out a father's love," he said. "It survives
everything and anything, and your love would save me."

Never, even under the eyes of Graydon Muir, had she been so conscious
of her heart before. Had he seen her when she departed on the earliest
train in the morning he would have witnessed a new expression on her
face.

CHAPTER XXXVI

MADGE ALDEN'S RIDE

Methodical Henry Muir found that the events of the last few days had
resulted in a reaction and weariness which he could not readily shake
off, and he had expressed an intention of sleeping late on Monday and
taking the second train. When he and his family gathered at breakfast,
the removal to Hotel Kaaterskill was the uppermost theme, and it was
agreed that Madge and Graydon should ride thither on horseback, and
return by a train, if wearied. Mr. Muir then went to the city, well
prepared to establish himself on a safer footing. Graydon and Madge
soon after were on their way through the mountain valleys, the latter
with difficulty holding her horse down to the pace they desired to
maintain.

After riding rapidly for some distance, they reached long, lonely
stretches, favorable for conversation, and Graydon was too fond of
hearing Madge talk to lose the opportunity. He looked wonderingly
at her flushed face, with the freshness of the morning in it; her
brilliant eyes, from which flashed a spirit that nothing seemed
to daunt; the sudden compression of her lips, as with power and
inimitable grace she reined in her chafing steed. Never before had
she appeared so vital and beautiful, and he rode at her side with
something like exultation that they were so much to each other. He
was turning his back on a past fraught with peril, over which hung the
shadow of what must have been a lifelong disappointment.

"The girl who would have taken me, as Henry chooses among commercial
securities, cannot now make me an adjunct to her self-pleasing
career," he thought. "I am free--free to become to Madge what I was in
old times. No one now has the right to look askance at our affection
and companionship. What an idiot I was to endure Stella's criticism
while she was playing it so sharp between Arnault and myself! No
wonder crystal Madge said she and Stella were not congenial!

"I call Madge crystal, yet I don't understand her fully, and have not
since my return. She has had some deep, sad experience, which she is
hiding from all. From what Mrs. Wendall said at the funeral yeste