Brian did not face his problem with excitement. He faced it with ruthless concentration. All summer he had been groping through fog and disillusion to the meaning of service, service to his fellowmen, and he had groped through to something vague and lofty. Service lay across the water where men raved in the red fever of destruction, service and inclination. Could not one be mercifully the religion of the other? Must service spring from the bitter dregs of self-denial? Brian stared wretchedly into the dank white mist curling in the moonlight like a fallen cloud. And again with his conscience up in arms he remembered the face of Donald's sister. In a sense he could thank the boy for the peace of his summer. And he had written his promise. He was like Kenny, that boy, inflammable of purpose, erratic in his vigor, and likable. And he needed a friend, inflexible and kindly. "Always," said Brian, "I am slated to be somebody's keeper." Could he shirk? Had he shirked when he left the studio in anger? Had he a right to live his life his own way? Had anybody? His common sense endorsed his earlier rebellion. This was different. "Whenever you tell me I can do a thing and hang around to see me do it, I can seem to make myself do it somehow!" The words echoed harshly in his ears; and at first Brian refused to hear them. Then inexorably he faced his fact. He and he alone was the spur to the boy's amazing energy. A year? Well, after all what was a year? He went back through the autumn moonlight with a sigh. "Don," he said, "you're right. You couldn't swing it up here alone. I'll stick and see you through it." Don looked up, his face scarlet with emotion. Brian's hand was on his shoulder. And Brian's eyes were half humorous, half quizzical and wholly tender. "No, no, Brian, no!" he choked. "I--I didn't mean that--" "Of course you didn't," said Brian. "I thought that much of it out for myself." Don's head went down upon his hands with a sob. That night Brian wrote to Whitaker. CHAPTER XIX SAMHAIN To Kenny in poetic mood the seasons were druidic. There was May Eve with its Bel fires when summer peeped over the hilltops at the cattle driven through the sacred flames to protect them from disease. There was Midsummer's Eve with more fires, and if St. Patrick in unpagan zeal had chosen to kindle his fires in honor of St. John, he could. To Kenny the festival was still druidic. There was Samhain or summer ending, when the November wind speeded the waning season with a flurry of dead leaves; and to Kenny, Samhain came and drove him forth in the chill dusk to face another problem.