inter. I never dreamed you were
having it built right away."

"Well, isn't it rather nice to come home to?" he observed.

"It's dear. A homey looking place," she answered. "A beautiful site, and
the house fits,--that white and the red tiles. Is the big stone
fireplace in the living room, Jack?"

"Yes, and one in pretty nearly every other room besides," he nodded.
"Wood fires are cheerful."

The _Panther_ turned her nose shoreward at Fyfe's word.

"I wondered about that foundation the first time I saw it," Stella
confessed, "whether you built it, and why it was never finished. There
was moss over the stones in places. And that lawn wasn't made in a
single season. I know, because dad had a country place once, and he was
raging around two or three summers because the land was so hard to get
well-grassed."

"No, I didn't build the foundation or make the lawn," Fyfe told her. "I
merely kept it in shape. A man named Hale owned the land that takes in
the bay and the point when I first came to the lake. He was going to be
married. I knew him pretty well. But it was tough going those days. He
was in the hole on some of his timber, and he and his girl kept waiting.
Meantime he cleared and graded that little hill, sowed it to grass, and
laid the foundation. He was about to start building when he was killed.
A falling tree caught him. I bought in his land and the timber limits
that lie back of it. That's how the foundation came there."

"It's a wonder it didn't grow up wild," Stella mused. "How long ago was
that?"

"About five years," Fyfe said. "I kept the grass trimmed. It didn't seem
right to let the brush overrun it after the poor devil put that labor of
love on it. It always seemed to me that it should be kept smooth and
green, and that there should be a big, roomy bungalow there. You see my
hunch was correct, too."

She looked up at him in some wonder. She hadn't accustomed herself to
associating Jack Fyfe with actions based on pure sentiment. He was too
intensely masculine, solid, practical, impassive. He did not seem to
realize even that sentiment had influenced him in this. He discussed it
too matter-of-factly for that. She wondered what became of the
bride-to-be. But that Fyfe could not tell her.

"Hale showed me her picture once," he said, "but I never saw her. Oh, I
suppose she's married some other fellow long ago. Hale was a good sort.
He was out-lucked, that's all."

The _Panther_ slid in to the float. J