tself. They were in the credit
account of Gordon and Gordon, every dollar of which justly belonged to
the parent company. Was not the pipe-making invention perfected by a
Chiawassee stock-holder, who was also a Chiawassee employee, on
Chiawassee time, and with Chiawassee materials? Then why, in the name of
justice, was it not to be considered a legitimate Chiawassee asset?

Mr. Duxbury Farley asked these questions pathetically and insistently;
at the Cupola Club, in the Manufacturers' Association, in season and out
of season, wherever there was a willing ear to hear or the smallest
current of public sentiment to be diverted into the channel so patiently
dug for it. Was his virtuous indignation merely the mental attitude of
all the Duxbury Farleys toward things external? That bubble is too huge
for this pen to prick; besides, its bursting might devastate a world.

But if we may not probe too deeply into primal causes, we may still be
regardful of the effects. Mr. Farley's bid for public sympathy was not
without results. True, there were those who hinted that the veteran
promoter was only paving the way for a _coup de grace_ which should
obliterate the Gordons, root and branch; but when the days and weeks
passed, and Mr. Farley had done nothing more revolutionary than to
reelect himself president of Chiawassee Consolidated, and to resume,
with Dyckman as his lieutenant, the direction of its affairs, these
prophets of evil were discredited.

It was observed also that Caleb remained general manager at Gordonia,
and still received the patronizing friendship of former times; and to
Tom the full width of the pike was given--a distance which he kept
scrupulously. But as for the younger Gordon, he knew it was the lull
before the storm, and he was watching the horizon for the signs of its
coming--when he was not searching for clues or brooding behind the
closed door of his private office with the devil of homicide for a
closet companion.

During this reproachful period Vincent Farley gave himself unreservedly,
as it would seem, to the sentimental requirements, spending much time on
the mountain top and linking his days to Ardea's in a way to give her a
sinking of the heart at the thought that this was an earnest of all time
to come.

Mountain View Avenue had understood that the wedding was to be in
September; but as late as the final week in August the cards were not
out, and Miss Euphrasia, the source and fountainhead of th