Billy's question concerning Williams had crystallized Rita's feeling that the "fellow in there" was "making up" to her, and when she returned to the house that evening, she had few words for Roger. Monday Rita was unusually industrious during the day, but the evening seemed long. She was not uncivil to her father's guest, but she did not sit by him on the edge of the porch as she had done upon the first evening of his visit. He frequently came to her side, but she as frequently made an adroit excuse to leave him. She did not dislike him, but she had found him growing too attentive. This girl was honest from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, and longed to let Williams understand that she was the property of another man to whom she would be true in the spirit and in the letter. Tuesday morning the guests departed. Mrs. Bays urgently invited Williams to return, and he, despite Rita's silence, assured his hostess that he would accept her invitation. The Indianapolis project had been agreed upon, provided Bays could raise the money. If that could be done, the new firm would begin operations January first. That afternoon Rita went to the step-off and looked the Indianapolis situation in the face. It stared back at her without blinking, and she could evolve no plans to evade it. Dic would return in November--centuries off--and she felt sure he would bring help. Until then, Indianapolis, with the figures of her mother and Williams in the background, loomed ominously before her vision. Williams's second visit was made ostensibly to Rita's father. The third, two weeks later, was made openly to her father's daughter. It was preceded by an ominous letter to Rita requesting the privilege of making the visit to her. Rita wished to answer at once by telling him that she could not receive him, but Rita's mother thought differently. "Say to him," commanded Mrs. Bays, "that you will be pleased to see him. He is a fine young man with a true religious nature. I find that he has been brought up by a God-fearing mother. I would not have you receive him because he is rich, but that fact is nothing against him. I can't for the life of me understand what he sees in you, but if he--" she stopped speaking, and her abrupt silence was more emphatic than any words could have been. Rita saw at once the drift of her mother's intentions and trembled. "But I would not be pleased to see him, mother," the girl responded pleadingly; "and if I write to him that I would, I should be telling a lie." "I tell a lie," cried the stern old woman in apparent anguish. "Oh, my heart!" She sank to a chair, and gasping between her words, continued, "Oh, that I should have lived to be told by my own child that I'm a liar!" Her head fell backward, and one would have supposed dissolution near. Mr. Bays ran to fetch a cup of water, and Rita stood in deep trouble by her mother's side fanning her. "A liar! a liar!" moaned the dying woman. "I did not say that, mother. I said--"