er."

"I know enough about her: I know all about her!"

"Then you know more than anybody else does. Nobody else seems to know
_anything_ about her!" she ended triumphantly.

"There you go again with insinuations! It's ungenerous, it's unlike
you."

"Morton Bassett," she went on huskily, "if you took some interest in
your own children it would be more to your credit. You blamed me for
letting Marian go to the Willings' and then telegraphed for her to come
home. It's a beautiful relationship you have established with your
children! She hasn't even answered your telegram. But I suppose if she
had you'd have kept it from me. The newspapers talk about your secretive
ways, but they don't know you, Morton Bassett, as I do. I suppose you
can't imagine yourself entertaining Marian on the veranda or walking
with her, talking and laughing, as I saw you with that girl."

"Well, thank God there's somebody I can talk and laugh with! I'm glad to
be able to tell you that Marian will be home to-morrow. You may have the
satisfaction of knowing that if you _would_ let her go to the Willings'
with Allen Thatcher I can at least bring her back after you failed to do
it."

"So you did hear from her, did you! Of course you couldn't have told me:
I suppose you confide in Miss Garrison now," she ended drearily.

His wife's fatigue, betrayed in her tired voice, did not mitigate the
stab with which he wished to punish her references to Sylvia. And he
delivered it with careful calculation.

"You are quite right, Hallie. I did speak to Miss Garrison about Marian.
Miss Garrison has gone to bring Marian home. That's all; go to bed."

CHAPTER XXVIII

A CHEERFUL BRINGER OF BAD TIDINGS

The announcement that Harwood was preparing to attack the reorganization
of the White River Canneries corporation renewed the hopes of many
victims of that experiment in high finance, and most of the claims
reached Dan's office that summer. The legal points involved were
sufficiently difficult to evoke his best energies, and he dug diligently
in the State Library preparing his case. He was enjoying the cool, calm
heights of a new freedom. Many older men were eking out a bare living at
the law, and the ranks were sadly overcrowded, but he faced the future
confidently. He meant to practice law after ideals established by men
whose names were still potent in the community; he would not race with
the ambulance to pick up damage suits, and he refused divor