For a long time he lay there thinking. He had been a man of some refinement, and nature had punished him, after an old fashion, for the abuse of it with extreme sensitiveness. He had come to the Adirondacks from a New England city and married and gone into business. At first he had prospered, and then he had begun to go down. He had been a lover of music and a reader of the poets. As he lay thinking in the early dusk he heard the notes of the wood-thrush. That bird was like a welcoming trumpeter before the gate of a palace; it bade him be at home. Above all he could hear the water song of Fiddler's Falls--the tremulous, organ bass of rock caverns upon which the river drummed as it fell, the chorus of the on-rushing stream and great overtones in the timber. Sound and rhythm seemed to be full of that familiar strain--so like a solemn warning: [Illustration: 0038] A long time he sat hearing it. He began to feel ashamed of his folly and awakened to the inspiration of a new purpose. He rose and looked about him. When you enter a house you begin to feel the heart of its owner. Something in the walls and furnishings, something in the air--is it a vibration which dead things have gathered from the living?--bids you welcome or warns you to depart. It is the true voice of the master. As Gordon came into the wilderness he felt like one returning to his father's house. In this great castle the heart of its Master seemed to speak to him with a tenderness fatherly and unmistakable. A subtle force like that we find in houses built with hands now bade him welcome. "Lie down and rest, my son," it seemed to say. "Let not your heart be troubled. Here in your Father's house are forgiveness and plenty." He put away the thought of death. He covered the sleeping boy and girl, pushed his canoe forward upon the sand, and lying back comfortably soon fell asleep. He awoke refreshed at sunrise. The great, green fountain of life, in the midst of which he had rested, now seemed to fill his heart with its uplifting joy and energy and persistence. He built a fire under the trees and broiled the meat and made toast and coffee. He lifted the children in his arms and kissed them with unusual tenderness. "To-day we'll see Uncle Silas," Gordon assured them. "My Uncle Silas!" said the boy, fondly. "He's mine, too," Sue declared. "He's both of our'n," Socky allowed, as they began to eat their breakfast. IV SILAS STRONG, or "Panther Sile," as the hunters called him, spent every winter in the little forest hamlet of Pitkin and every summer in the woods.