Having discovered how easy and simple it was to keep nocturnal trysts, Nathan began to show a sudden filial docility which pleased and puzzled Johnathan. The father soon realized that an entire fortnight had passed during which he had accounted for every moment of his son’s time—perfect alibis in every instance—and not once had Nathan seen or spoken to the girl. If Nathan had gone two weeks without her, of course he had taken his father’s counsel and given up the Sybarite forever. That was only logic. If the boy showed a strange and unaccountable drowsiness around three o’clock each afternoon, or if it became increasingly difficult to awaken him each morning at five-thirty, it was—according to his mother—because he was “working too hard to the shop.” To which Nathan amusedly subscribed. Because he had given heed to his father and yielded obedience without that threatened murder being necessary, Johnathan conceived the idea of letting the boy have a week’s vacation and take a little trip somewhere, say down to Nantasket. Nathan, however, failed to enthuse. With visible relief on Johnathan’s part, the vacation idea was swiftly dropped. The father did not cease from reminding the son of the former’s magnanimity, however, when later differences arose upon other matters. The thing which troubled Nathan in those hectic days was Edith’s propensity to be allowed the same nocturnal privilege. It was quite all right for Nathan to spend his nights in the company of a reasonably pretty girl who was treated “cruelly” by her relatives. He was a man. But MacHenry shot too good a game of Kelly pool to make Nathan feel that a duplication of the stunt by his sister was advisable. His anxiety was ended one morning, however, when Edith fell over a chair in the outer hallway on her return, before her brother knew she had been out. The parents did not awaken but Nathan did. He leaped out to find Edith’s hair down and her clothing torn. One sleeve of her shirt waist was slit to ribbons and she was limping painfully. “What’s happened, Edie; where you been?” the brother cried frightenedly. “Oh, he tried to get too fresh!” was the sister’s rejoinder. She went to her room, destroyed the torn waist and slipped into bed. The MacHenry fellow disappeared from town next day. While Nat had never given his consent to Edith’s nocturnal absences nor abetted them, he was thankful his sister’s interest had waned. For Nathan, however, no summer was ever quite like that summer. For spring passed and June came, and at least three times a week he left his room as soon as he heard his father’s heavy snoring to return in the moist, mystic hush of dawn—dawn broken only by the energetic chirping of countless song birds and the dull knocking rattle of distant milk wagons.