ar by year, because millions were breeders! The newspaper
stories of them--the wonder at and belief in their power! It was all
going on just as before, and yet here stood a Vanderpoel in an English
village street, of no more worth as far as power to aid herself went
than Joe Buttle's girl with the thick waist and round red cheeks. Jenny
Buttle would have believed that her ladyship's rich American sister
could do anything she chose, open any door, command any presence,
sweep aside any obstacle with a wave of her hand. But of the two, Jenny
Buttle's path would have laid straighter before her. If she had had "a
young man" who had fallen ill she would have been free if his mother had
cherished no objection to their "walking out"--to spend all her spare
hours in his cottage, making gruel and poultices, crying until her
nose and eyes were red, and pouring forth her hopes and fears to any
neighbour who came in or out or hung over the dividing garden hedge. If
the patient died, the deeper her mourning and the louder her sobs at his
funeral the more respectable and deserving of sympathy and admiration
would Jenny Buttle have been counted. Her ladyship's rich American
sister had no "young man"; she had not at any time been asked to "walk
out." Even in the dark days of the fever, each of which had carried
thought and action of hers to the scene of trouble, there had reigned
unbroken silence, except for the vicar's notes of warm and appreciative
gratitude.

"You are very obstinate, Fergus," Mr. Penzance had said.

And Mount Dunstan had shaken his head fiercely and answered:

"Don't speak to me about it. Only obstinacy will save me from behaving
like--other blackguards."

Mr. Penzance, carefully polishing his eyeglasses as he watched him, was
not sparing in his comment.

"That is pure folly," he said, "pure bull-necked, stubborn folly,
charging with its head down. Before it has done with you it will have
made you suffer quite enough."

"Be sure of that," Mount Dunstan had said, setting his teeth, as he
sat in his chair clasping his hands behind his head and glowering into
space.

Mr. Penzance quietly, speculatively, looked him over, and reflected
aloud--or, so it sounded.

"It is a big-boned and big-muscled characteristic, but there are things
which are stronger. Some one minute will arrive--just one minute--which
will be stronger. One of those moments when the mysteries of the
universe are at work."

"Don't speak to me