These men were
thought to have been touched by the finger of a dream many years ago.
These men could see in the dark." The Indian said this confidently.

CHAPTER XXXVI

AT THE GATEWAY

In a certain old Southern city there stands, as there has stood for
many generations, and will no doubt endure for many more, a lofty
mansion whose architecture dates back to a distant day. Wide and
spacious, with lofty stories, with deep wings and many narrow windows,
it rests far back among the ancient oaks, a stately memorial of a day
when gentlemen demanded privacy and could afford it. From the iron
pillars of the great gateway the white front of the house may barely be
seen through avenues made by the trunks of the primeval grove. The
tall white columns, reaching from gallery floor to roof without pause
for the second lofty floor, give dignity to this old-time abode, which
comports well with the untrimmed patriarchal oaks. Under these trees
there lies, even today, a deep blue-grass turf which never, from the
time of Boone till now, has known the touch of ploughshare or the tool
of any cultivation.

It was the boast of this old family that it could afford to own a
portion of the earth and own it as it came from the hand of Nature.
Uncaught by the whirl of things, undisturbed essentially even by the
tide of the civil war, this branch of an old Southern family had lived
on in station unaffected, though with fortune perhaps impaired as had
been those of many Southern families, including all the Beauchamp line.

To this strong haven of refuge had come Mary Ellen Beauchamp from the
far-off Western plains, after the death of her other relatives in that
venture so ill-starred. The white-haired old widow who now represented
the head of the Clayton family--her kin somewhat removed, but none the
less her "cousins," after the comprehensive Southern fashion--had taken
Mary Ellen to her bosom, upbraiding her for ever dreaming of going into
the barbarian West, and listening but little to the plea of the girl
that poverty had driven her to the company of those who, like herself,
were poor. Now, such had been the turn of the wheel, the girl was
nearly as rich in money as her older relative, and able to assume what
little of social position there remained in her ambition.

Mary Ellen was now well past twenty-seven, a tall, matured, and
somewhat sad-faced woman, upon her brow written something of the
sorrows and uncertainties of t