e and Cynthia.

Quickened by spiritual insight Sandy saw that the girl was awake to the
reality of things. Shock had shattered her childishness forever, but
she was not afraid. Uncertainty and ignorance were there, but no sense
of danger in the clear, wonderful eyes.

"Oh! Sandy," she panted, going close to him and holding her hands out,
"Sandy, you know?"

"Yes."

"I wanted to be here with you-all after she"--the sweet eyes turned to
Marcia Lowe--"told me. I--I thought maybe he"--she glanced toward
Treadwell--"might not tell you, till morning. Poor dear!"

This last was to Sandy, for the look in his eyes wrung the tender heart
with divine pity.

"Sit down," Sandy urged, placing chairs near the hearth and bending to
lay on more wood, "there is much to say."

Then it was that the little doctor took command. She did not sit down
as the others had; she stood by the table with some loose papers in her
hand.

"I feel as if it were all my fault," she began. "Things lie so still
here; we seem so shut in. Cynthia has been like a child to me--I
haven't thought ahead and I just played with her and worked out--my
puzzle piece by piece. It was only a week ago that I felt sure; I
meant to tell Cynthia slowly and little by little--and then this
happened!"

Marcia Lowe's face was fixed and white. No one spoke. Then she went
on again.

"I have always believed Cynthia's father was--my uncle, Theodore Starr!
I came to Lost Hollow because I believed that, but I had no absolute
proof and Ann Walden denied me support. But look at her--look at
Cynthia and me! Of course I am old, old, and she's a baby, but can't
you read God's handwriting in our faces? See the colour,
form--expression----"

Morley and Treadwell stared at the two faces and into their benumbed
consciousness something vital struggled to life. It brought a gleam to
Lans's eyes; a groan of surrender to Sandy's lips! The contrite voice
was going on and on.

"There was no marriage certificate. There had been an unhappy
engagement between my uncle and Ann Walden--he, poor, timid, gentle
soul, dared not speak at the proper moment, he dreaded giving pain, and
he married Cynthia's mother privately, and before things could be made
plain--he died up in the hills, serving men! The man that married them
went away--only a year ago he came back; recently Mr. Greeley drove
over to Sudley's Gulch to make a will for this man; Cynthia and I went
with him. The