The horse at the gate was pawing the ground impatiently. Frazier looked over the landscape musingly. The moon was just appearing above a mountain-top. The old house which had blazed with the festive light and rung with the merriment of buried generations stood swathed in darkness, its roof-edge drawing a line against the dun sky. Ghosts of the past, earth-anchored by sweet memories, perchance, came and went through the old doorway and strolled about the moonlit grounds. "It is time I was going," Frazier announced. "I don't know what has come over me of late, little girl, but I know that I am different from what I used to be. If I hadn't been I'd never have said what I've said to-night. I hope you will be happy. You'd never have been so with me--never! Good-by!" "Good-by!" she echoed. She was crying. Why? She couldn't have answered. She went with him to the gate. She held his arm in a gentle grasp of pitying gratitude. They shook hands over the gate. He took up the reins, got into the buggy with his old ponderous movement, raised his hat, and the impatient horse bore him away. She turned and glanced up at the window of Charles's room. He was standing there, looking at her, but she could not see him through the murky panes. "Now go to bed, darling," a voice from the past whispered in her subconscious ear, "Mother is watching over you." CHAPTER XXVIII The next day, in the afternoon, Charles and the boys were in the blacksmith's shop repairing a plow that was to be used immediately. Kenneth was at the bellows, and Charles at the anvil, his sleeves rolled high on his brawny arms. Martin stood in the doorway. Presently he whistled softly, and ran to Charles just as he was about to strike the red-hot plowshare which he was holding on the anvil. "Don't make any noise!" he said. "I see a buggy and horse stopping at the gate. It looks like the sheriff's rig, and I think he is in it." Charles dropped his tools, and he and his companions crept to a crack in the wall and peered through it. "That's who it is," Kenneth informed Charles, in a startled voice. "I wonder if--if Tobe has become worse, or--or--" "I couldn't stand that," Martin cried out. "Oh, don't think it!" Charles said nothing, and there was no response from Kenneth, who was grimly peering through the crack. They saw Rowland, bareheaded, walking leisurely from the veranda to the gate. They saw him shaking hands over the buggy-wheels with the sheriff. They could not, at that distance, read his face. Of what was taking place the three watchers could form no idea. Presently they saw Mary come down the walk, pass through the gate, and shake hands with the sheriff. "Sister means to find out if anything has gone wrong, so she can warn us," Kenneth said. "Brown, this looks pretty tough on us. We were thinking everything was all right, but this looks bad."