a silent, awed group, they stood in the door-yard and
watched him go through the pasture gate. Across the hills, the sunset
and the twilight fell on forest and fields and hearts.

That night, men say, a dark shadow stole out of the graveyard at
midnight and galloped away. Far below in the Coyote Valley, where the
road to the plains goes down from the hill, some one said that--lying
awake near the window, in the stillness which comes towards
morning--he heard the sound of horse's hoofs going by, and rider and
horse swept on far down the road.

[Illustration: FINIS]

[Illustration: (decoration)]

EPILOGUE.

On Pine Tree mountain the old house still stands, its windows hidden
beneath vines. Back and forth by the barns Tony slowly moves. By the
gate an old dog lies waiting. On the porch a frail cripple sits in the
twilight and looks down the road. But the one they wait for will never
come. Across the years of busy action and world-wide service he treads
the path that leads to "palms of victory, crowns of glory." In the joy
of service he is finding the peace which the world cannot give nor
take away. In self-forgetfulness he is growing daily into His
likeness, until he shall at last awake in His image, satisfied.

[Illustration: (decoration)]

THE TAKING IN OF MARTHA MATILDA.

BY BELLE KELLOGG TOWNE.

She stood at the end of the high bridge and looked over it to where
her father was making his way along the river-bank by a path leading
to the smelter. Then she glanced up another path branching at her feet
from the road crossing the bridge and which climbed the mountain until
it reached a little adobe cottage, then stopped. She seemed undecided,
but the sweet tones of a church bell striking quickly on the clear
April air caused her to turn her face in the direction from whence the
sound came.

It was Martha Matilda, "Graham's girl," who stood thus, with the wind
from the snow-caps blowing down fresh upon her, tossing to and fro the
slim feather in her worn hat, and making its way under the lapels of
her unbuttoned jacket--Martha Matilda Graham, aged ten, with a wistful
face that might have been sweet and dimpled had not care and
loneliness robbed it of its rightful possessions. Further back there
had been a mother who called the child "Mattie." But now there was
only "father," and with him it was straight "Martha Matilda," spoken a
little brusquely, but never unkindly. Oh, yes, up in the cottage,