Then David stood still, looking stupidly at a dark wagon which stood before the gate. He knew the ownership and the purpose of that vehicle, but he could not connect it with his house. There dwelt only his father and his mother and himself, and all of them were alive and well. A group of children lingered near by, silent, staring at the dark wagon and the brightly lighted windows. The Hartman house with its illumination was as strange a phenomenon as the Millerstown children had ever seen. To them David, still standing at his gate, put a question. "What is the matter?" Instantly a small, excited, feminine voice piped out an answer. "Your father is dead." "He was sitting in his buggy in the mountain road," another excited voice went on. "They brought him down here and carried him in." David went into the yard and along the flag walk, and for the first time in his life entered his father's house by the wide-open front door, through which various Millerstonians were passing in and out. This was a great opportunity for Millerstown. Some one came out of the parlor, leaving the door ajar, and David saw a long dark figure lying on a low couch in the middle of the room. What there was to be known about his father's death he gathered from the conversation of those about him. He heard pitying exclamations, he felt that in a moment he would burst into cries of shock and terror. Bitterness fled, he was soft-hearted, weak, childlike. His father was gone, but there remained another person. He must find her; in her lay his refuge; she must be his stay, as he must henceforth be hers. Stumbling back through the hall toward the kitchen, he sought his mother. He was aware of the kind looks of those about him; his whole being was softened. "Mother!" he meant to cry. "Oh, mother! mother!" He felt her grief; he expected to find her prostrate on the old settle, or sitting by the table with her head on her arm, weeping. He would comfort her; he would be a good son to her; he truly loved her. From the kitchen doorway he heard her voice, clear and toneless, the voice of every day. She was giving orders to the Millerstown women who had hastened in with offers of help,--to Grandmother Gaumer and Sarah Knerr and Susannah Kuhns. She indicated certain jars of canned fruit which were to be used for the funeral dinner, and planned for the setting of raised cake and the baking of "fine cake." In Cassie's plan for her life, she had prepared for this contingency; even now her iron will was not broken, nor her stern composure lost. She moved about as David had always seen her move, quiet, capable, self-centered. She shed no tear; she seemed to David to take actual pleasure in planning and contriving.