Dazed as the girl was, she held herself well. Facing the little things about his room, she stood straight as though facing something of him. His courage called for her courage. Whatever had happened to him, she knew he had accepted like a man, so that whatever had happened, she must accept like a woman. If some of the color vanished from her cheeks that was not her fault. She could not control this. But she could control her trembling lips and did. Turning from the room, she found her way back downstairs and to the sitting-room. There she saw again his chair--the chair in which he had sat last evening. For a second she tottered. All the little things of him seemed so doubly important now. Every suggestion of him was so vital. It might be--it might be that this was all she had left; traces at a moment when she hungered for a hundred times more than she had ever had when within arm’s length of him. She pronounced his name below her breath. Just this-- “Ned.” Then louder as though the name itself could bring him nearer. “Ned,” she called. “Ned.” She received no answer. The man who had been here yesterday--who would have responded to her lightest whisper--did not count. And if he could have answered as of yesterday, that would not have counted. It was to-day--now--that she wanted him. It was this minute--this second. She wanted him to come to her and place his arms about her and hold her tight; she wanted the feel of his lips and the sound of his voice. She wanted him in the flesh with all his tousled light hair. She was empty without him--as empty as a mother with an unweighted arm. Tears started to her hot eyes, and, burying her face in her hands, she knelt before the wicker chair as before a sacred shrine. “God, give him back to me,” she pleaded. “I want him. I want him so.” If all the prayers of women were answered, perhaps there would be no need of other prayers. How many go trembling up through the day and through the night! Wilmer rose again to her feet--steadied and strengthened. It may be that this is the most direct and best answer God can give--strength to endure, strength to act. She moved towards the kitchen--towards the door she had found opened. It was as though this were the beginning of the trail leading to his side. She had no pre-conceived plan, but her feet took her here. This was the path Roxie had taken; the path Ned Allston had taken. It was the path she must take. Her heart leaped in response to the suggestion. She must follow him. If he could not come to her, she must go to him. In essence the idea was foreign to her nature. She was neither bold nor venturesome. Ordinarily she would have turned to her father, but now this never occurred to her. He played no part in this early morning drama. He slept and he must sleep on. This did not concern him. It concerned her alone--that inner woman who in a sense had never had a father.