"That is nothing. Do you remember, Doris, away last fall, when you said I must begin to solve my problems for myself? I have been trying to, that is all. And father is one of them. Somehow, as long as I could throw my worries off on you and father, I was glad to do it, and did not care what came of it. But when you put things squarely up to me, I found to my surprise that I had a sort of personal pride that kept pulling me up to the mark. You were pretty slick, General. And so I have been sort of looking ahead, and trying to help plan for father." "I am going to have it out with him right now. He shan't bear it alone any longer." She went softly up-stairs, and into her father's room, which was always in shadow now, although Doris in her happiness had thought nothing of it, and crept very quietly into her father's arms. "Let's talk it over, father. How soon do you plan to have the operation on your eyes? Is Doctor Hancock the very best you can get? Tell me what arrangements you have made." [Illustration: "Let's talk it over, father"] "Oh, Doris," he cried brokenly, dropping his head on her arm and holding her very close, "do you know? I have tried so hard to tell you--but I hadn't the heart. Yes, let's talk it over." And then, in quick broken sentences, without a trace of bitterness, he told her how his eyes had been growing constantly weaker and weaker, and how the doctor had tried in every way to strengthen them and to arrest the trouble, but now the operation was unavoidable and could not be put off long, and it would mean so many months of idleness--and how could he preach without his eyes? And he was too young to be "supered"--how could he step aside for the rest of his life? And how could he rest, with four young girls to keep going? Talking it over was a comfort. His voice grew gradually firmer and his face brighter. Now that he had the bright eyes of Doris beside him, blindness seemed more remote, and more impossible. New strength came to him from her vivid warm vitality. And in trying to buoy her with hope, hope came to him also. Two hours they sat there, just talking, saying again and again that there was a way, only they did not see it--not just yet. "I am going to tell the girls, father. They are old enough--and it will hurt them to be shut out of what touches you so closely. And Rosalie--father, Rosalie is coming out just fine." Quickly she told him of Rosalie's way of finding out, and of her quiet confident facing of facts--so unlike the problematic butterfly they had worried over so many, many times. "Send her up to me, will you? I think she will do me good." And while Rosalie was with her father Doris told Treasure and Zee. "Just be quiet about it to-night. After a while it will come natural. But we must not talk much, for father feels very badly. Just let him see that we are sorry--and we must all be very positive there is a grand way out for us, and we must find it."