atricia's keen enjoyment of the life in the
open, and--this put with gentle hesitation on the part of the
news-bringer--of Mrs. Honoria's growing affection for the young woman
whose ambitions reached out toward a sociological career.

"You say Patricia is learning to drive a car?" queried Patricia's lover.

"Best woman driver I ever saw," was the senator's praiseful rejoinder.
"Nothing feazes that little girl, and I'm telling you that she can turn
the wheels just about as fast as you want to ride."

This was a new aspect of Miss Anners, even to one who knew her as well
as Blount thought he knew her, and, lover-like, he found a grain of
encouragement in it. Patricia had never cared for the out-of-door things
save as they bore upon the hygienic condition of the poor in the great
cities. If she had changed in one respect, she might change in another.

"I'm glad to know that," he commented. "She was needing an outlet on
that side. There is a good bit of the Puritan in her--all work and no
play, you know."

The senator looked out from beneath his shaggy eyebrows. "Speaking of
work; they're working you pretty hard these days, aren't they, son? If
you belonged to my generation instead of your own, you wouldn't be
cold-shouldering that young woman out yonder at Wartrace the way you do;
not for all the politics that were ever hatched."

"I have my work to do, and Patricia Anners would be the last person in
the world to put obstacles in the way of it," returned the son gravely.
Then he added: "I wish I could say as much for other people."

The boss shot another keen glance across the table. "Somebody been
trying to block you, Evan, boy?" he asked.

Blount met the gaze of the shrewd gray eyes without flinching.

"I don't know of any good reason why we shouldn't be entirely frank with
each other, dad," he said, using for the first time since his return to
the homeland the old boyhood father-name. "You know, better than any one
else, I think, what the stumbling-blocks are, and who is putting them in
my way."

"Maybe so; maybe I do," was the even-toned answer. "It happens so, once
in a while, that I know a heap of things I can't tell, son." Then: "Has
McVickar been calling you down?"

"No one has called me down. But some one, or something, is keeping me
out of the real fight. I don't mean that I'm not doing what I set out to
do: I've got my own particular abomination by the neck, and I'm about to
choke the life out of it.