"God bless and help you, Kathie!" he replied, and turned quickly to Trix waiting at his side. "Look at Duke," said Kate, a moment later, as Darrell sprang into the saddle; "he doesn't know what to make of it that you haven't bade him good-by." Duke, who had shown considerable excitement over the unusual proceedings, had bounded to Kate's side as Darrell approached her, expecting his usual recognition; not having received it, he sat regarding Darrell with an evident sense of personal injury quite pathetic. Darrell looked at the drooping head and smiled. "Come, Duke," he said, slowly starting down the driveway. Kate bent quickly for a final caress. "Go on, Duke!" she whispered. Nothing loath to follow Darrell, he bounded forward, but after a few leaps, on discovering that his beloved mistress was not accompanying them, he stopped, looking back in great perplexity. At a signal from her and a word from Darrell he again started onward, but his backward glances were more than Kate could bear, and she turned to go into the house. "What are you sending the dog after him for, anyway?" inquired her father, himself somewhat puzzled. "I have given Duke to Mr. Darrell, papa," she replied. Something in the unnatural calmness of her tone startled him; he turned to question her. She had gone, but in the glimpse which he had of her face he read a little of the anguish which at that moment wrung her young heart, and happening at the same time to catch his sister's eye, he walked away, silent and uncomfortable. _Chapter XX_ FORGING THE FETTERS During the weeks immediately following Darrell's departure the daily routine of life at The Pines continued in the accustomed channels, but there was not a member of the family, including Mr. Underwood himself, to whom it did not seem strangely empty, as though some essential element were missing. To Kate her present life, compared with the first months of her return home, was like the narrow current creeping sluggishly beneath the icy fetters of winter as compared with the same stream laughing and singing on its way under summer skies. But she was learning the lesson that all must learn; that the world sweeps relentlessly onward with no pause for individual woe, and each must keep step in its ceaseless march, no matter how weary the brain or how heavy the heart.