ad returned to his home
in Chicago, where he would in future devote himself to the writing and
producing of great American plays.

CHAPTER 18

In everybody's life there are hours or days or even weeks that refuse to
march on with the solemn procession of time, but lag behind and hide in
some byway of memory, there to remain for ever and ever. It was such a
week that tumbled unexpectedly out of Quin's calendar about the first of
June, and lived itself in terms of sunshine and roses, of moonshine and
melody, seven halcyon days between the time that Eleanor returned from
school and the Bartletts went away for the summer. For the first time
since he met her, she seemed to have nothing more demanding to do than to
emulate "the innocent moon, who nothing does but shine, and yet moves all
the slumbering surges of the world."

There was no doubt about Quin's "slumbering surges" being moved. Within
twenty-four hours of her return to town he became totally and hopelessly
demoralized. Education and business were, after all, but means to an end,
and when he saw what he conceived to be a short cut to heaven, he rashly
discarded wings and leaped toward his heart's desire.

The hour before closing at the factory became a time of acute torture. He
who usually stayed till the last minute, engrossed in winding up the
affairs of the day, now seemed perfectly willing to trust their
completion to any one who would undertake it. The instant the whistle
blew he was off like a shot, out of the factory yard, clinging to the
platform of a crowded trolley, catching an interurban car, plunging
through a thicket, down an old lane, and emerging into Paradise.

The Rannys were having the adventure of their lives with the secret farm,
an adventure shared with equal enthusiasm by their co-conspirators.
"Valley Mead" was proving the most marvelous of forbidden playthings, and
was doing for Randolph Bartlett what doctors and sanitariums and tears
and threats had failed to do. The old place had been overhauled, the
house made habitable, and now that furnishing was in progress, each day
brought new and fascinating developments.

Eleanor had arrived from school just in time to fling herself heart and
soul into the enterprise. By a happy chance she had been allowed to spend
the week with the Randolph Bartletts, only reporting to her grandmother
from time to time for consultations regarding summer clothes. Her strang