indings; she had heard it spoken of in the family. It was part of
Marian's pride in her father that he was a bookish man. When the
minister returned to his seat Sylvia asked as she put down the book:--

"Who was Elizabeth?"

And then, little by little, in his abrupt way, he told the story, much
as he had told it that night on the Kankakee, with pauses for which
Sylvia was grateful--they gave her time for thought, for filling in the
lapses, for visualizing the scene he described. And the shadow of the
Morton Bassett she knew crept into the picture. She recalled their early
meetings, that first brief contact on the shore of the lake; their talk
on the day following the convention when she had laughed at him; that
wet evening when they met in the street and he had expressed his
interest in Harwood and the hope that she might care for the young
lawyer. With her trained habits of reasoning she rejected this or that
bit of testimony as worthless; but even then enough remained to chill
her heart. Her hands were cold as she clasped them together. Who was
Elizabeth? Ah, who was Sylvia? The phrase of the song that had brought
her to tears that starry night on the lake when Dan Harwood had asked
her to marry him smote her again. Her grandfather's evasion of her
questions about her father and mother, and the twinges of heartache she
had experienced at college when other girls spoke of their homes,
assumed now for the first time a sinister meaning. Had she, indeed, come
into the world in dishonor, and had she in truth known that far hill
country, with its evergreens and glistening snows?

Ware had finished his story, and sat staring into the crackling fire. At
last he turned toward Sylvia. In the glow of the desk lamp her face was
white, and she gazed with unseeing eyes at the inscription in the book.

The silence was still unbroken when a few minutes later Mrs. Ware came
in with Harwood, whom she had met in the street and brought home to
dinner.

Dan was full of the situation in the legislature, and the table talk
played about that topic.

"We're sparring for time, that's all, and the people pay the freight!
The deadlock is clamped on tight. I never thought Thatcher would prove
so strong. I think we could shake loose enough votes from both sides to
precipitate a stampede for Ramsay, but he won't hear to it. He says he
wants to do the state one patriotic service before he dies by cleaning
out the bosses, and he doesn't want to