She was the wife of Philip Davison, and her son Justin was born a year after her marriage. Davison was then a small farmer, with a few cattle, living in a certain valley, which she named. Davison, as Justin knew, had come from that valley to the valley of Paradise. Davison’s habit of occasional intoxication was known to her before her marriage, as was also his violent outbursts of temper; but love had told her the old lie, that she could save him from himself. The result had been disaster. In a fit of drunken rage he had so abused her that she had fled from him in the night with her child. A terrible storm arose as she wandered through the foothills. But she had stumbled on, crazed by fear and more dead than alive. How she lived through the week that followed she declared in this yellowed writing that she did not know, but she had lived. She was journeying toward the distant railroad. Now and then some kind-hearted man gave her a seat in his wagon, and now and then she found shelter and food in the home of some lonely settler. She would not return to Davison, and she hoped he believed she had died in the storm. The brief record ended in a blank, which had never been filled. Sanders—his name was not mentioned by her—had taken her into his prairie schooner—he was but a fatherless boy himself—and there she had died, worn out by suffering and exhaustion. But her baby had lived, and was now known as Justin Wingate. A deep sense of indignation burned in Justin’s breast against Philip Davison, as he read the pathetic story. Against Sanders he could not be indignant, in spite of the wrong the man had done him by withholding this information through all the years; for Sanders had soothed the last moments of his mother, and Sanders’ wagon had given her the last shelter she had known. Justin’s fingers shook, and in his eyes there was a blinding dash of tears. Sanders was still drawling on, stopping occasionally to chew at an unwilling sentence. It was an old story to him, and so had lost interest. Sibyl was standing expectantly by, watching Justin with solicitude for her plans. His feelings did not reach her. “So I am Philip Davison’s son!” Justin drew a long breath. His voice was choked and the words sounded hoarse and strange. “I reckon I ought to 'a’ told you a good while ago,” Sanders apologized; “but I kinder felt that it would please Davison, and after that trouble you an’ me had I didn’t want to tell it; and, so, I didn’t.” His cunning gray eyes shone vindictively. “I don’t mind sayin’ to you that I wouldn’t turn my hand over to save Davison from the pit, if he is your father; he didn’t do right by me, an’ you didn’t do right by me. It won’t please him to know that you’re his son, fer you’re fightin’ him teeth an’ nail; and so I’m willin’ to tell it now.” Sanders’ ulterior motive was exposed. First and last hatred of Philip Davison and of Justin had guided him.