r patents, although the screw was
complete. That was a trifle: he would wait for his more important works.

One day old Mr. Vickery, having watched the superintendent roll safely
past down the road on his way to Bridge No. 2, left his charge in the
care of old Julius for the time being, and walked up the track toward
Wilbarger. It was the shortest road to the village--indeed, the only
road; but one could go by water. Before the days of the railroad, the
Vickerys always went by water, in a wide-cushioned row-boat, with four
pairs of arms to row. It was a great day, of course, when the first
locomotive came over Vickery Marsh; but old Mr. Vickery was lamentably
old-fashioned, and preferred the small days of the past, with the
winding, silver channels and the row-boat, and the sense of wide
possession and isolation produced by the treeless, green expanse which
separated him from the town. To-day, however, he did not stop to think
of these things, but hastened on as fast as his short legs could carry
him. Mrs. Manning was an old friend of his; to her house he was
hurrying.

"You are both--you are both," he gasped, bursting into the sitting-room
and sinking into a chair--"you are both--ah, ugh! ugh!"

He choked, gurgled, and turned from red to purple. Mrs. Manning seized a
palm-leaf fan, and fanned him vigorously.

"Why _did_ you walk so fast, Mr. Vickery?" she said reproachfully. "You
know your short breath can not stand it."

"You would, too, Nannie," articulated the old man, "if--if _your_ boy
had come home!"

"What, Lawrence? You do not mean it!" she exclaimed, sinking into a
chair in her turn, and fanning herself now. "I congratulate you, Mr.
Vickery; I do, indeed. How long is it since you have seen him?"

"Thirteen years; thir--teen years! He was fifteen when he went away, you
know," whispered the old man, still giving out but the husky form of
words without any voice to support them. "Under age, but would go. Since
then he has been wandering over the ocean and all about, the bold boy!"

"Dear me!" said Mrs. Manning; "how glad I shall be to see him! I was
very fond of his mother."

"Yes; Sally was a sweet little woman, and Lawrence takes after his
mother more than after his father, I see. My son was a true Vickery;
yes, a true Vickery. But what I came to say was, that you and Marion
must both come over to-morrow and spend the day. We must kill the fatted
calf, Nannie--indeed we must."

Then, with his first