nto a deep chair and waited, with troubled eyes regarding
her. "There!" She rubbed vigorously down on the blotter. "These are all
done, every blessed one, James. Now what?"

In an instant she was curled up, feet and all, like a kitten in his lap,
her small brown head, its wisps of fine, straight hair straying over
temples and rounded cheeks, tucked comfortably under his chin; and thus
every point was carefully talked over.

With many exclamations of anxiety and doubt, and much discreet
suggestion from the small adviser, it was at last settled. Frale was to
be properly clothed from the missionary boxes sent every year from the
North. He should stay with them for a while until a suitable place could
be found for him. Above all things he must be kept out of bad company.

"Oh, dear! Poor Cassandra! After all her hopes--and she might have done
so much for her people--if only--" Tears stood in the brown eyes and
even ran over and dropped upon the bishop's coat and had to be carefully
wiped off, for, as he feelingly remarked,--

"I can't go about wearing my wife's tears in plain view, now, can I?"

And then Doctor Hoyle's young friend--she must hear his letter. How
interesting he must be! Couldn't they have him down? And when the bishop
next went up the mountain, might she accompany him? Oh, no. The trip was
not too rough. It was quite possible for her. She would go to see
Cassandra and the old mother. "Poor Cassandra!"

But the self-respecting old stepmother and her daughter did not allow
these kind friends to trespass on any missionary supplies, for Uncle
Jerry was despatched down the mountain with a bundle on the back of his
saddle, which was quietly left at the bishop's door; and Frale next
appeared in a neat suit of homespun, home woven and dyed, and home-made
clothing.

CHAPTER VIII

IN WHICH DAVID THRYNG MAKES A DISCOVERY

Standing on the great hanging rock before his cabin, Thryng imagined
himself absolutely solitary in the centre of a wide wilderness. Even the
Fall Place, where lived the Widow Farwell, although so near, was not
visible from this point; but when he began exploring the region about
him, now on foot and now on horseback, he discovered it to be really a
country of homes.

Every mule path branching off into what seemed an inaccessible wild led
to some cabin, often set in a hollow on a few acres of rich soil,
watered by a never failing spring, where the forest growth had been cut
away to