Noreen, too, had to be petted into a calmer state--her old aversion to her father sprang into renewed life with each return after an absence. In a few days the child would grow accustomed to his presence and accept him with indifference, at least, but there was always this struggle. Mary-Clare herself wondered where Larry was; why he delayed, once having come back to the Forest; but she kept to her tasks of preparation and reassuring Noreen, and so the day passed. At eight o'clock, having eaten supper and undressed the child, she sat in the deep wooden rocker with Noreen in her arms. There was always one story that had power to claim attention when all others failed, and Mary-Clare resorted to it now. Swaying back and forth she told the story of the haunt-wind. "It was a wonderful wind, Noreen, quite magical. It came from between the south and the east--a wild little wind that ran away and did things on its own account; but it was a good little wind for all that foolish people said about it. It took hold of the bell rope in the belfry, and swung out and out; it swung far, and then it dropped and fluttered about quite dizzily." "Touching Jan-an?" Noreen suggested sleepily. "Jan-an, of course. Making her beautiful and laughing. Waking her from her sad dream, poor Jan-an, and giving her strength to do really splendid things." "I love the wild wind!" Noreen pressed closer. "I'm not afraid of it. And it found Aunt Polly and Uncle Peter?" "To be sure. It made Aunt Polly seem as grand and big as she really is--only blind folks cannot see--and it made all the blind folks _see her_ for a minute. And it made Uncle Peter--no; it left Uncle Peter as he is!" "I like that"--drowsily--"and it made us see the man that went to the inn?" Noreen lifted her head, suddenly alert. "What made you think of him, Noreen?" Mary-Clare stopped swaying to and fro. "I don't know, Motherly. Only it was funny how he just came and then the haunt-wind came and Jan-an says she thinks he _isn't_. Really we only think we see him." "Well, perhaps that's true, childie. He's something good, I hope. Now shut your eyes like a dearie, and Mother will rock and sing." Mary-Clare fixed her eyes on her child's face, but she was seeing another. The face of a man whose glance had held hers for a strange moment. She had been conscious, since, of this man's presence; his name was familiar--she could not forget him, though there was no reason for her to remember him except that he was new; a something different in her dull days. But Noreen, eyes obediently closed, was pleading in the strange, foolish jargon of her rare moments of relaxation: "You lit and lock, Motherly, and I'll luck my lum, just for to-night, and lall aleep." "All right, beloved; you may, just for to-night, suck the little thumb, and fall asleep while Mother rocks."