me of the feverishness from her sense of tension as they
continued their walk up the hill.

Up the hill there were only two directions in which to go--along the
prosaic road to Marchfield or into the quiet winter woods where masses
of shadow lay interspersed with patches of white moonlight, while, on
this soundless night there was not a murmur in the tree-tops. By
instinct rather than intention they followed a faint, familiar path
running under pines.

Lois was now speaking of the Fays. "Mrs. Fay _knows_. The others
don't--not certainly. Rosie has brought herself round to thinking him
innocent, and Matt and Jim only suspect what happened--but Mrs. Fay
_knows_. It must be a tragic thing to spend your life with a man who's
done a thing like that. Poor soul! We must do what we can to help her,
mustn't we?"

She pursued the theme not for its interest alone, but for the sake of
the objective point to which it was leading her. By speaking freely,
first of Matt and then of Jim Breen, she came at last to Rosie. She
spoke freely of her, too, at the risk of opening up old wounds, at the
risk of lacerating that which was probably still sensitive. Her main
purpose was to speak, and if possible to make him speak, so that this
name should no longer be kept as an inviolable symbol between them.
Since the day when it began to have significance for them both it had
scarcely been pronounced by either otherwise than allusively or of
necessity. She was resolute to make it as little to be shunned as his or
her own.

Not that she was successful, for the minute at any rate. His responses
continued to be brief, so brief that they were hardly responses at all.
They were not grudged or ungracious; they were only like those first
little flashes of lightning which hint that the heavens will soon be
alive. As a frightened boy whistles from bravado, she talked to conceal
her trembling at this coming of celestial wonders.

"Oh, Thor, there'll be so much now to do! It's really only beginning,
isn't it? And it brings in so many elements of our life--I mean of our
whole national life. I like that. I like getting out of our own little
groove--so futile and narrow as it generally is--and being in touch with
what is stronger, even if it's terrific. That's what I feel about Matt
Fay--that he's terrific. He represents a terrific movement, doesn't he?
and one we can't ignore. When I say terrific I don't mean that I'm
afraid of it. I'm not. It seems to m