm, it happened
one evening that Miss Winifred Rawlinson sat uneasily expectant far back
under the gallery of a concert-hall in an English manufacturing town. In
her back seat Miss Rawlinson could not hear very well, but it was the
cheapest place she could obtain, and economy was of some little
importance to her. Besides, by craning her neck a little to avoid the
hat of the strikingly dressed young woman in front of her, she could, at
least, see the stage. The programme which she held in one hand announced
that Miss Agatha Ismay would sing a certain aria from a great composer's
oratorio. Miss Rawlinson leaned further forward in her chair when a girl
of about her own age, which was twenty-four, slowly advanced to the
center of the stage.

The girl on the stage was a tall, well-made, brown-haired girl, with a
quiet grace of movement and a comely face. She was attired in a long
trailing dress of a shimmering corn-straw tint. Agatha Ismay had sung at
unimportant concerts with marked success, but that evening there was
something very like shrinking in her eyes.

A crash of chords from the piano melted into a rippling prelude, and
Winifred breathed easier when her friend began to sing. The voice was
sweet and excellently trained, and there was a deep stillness of
appreciation when the clear notes thrilled through the cl