"Well," said Charles Rideout, looking keenly from one to the other, "thank God for it, you young people! It never comes back! The days when you shoulder your troubles cheerfully together,--they come to their end! And they are"--he shook his head--"they are very wonderful to look back to! I remember a certain day," he went on reminiscently, "when we had paid the last of the doctor's bills, and Rose met me down town for a little celebration. We had had five or six years of pretty hard sailing then. We bought her new gloves that day, I remember, and--shoes, I think it was, and I got a hat, and a book I'd been wanting. We went to a little French restaurant to dinner, with all our bundles. And that, that, my dear,--" he said, smiling at Anne,--"seemed to be the turning point. We got into the country next year, picked out a little house. And then, the rest of it all followed; we had two maids, a surrey, I was put into the superintendent's place--" a sweep of the fine hand dismissed the details. "No man and wife, who do what we did," said he, gravely, "who live modestly, and work hard, and love each other and their children, can FAIL. That's one of the blessed things of life." Jim cleared his throat, but did not speak. Anne was frankly unable to speak. "And now I mustn't keep these children out of bed any longer," said the older man. "This has been a--a lovely afternoon for me. I wish Mrs. Rideout had been with me." He stood up. "Shall I give you this little fellow, Mrs. Warriner?" "We'll put the babies down," said Jim, rising, too, "and then, perhaps, you'd like to look about the house, Mr. Rideout?" "But I know how a lady feels about having her house inspected--" hesitated the caller, with his bright, fatherly look for Anne. "Oh, please do!" she urged them. So the gas was lighted, and they all went into the bedroom, where Anne tucked the children into their cribs. She stayed there while the others went on their tour of inspection, patting her son's small, warm body in the darkness, and listening with a smile to the visitor's cheerful comments in kitchen and hallway, and Jim's answering laugh. When she came blinking out into the lighted dining-room, the men were upstairs, and Helma, to Anne's astonishment, was showing in another caller,--and another Charles Rideout, as Anne's puzzled glance at the card in her hand, assured her. This was a tall young man, a little dishevelled, in a big storm coat, and with dark rings about his eyes. "I beg your pardon, madam," said he, abruptly, "but was my father, Mr. Charles Rideout, here this afternoon?" "Why, he's upstairs with my husband now!" Anne said, strangely disquieted by the young man's manner. "Thank God!" said the newcomer, briefly. And he wiped his forehead with his handkerchief, and drew a deep short breath.