she was
sobbing on his shoulder. "Mother," he pleaded, "forgive me! To think I
never knew!"

They had a long talk then, intimate and searching. "You have borne it
bravely," he said. "No one has ever dreamed of it, I am sure. The Master
told me, the other day, that I must not be afraid of life. He said that
everything, even our blessings, came to us through pain."

"I would not say everything," temporised Margaret, "but it is true that
much comes that way. We know happiness only by contrast."

"Happiness and misery, light and dark, sunshine and storm, life and
death," mused Lynn. "Yes, it is by contrast, but, as the Master says,
'the balance swings true.' I wish you knew him, mother; he has helped
me. I never knew my father, so it is not wrong for me to say that I wish
he might have been my father."

Margaret grew as cold as ice, and her senses reeled, then flame swept
her from head to foot. "Come," she said, not knowing her own voice, "it
is late."

Long afterward, in the solitude of her room, she took the precious
thought from its hiding-place, and found it purest gold. It was as
though all the bitterness in her heart, growing upward, through the
years, had flowered overnight into a perfect rose.

XVIII

Lynn Comes Into His Own

At the post-office there was a letter for Mrs. Irving. Lynn took it,
with a lump rising in his throat, for, though he had never seen her
handwriting, he knew, through a sixth sense, that it was from Iris.
Evidently, it was a brief communication, for the envelope contained not
more than a single sheet. The straight, precise slope of the address had
an old-fashioned air. It was very different from the modern angular hand
which demands a whole line for two or three words.

In some way, it brought her nearer to him, and in the shadow of the
maple, just outside the house, he kissed the superscription before he
took it in.

He waited, consciously, while his mother read it. It was little more
than a note, saying that she was established in a hall bedroom in a
city boarding-house, where she had the use of the piano in the parlour,
and that she was taking two lessons a week and practising a great deal.
She gave the name of her teacher, said she was well, and sent kind
remembrances to all who might inquire for her.

With a woman's insight, Margaret read heartache between the lines. She
knew that the note was brief because Iris did not dare to trust herself
to write more. There was