And when he asserted himself sufficiently to go back to you I was right
there to shoot him!"

"You are a highly amusing person! It would interest me a good deal to
know your real name and a lot of other things about you."

"In due season you shall know everything. Just now I haven't the heart
to keep you from your husband, and I'm going to send him to you
immediately. And as I shrink from telling a man I like so much that I
tried to kill him not so long ago, I'm going to turn that agreeable
business over to you!"

IV

That night the Governor's condition took an unfavorable turn and Dr.
Mosgrove was summoned. He remained until the crisis was passed.

"We must expect progress to be retarded now and then; but now that we've
got by this we may feel more confident. He hasn't been wholly conscious
at any time, but he's muttered a name several times--Julia; is that the
sister? Then the sight of her may help us in a day or two when his mind
clears up."

Archie was beset with many fears as he waited the arrival of Mrs.
Graybill. His utter ignorance of any details touching the life of his
friend seemed now to rise before him like a fog which he was afraid to
penetrate. And there was Ruth, with her happiness hanging in the
balance; she was in love with a man of whom she knew nothing; indeed the
mystery that enfolded him was a part of his fascination for her, no
doubt; and if in the Governor's past life there was anything that made
marriage with a young woman of Ruth's fineness and sweetness hazardous,
the sooner it was known the better. But when he caught a glimpse of Mrs.
Graybill in the vestibule of the train his apprehensions vanished. The
poise, the serenity of temper, an unquestioning acceptance of the fate
that played upon her life, which he had felt at their first meeting
struck him anew.

"Our patient is doing well. The news is all good," he said at once.

"I felt that it would be; I couldn't believe that this was the end!"

"We will hope that it is only the beginning!" he said gravely.

"A capital place for a beginning, or ending!" she remarked glancing with
a rueful smile at the desolate street and shabby hotel.

Putney and his wife had moved to Heart o' Dreams for a few days. It
would be a second honeymoon, Putney said. Mrs. Graybill was introduced
into the hotel without embarrassment. It might have seemed that she had
foreseen just such a situation and prepared for it. She won Dr.
Reynolds' heart by the