ed through the
first spring wild flowers to the cottage on the hill.

Graham was uncomfortable the next morning on his way to the mill. Anna's
face had haunted him. But out of all his confusion one thing stood out
with distinctness. If he was to be allowed to marry Marion, he must have
no other entanglement. He would go to her clean and clear.

So he went to the office, armed toward Anna with a hardness he was far
from feeling.

"Poor little kid!" he reflected on the way down. "Rotten luck, all
round."

He did not for a moment believe that it would be a lasting grief. He
knew that sort of girl, he reflected, out of his vast experience of
twenty-two. They were sentimental, but they loved and forgot easily.
He hoped she would forget him; but even with that, there was a vague
resentment that she should do so.

"She'll marry some mill-hand," he reflected, "and wear a boudoir cap,
and have a lot of children who need their noses wiped."

But he was uncomfortable.

Anna was not in her office. Her coat and hat were not there. He was
surprised, somewhat relieved. It was out of his hands, then; she had
gone somewhere else to work. Well, she was a good stenographer. Somebody
was having a piece of luck.

Clayton, finding him short-handed, sent Joey over to help him pack up
his office belongings, the fittings of his desk, his personal papers,
the Japanese prints and rugs Natalie had sent after her single visit
to the boy's new working quarters. And, when Graham came back from
luncheon, Joey had a message for him.

"Telephone call for you, Mr. Spencer."

"What was it?"

"Lady called up, from a pay phone. She left her number and said she'd
wait." Joey lowered his voice confidentially. "Sounded like Miss Klein,"
he volunteered.

He was extremely resentful when Graham sent him away on an errand. And
Graham himself frowned as he called the number on the pad. It was like
a girl, this breaking off clean and then telephoning, instead of letting
the thing go, once and for all. But his face changed as he heard Anna's
brief story over the wire.

"Of course I'll come," he said. "I'm pretty busy, but I can steal a
half-hour. Don't you worry. We'll fix it up some way."

He was more concerned than deeply anxious when he rang off. It was
unfortunate, that was all. And the father was a German swine, and ought
to be beaten himself. To think that his Christmas gift had brought her
to such a pass! A leather strap! God!

He was vagu