nd they sat staring at the rapine of the
lightning, the tigerish atrocity that had butchered and mutilated their
beloved trees. Susan dropped into Mrs. Coburn's lap what mail she
brought and hurried inside to faint.

The old couple sat in a stupor long and long before Mrs. Coburn found
that she was idly fingering letters and papers. She glanced down, and a
familiar writing brought her from her trance.

"Oh, Paw, here's a letter from the boy! Here's a letter from Stevie. And
here's your paper."

He took the paper, but did not open it, turning instead to ask, "What
does the boy say?"

With hands awkwardly eager she ripped the envelope, tore out the letter,
and spread it open on her lap, then pulled her spectacles down from her
hair, and read with loving inflection:

"MY DARLING MOTHER AND DAD,--It is simply heinous the way I neglect
to write you, but somehow the rush of things here keeps me putting
it off from day to day. If remembrances were letters you would have
them in flocks, for I think of you always and I am homesick for the
sight of your blessed faces.

"I should like to come out and see you in your little old nest, but
business piles up about me till I can't see my way out at present.
I do wish you could run down here and make me a good long visit,
but I suppose that is impossible, too. There are two or three big
deals pending that look promising, and if any one of them wins out
I shall clean up enough to be a gentleman of leisure. The first
place I turn will be home. My heart aches for the rest and comfort
of your love.

"Write me often and tell me how you both are, and believe me, with
all the affection in the world,

"Your devoted son,
"STEPHEN."

She pushed her dewy spectacles back in her gray hair and pressed the
letter to her lips; she was smiling as only old mothers smile over
letters from their far-off children. The man's face softened, too, with
the ache that battle-scarred fathers feel, thinking of their sons in the
thick of the fight. Then he unfolded his paper, set his glasses on his
big nose, and pursed his lips to read what was new in the world at
large. His wife sat still, just remembering, perusing old files and back
numbers of the gazettes of her boy's past, remembering him from her
first vague thrill of him to h