"Yes, I think I do," she answered. But her eyes watered. "I do--in a way," she added. "That is, I love my singing, and the thought of making a success is delightful to me. But of course it means that I give up everything else. I can't have home life, and--and the valley--for years, four or five anyway, I'll have to give all that up. And I'm twenty-seven, Peter. And I'd always rather hoped that my music was going to be a domestic variety--" She stopped, smiling, but he saw the pain in her eyes. "George Sewall most kindly asked me to mother his small son--" she resumed, casually. "But although he is the dearest--" "Sewall did!" Peter exclaimed, rather struck. "Great Scott! his father is one of the richest men in San Francisco." "I know it," Alix agreed. "And he is one of the nicest men," she added. "But of course he'll never really love any one but Ursula. And I felt--oh, I felt too tired and alone and depressed to enter upon congratulations and clothes and family dinners with the Sewalls," she ended, a little drearily. "I wanted--I wanted things in the old way--as they were--" she said, her voice thickening. "I know--I know!" Peter said, sympathetically. And for a while there was silence in the little house, while the rain fell steadily upon the dark forest without, and soaked branches swished about eaves and windows. "Can you put me up to-night?" he asked, suddenly. He liked her frank pleasure. "Rather! I think Cherry's room was made up fresh last Monday," she told him. "And to-morrow," she added, with a brightening face, "we'll walk up to your house, and see what six months of Kow's uninterrupted sway have done to it!" "That's just what we'll do!" he agreed, enthusiastically. "And we'll have some music--" She had risen, as if for good-nights, and was now beside the old square piano, where she had placed the lamp. "I haven't touched it--since--" she said, sadly, sitting on the stool, and with her eyes still smiling on him, putting back the hinged cover. And a moment later her hands, with the assurance and ease of the adept, drifted into one of the songs of the old days. "Do you remember the day we put the rose tree back, Peter?" she asked. "When Martin was almost a stranger? And do you remember the day Cherry and I fell into the Three Wells and you and Dad had to disappear while we dried our clothing on branches of trees? And do you remember the day we made biscuits, over by the ocean?" "I remember all the days," he answered, deeply stirred. "We didn't see all this, then," Alix mused, still playing softly. "Anne claiming everything for her husband, you and I here talking of Dad's death, and Cherry married--" She sighed. "She's not happy?" he questioned quickly. Alix shrugged, pursing her lips doubtfully.