face grew still.

"Where has he gone?" The question was put calmly, but with effort.

"It's quite a yarn, Con; can you come in?"

"I can hear from here, Ralph; go on."

"You know that rich old fellow on the Pacific Coast who has just died,
Jasper Filmer, the mining magnate?"

"Yes."

"He's was Jock's--father."

Drew heard a package drop from his sister's arms. She stooped and picked
it up. From his chair Drew saw that her face never changed expression.

"So then, Filmer did not take the trouble to change even his name?"

The voice was completely under control now.

"No. I imagine this was no case of the town-crier being sent out. When
the prodigal got ready to return, under prescribed conditions--the calf
was there."

"I see. And has he--has Jock accepted the--conditions?"

"He's gone to make--a big fight, Con. He will not take the fortune
unless he wins. Filmer's got some of the old man in him, I bet."

"Yes. Is--is his mother living? Has he any one to go to--out there?"

"No one, Con. From what he told me, I gathered that it was to be a fight
with the odds--against him."

There was a long pause. A package again dropped to the floor. The girl
outside stooped to gather it up; dropped two or three more, then
straightened herself with an impatient exclamation.

"He'll win out!" The words sounded like a rally call. With that the girl
fled down the hall, trilling the merriest sort of a Christmas tune.

At three o'clock St. Ange turned out in force, and set its face toward
the bungalow.

Leon Tate had decided that to put a cheerful front to the foe was the
wiser thing to do, so he closed the Black Cat and arrayed his oily
person in his best raiment, kept heretofore for the Government Inspector
and Hillcrest potentates, and drove his wife himself up to Drew's fete.

"Do you know," he said, as they started, "Brown Betty looks as played
out as if she had been druv instead of loafing in the stable."

"She do look beat," Isa agreed. "What's that in the bottom of the sled,
Tate?" she suddenly asked.

Tate picked it up.

"Now what do you think of that?" he grunted, and held the object out at
arm's length.

It was a baby's tiny sock; unworn, unsoiled. The little twisted foot
that had found shelter in it for so brief a time had not been a restless
foot.

"Give that to me," Isa said hoarsely, and tears stood in her grim eyes.

"What the--what does that--mean?"

"How should I know, Tate? But it set me t