ssuming that he should
finally and definitely decide to seek such an interview. And Mr.
Hubert Morrissey and Mr. Frank Campbell bowed themselves out of
Colonel Butler's presence.

While the cause of this sudden change of attitude on Colonel Butler's
part remained a mystery to his two visitors, it was, in reality, not
far to seek. For, as he looked out at his window that March morning,
he saw, not the bare trees on the lawn, not the brown hedge or the
beaten roadway; he saw, out somewhere among the snow-covered fields,
laboring as a farmer's boy, enduring the privations of a humble home,
and the limitations of a narrow environment, the lad who for a dozen
years had been his solace and his pride, the light and the life of
Bannerhall. How sadly he missed the boy, no one, save perhaps his
faithful daughter, had any conception. And she knew it, not because of
any word of complaint that had escaped his lips, but because every
look and mood and motion told her the story. He would not send for
his grandson; he would not ask him to come back; he would not force
him to come. It was a piece of childish folly on the boy's part no
doubt, this going away; due to his impetuous nature and his immature
years; but, he had made his bed, now let him lie in it till he should
come to a realization of what he had done, and, like the prodigal son
of old, should come back of his own accord, and ask to be forgiven.
Yet the days went by, and the weeks grew long, and no prodigal
returned. There was no abatement of determination on the grandfather's
part, but the idea grew slowly in his mind that if by some chance, far
removed from even the suspicion of design, they should encounter each
other, he and the boy, face to face, in the village street, on the
open road, in field or farm-house, something might be said or done
that would lead to the longed-for reconciliation. It was the practical
application of this thought that led to his change of attitude that
morning in the presence of his visitors. He would have a legitimate
errand to the home of Enos Walker. The incidental opportunities that
might lie in the path of such an errand properly fulfilled, were not
to be lightly ignored nor peremptorily dismissed. At any rate the
matter was worth careful consideration. He considered it, and made his
decision.

That afternoon, after his daughter Millicent had gone down into the
village in entire ignorance of any purpose that he might have had to
leave th