concerning the luck of which we know so little.
And, while I may or may not have agreed with his general theories, I
did not disagree with the one that the autumn is as much a part of what
there is as is the spring, and that all trends toward a common end,
which must be for the best in some way we do not comprehend, because we
see, at least, enough to know that nature, wiser than we, makes no
mistakes. "The fruitage 'goes'!" Grant exclaimed larkingly, and then,
forgetting me for the moment, he caught up Jean, and, carrying her
gravely about, repeated to her these lines:

"Grow old, along with me;
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made!"

And they were at least exponents of the belief they had, and it was to
me an education and a comfort. I learned, what I could not profit by,
that a man and woman together are more than twice one man or twice one
woman, when the man and woman are the right two. It was like an
astronomer studying the sun. And what warmth and light there was to
look upon!

I have tried in these rambling words to tell how these two people faced
the autumn and found it spring, since they were still together. I
wonder why I made the attempt? It is but a simple relation of certain
things which happened, yet I do not, somehow, get the pulse of it. It
must be because I have known the people all too well. My heart is so
much in what I try to say that I am not clear.

CHAPTER XXXII.

THE LAW OF NATURE.

Of what was the result of finally owning the Ninth Ward and the
district I have only to say that it, of course, added to the reputation
of one man--and of one woman as well, it may be added, for Jean in her
necessary social functions grew in her way with Grant; but otherwise it
made little difference. There was the family hegira to the capital,
and much enjoyment of the limited attractions of the semi-Ethiopian and
shabby but semi-magnificent city in a miasmatic valley, and it was, no
doubt, some education for the children. To Grant it was a fray, of
course, and to Jean it was enjoyment of his successes, and probably
more sorrow than he felt at his failures. The successes were the more
numerous. Jean herself never failed. She was an envied woman in the
social world. She was a strong man's wife, and possessed of all tact
and gentle wisdom in aiding him, but she was not a rival of the mere
self-advertisers among the queens of a shifting society. She c