"Yes, indeed, Esther. I took that little fellow three years ago. I had no idea he would grow so pretty. Folks said it was the oddest of pranks, but if I had bought fifteen more horses than I could use, or dogs enough to craze the neighborhood, or even a parrot, like my good neigbor Tarbelle, everybody would have been satisfied. Of course, I had to take a house and keep a number of people for whom a bachelor has no great need. But, Esther, when I go home there is framed in my window the most welcome picture human eye has ever seen--that little face, Esther!" The man is enwrapped. The woman joins in the man's exaltation. "He is the most beautiful child I have ever seen anywhere. It is the talk of everybody. You are so proud of him when you ride together!" "Esther, I have seen him in the morning when he came to rouse me--his face as white as his gown; his golden hair long, and so fleecy that it would stand all about his head; his mouth arched like the Indian's bow; his great blue eyes bordered with dark brows and lashed with jet-black hairs a half-inch long. That picture, Esther, I fear no painter can get. I marvel why I do not make the attempt." "He is as bright as he is beautiful," she says. "Yes, Esther, I have looked over this world. Childhood is always beautiful--always sweet to me--but my boy is without equal, and nearly everybody admits it." "He is not yours, David." The man looks inquiringly. "I have as good a right to love him as you have. I do love him." The man has been eloquent and self-forgetful. The woman has lost her command. Tears are coming in her eyes. Shame is mantling her cheeks. David Lockwin is startled. George Harpwood passes in the distance with Esther's mother on his arm. "Esther, you know me, with all my faults. I think we could be happy together--we three--you and I and the boy. Will you marry me? Will you be a mother to my little boy? He is lonesome while I am gone!" The matter is settled. It has come by surprise. If David Lockwin had foreseen it, he would have left the field open to Harpwood. If Esther Wandrell had foreseen it, she would have shunned David Lockwin. It is her dearest hope, and yet-- CHAPTER II THE PEOPLE'S IDOL If David Lockwin had planned to increase all his prospects, and if all his plans had worked with precision, he could in nowise have pushed his interests more powerfully than by marrying Esther Wandrell. It might have been said of Lockwin that he was impractical; that he was a dreamer. He had done singular things. He had not studied the ways of public opinion. But now, to solidify all his future--to take a secure place in society, especially as his leanings toward politics are pronounced--to do these things--this palliates and excuses the adoption of the golden-haired boy. Lockwin hears this from his friend, the doctor. Lockwin hears it from the world. The more he hears it the less he likes it.