She rattled along gaily, with a furtive side-glance at Alec. He had had nothing to say to her since her outburst up-stairs, and now, ignoring her pleasantries, he walked into the kitchen in his most dignified manner. "Is there anything more you want me to do, Aunt Eunice?" he asked. Finding that there was nothing just then, he went out to the side porch opening off the room which was to be used as both dining-room and parlour. He had hung the hammock there a little while before, and he threw himself into it with a sigh of relief. Swinging back and forth in the shelter of the vines, the feeling of comfort began to steal over him that comes with the relaxation of tired muscles. The rattle of dishes and aroma of hot coffee coming out to him were pleasantly suggestive to his healthy young appetite. He closed his eyes, not intending to go to sleep, but the hammock stopped swinging almost instantly, and he did not hear the footsteps going past him a few minutes later, nor his Aunt Eunice's surprised cry of welcome as a tall, bearded stranger knocked at the door. The continuous murmur of voices finally roused him, and he lay there blinking and listening, trying to recognize the deep bass voice that laughed and talked so familiarly with his aunt. "The Lord has certainly sent you, Dick," Alec heard her say in a tremulous tone, and then he knew instantly who had come. [Illustration: "'THE LORD HAS CERTAINLY SENT YOU, DICK.'"] All his life he had heard of Dick Willis, one of the many boys his grandfather had befriended and taken into the shelter of his home for awhile. Dick had lived five years in the old house that had just burned, when Eunice and Sally Macklin were children; and all the stories of their school days were full of their foster-brother's mischievous sayings and doings. That the harum-scarum boy had given place to this middle-aged, successful business man, with the deep voice and big whiskers, was hard for Alec to realize, for in all Miss Eunice's reminiscences he had kept the perennial prankishness of youth. But now Alec, listening, learned the changes that had taken place since the man's last visit to his home. He had thought every year that he would come back for another visit, he told Miss Eunice, but he had put it off from season to season, hard pressed by the demands of business, and now it was too late for him to ever see the old homestead again. He had seen an account of the fire in a paper which he read on the train on his way East, and he decided to stop his journey long enough to run over to the old place for a few hours, and see if she did not need his help. He wanted her to feel that he stood ready to give it to the extent of his power, and expected her to call upon him as freely as if he were a real brother.