On the evening of the third day, a letter from West Adams arrived, announcing that Jenny was up and around, and the farm-house was ready for Neale. The evening after that, Neale was undressing in the slant-ceilinged big-beamed, white-washed bedroom, as familiar to him as his room at Union Hill--but uncontaminated with any of the new, troubling sensations. The air of the hills blew in at the window. Neale felt that it was a different air. He began to feel a difference in himself, but fell asleep in the midst of this perception. The next morning, scorning the mill, the barn-yard, the brook, he climbed to the highest back-pasture where the young white birches and quivering aspens, skirmishers of the unconquered forest, were leading the way in the reconquest of the fields man had taken from them. Here he lay down and prepared to nurse his sorrow.... "Pain gnaws at my heart like a rat that gnaws in a drain...." But what was this? What was this? As unexpectedly as the impudent little mick had sprung out of the ground to carry off his shinny ball, so did a cheerful little imp of high spirits spring up in his heart, leaping and skipping to meet the glory of the great sun pouring down its mellow gold upon him through the flickering, tricksy aspen leaves. He lay back on the soft, deep moss, his hands clasped under his head. Huge, jovial-looking clouds floated, piled up in strong, rounded masses against the summer sky. Miles off in the valley he could see the Hoosick River winding its way among the green, green hills. He was warmed, cool, alive ... and, oh, yes, there was no use in pretending otherwise, mighty well pleased to be alive. The ten-year-old Neale when suddenly the glamor had faded from his lead soldiers, had never wasted time in pretending that it was there. He had risen at once, left the little heap of clumsily-made mannequins to lie foolish in their flaking paint, and sliding down the banisters, had gone out of doors in a great hurry. Well, he wasted no time now. He looked with an ironic eye upon the glamorless lost illusion, with the paint flaking off, and hurriedly turning his back on it all, he went, metaphorically, out of doors. What had happened after all? He'd thought the world of Don Roberts, who had turned out a four-flusher. Well, he'd been stung. But why holler so about it? And whose fault was it? His own, for not knowing better. Don hadn't ever pretended to be any less of a four-flusher than he was. It was just that he, Neale, had been taken in by a cheap, flashy guy when any kid ought to have had enough sense to see through him, and those would-be smart college-man airs and manners.