egree of mental fitness which would enable
him to think calmly of Ardea as another man's wife. The effort commended
itself as a part of the new broadening process, but it was not entirely
successful.

"You wrote me the Farleys would be back this month, didn't you?" he
asked.

"The fifteenth," said Caleb; smoking reflectively through another long
pause before he added. "And then come the business fireworks. Have you
made up your mind what-all you're goin' to do, Buddy?"

"Oh, yes," said Tom, as if this were merely a matter in passing. "We'll
consolidate the two plants and the coal-mine, if it's agreeable all
around."

The iron-master took a fresh hitch in his chair. Truly, this was a
retransformed Tom; a creature totally and radically different from the
college junior who had sweltered through the industrial battle of the
previous summer, breathing out curses and threatenings.

"Was you allowin' to let Colonel Duxbury climb into all three o' the
saddles?" he inquired, keeping his emotions out of his voice as he
could.

"That will be for you and Major Dabney to decide," was the even-toned
response. "I would suggest a three-cornered alliance: a third to you,
another to Farley, and the remaining third to the Major. The pipe
foundry can't run without the furnace and, under present conditions, the
furnace is pretty largely dependent on the pipe foundry for its market;
and neither could run without the Major's coal."

"Yes, that scheme might carry far enough to hit three of us. But
whereabouts do you figure out the fourth third for yourself, son?"

"Oh, I'm not in it; or I'm not going to be after the Farleys come back.
I made up my mind to that six months ago," said Tom coolly.

"Great Peter!" ejaculated Caleb, stirred for once out of his
slow-speaking, reticent habit. But he made amends by remaining silent
for five full minutes before he hazarded the query: "Got something else
on the string, Buddy?"

"Yes, two or three things," was Tom's immediate and frank rejoinder. "I
can have a place as chemist with the steel people at Bethlehem; and Mr.
Clarkson is anxious to have me to go to the New Arizona iron country for
him."

It was the brightest of midsummer nights, and a late moon was swinging
clear of the Lebanon sky-line, but the prospect of close-clipped lawn
and stately trees suddenly went dim before the eyes of the old
ex-artillery-man.

"You're all I got in this world, son, and I reckon it makes me sort o'