Produced by Annie McGuire. This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print archive. THE COTTAGE OF DELIGHT BOOKS BY WILL N. HARBEN THE COTTAGE OF DELIGHT THE HILLS OF REFUGE THE TRIUMPH ABNER DANIEL ANN BOYD THE DESIRED WOMAN DIXIE HART THE GEORGIANS GILBERT NEAL THE INNER LAW JANE DAWSON KENNETH GALT MAM' LINDA THE NEW CLARION PAUL RUNDEL POLE BAKER SECOND CHOICE THE SUBSTITUTE WESTERFELT * * * * * HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK [ESTABLISHED 1817] [Illustration] THE COTTAGE OF DELIGHT A NOVEL BY WILL N. HARBEN _Author of "Ann Boyd," "Abner Daniel," "The Triumph," "The Hills of Judgment," etc._ [Illustration] HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK AND LONDON Copyright 1919, by Harper & Brothers PART I CHAPTER I John Trott waked that morning at five o'clock. Whether it was due to the mere habit of a working-man or the blowing of the hoarse and mellow whistle at the great cotton-mills beyond the low, undulating hills half a mile away he did not know, but for several years the whistle had been his summons from a state of dead slumber to a day of toil. The morning was cloudy and dark, so he lighted a dingy oil-lamp with a cracked and smoked chimney, and in its dim glow drew on his coarse lime-and-mortar-splotched shirt and overalls. The cheap cotton socks he put on had holes at the heels and toes; his leather belt had broken and was tied with a piece of twine; his shoes were quite new and furnished an odd contrast to the rest of his attire. He was young, under twenty, and rather tall. He was slender, but his frame was sinewy. He had no beard as yet, and his tanned face was covered with down. His hair was coarse and had a tendency to stand erect and awry. He had blue eyes, a mouth inclined to harshness, a manner somewhat brusk and impatient. To many he appeared absent-minded. Suddenly, as he sat tying his shoes, he heard a clatter of pans in the kitchen down-stairs, and he paused to listen. "I wonder," he thought, "if that brat is cooking breakfast again. She must be, for neither one of those women would be out of bed as early as this. It was three o'clock when they came in." Blowing out his light, he groped from the room into the dark passage outside, and descended the old creaking stairs to the hall below. The front door was open, and he sniffed angrily. "They didn't even lock it. They must have been drunk again. Well, that's their business, not mine."