nd sat down facing him. "Yes, it
does seem so. I think I've hinted that I wasn't happy in my old home life;
but I've never talked very much about it. I ought to tell you, I think,
that I want to forget all about it. I want the old relationship broken off
completely."

Harboro shook his head with decision. "That won't do," he declared.
"Believe me, you're making a mistake. You're a good deal younger than I,
Sylvia, and it's the way of the young to believe that for every old tie
broken a new one can be formed. At your age life seems to have an
abundance of everything. But you'll be dismayed, in a few years, to
discover that most things come to us but once, and that nearly all the
best things come to us in our youth."

He stood before her with an air of such quiet conviction, of such tranquil
certainty of the truth of what he said that she could not meet his glance.
She had placed an elbow on the table, and was supporting her face in her
hand. Her expression was strangely inscrutable to the man who looked down
at her.

"Your father must be getting old. If you shouldn't see him for a year or
so, you'd be fearfully grieved to note the evidences of failure: a slight
stoop, perhaps; a slower gait; a more troubled look in his eyes. I want to
help you to see this thing clearly. And some day you'll get word that he
is dead--and then you'll remember, too late, how you might have carried
little joys to him, how you might have been a better daughter...."

She sprang up, shaking the tears from her eyes. "I'll go," she said. She
startled Harboro by that note of despair in her voice. "When does he wish
me to come?"

"He says he is ill and alone. I think he would be glad if I could persuade
you to go this evening. Why not this evening?"

Unfortunately, Harboro concealed a part of the truth in this. Her father
had quite definitely asked to have her come this evening. But Harboro
wished her to feel that she was acting voluntarily, that she was choosing
for herself, both as to the deed and as to the time of its doing.

And Sylvia felt a wave of relief at the assurance that her father had not
set a definite time. Oh, surely the letter was just what it purported to
be--a cry of loneliness and an honest desire to see her. And Sylvia really
loved her father. There was that in her nature which made it impossible
for her to judge him.

"I could go with you," ventured Harboro, "though he doesn't say anything
about my coming. I've felt we