orn to be a wanderer in love, an experimenter in passion. She even
recognized in him an incurable sensuous curiosity about women, that
would be quite remote from his love for her. He would see nothing wrong
in his infidelities, so long as she did not know and did not suffer. And
he would come back to her from them, watchful for suspicion, relieved
when he did not find it, and bringing her small gifts which would be
actually burnt offerings to his own soul.

She made up her mind to give him up. She would go home in the morning,
make her peace with them all, and never see Louis Akers again.

She slept after that, and at ten o'clock Elinor wakened her with the
word that her father was downstairs. Elinor was very pale. It had been
a shock to her to see her brother in her home after all the years, and a
still greater one when he had put his arm around her and kissed her.

"I am so sorry, Howard," she had said. The sight of him had set her lips
trembling. He patted her shoulder.

"Poor Elinor," he said. "Poor old girl! We're a queer lot, aren't we?"

"All but you."

"An obstinate, do-and-be-damned lot," he said slowly. "I'd like to see
my little girl, Nellie. We can't have another break in the family."

He held Lily in much the same way when she came down, an arm around her,
his big shoulders thrown back as though he would guard her against the
world. But he was very uneasy and depressed, at that. He had come on a
difficult errand, and because he had no finesse he blundered badly.
It was some time before she gathered the full meaning of what he was
saying.

"Aunt Cornelia's!" she exclaimed.

"Or, if you and your mother want to go to Europe," he put in hastily,
seeing her puzzled face, "I think I can arrange about passports."

"Does that mean he won't have me back, father?"

"Lily, dear," he said, hoarse with anxiety, "we simply have to remember
that he is a very old man, and that his mind is not elastic. He is
feeling very bitter now, but he will get over it."

"And I am to travel around waiting to be forgiven! I was ready to go
back, but--he won't have me. Is that it?"

"Only just for the present." He threw out his hands. "I have tried
everything. I suppose, in a way, I could insist, make a point of it,
but there are other things to be considered. His age, for one thing,
and then--the strike. If he takes an arbitrary stand against me, no
concession, no argument with the men, it makes it very difficult, in
many