aid softly, "you must all leave now."

So they rose. But Suzanna, after saying farewell, turned again. The
nurse was arranging the bed. Drusilla sat, her eyes looking off into the
distance. Suzanna went swiftly back.

"Is the land you're going to very beautiful, Drusilla?" she whispered.

"Fairer than you may dream, little girl," Drusilla returned. And then:
"Kiss me, Suzanna, and call me Drusilla once more."

Suzanna kissed the soft, wrinkled cheek. "Good-bye, Drusilla," she
breathed. "I love you with all my heart, and I'm coming to see you again
very soon."

CHAPTER XXI

MR. BARTLETT SEES THE MACHINE

But Suzanna did not go to see her friend Drusilla again. For within a
few days after the hurried night visit, Drusilla set off on her journey.
There was but one with her when she left, all aquiver to be gone, her
eyes set in the distance on visions hid from earthly eyes.

Her boy was close beside her, his arms about her, his heart filled with
woe for all the years he had forgotten. And when he kissed her and
begged her forgiveness, she was all love and understanding for him, even
as when a small boy he had sought her forgiveness and her understanding.

The tents were up now in the big Bartlett grounds. Tents with floors and
movable stoves. Children played about the grounds on the rare sunny day
that Drusilla went away.

Mr. Bartlett, returning from his mother's bedside, went hurriedly
through his grounds, and on upstairs to his own room. There, waiting for
him, was Graham. The boy knew at once the truth.

"Father," he cried, and put his arms about the tall figure.

They stood so, the man finding comfort in the contact of his boy. And so
Mrs. Bartlett, returned temporarily from a journey, found them.

She started back at sight of them thus together. They seemed in their
new intimacy to have shut her out, quite out of their lives. "I've been
looking for you, Graham," she began, and then caught her breath sharply
at the look the boy gave her; not a premeditated cold look, only one
that he might bestow upon a stranger.

"Father has just come home," he said; "grandmother--"

But he did not finish. He saw that his mother understood that Drusilla
had gone away. Mr. Bartlett spoke to his wife. "I heard this morning
that you had returned to stay for a day. I'm afraid the tents and the
children will still disfigure our grounds for some time."

His bitterness made her wince. But she answered calmly. "Yes,