The sands of the blowout on Jerry's claim seared not more hotly her fresh young hopes of prosperity, through her own effort and control, than this sudden change from the artist, with his dreams of beauty and power, to the man of easy clerical duty with a good salary and small responsibility. Of course Aunt Jerry had been back of it all, but so would Aunt Jerry have been back of her--if she had given up. Jerry sat for a long time staring at the missive where it had fallen on the floor, the typewritten neatness of the blue lettering only a blur to her eyes. For she was back at "Eden," on the steep but beautiful bluff road, with Eugene afraid to drive the big Darby car. She was in the rose-arbor looking up to see that faint line of indecision in the dear, handsome face. She was in the "Eden" parlor under the soft light of rose-tinted lamps, facing Aunt Jerry and sure of herself, but catching again that wavering line of uncertainty on Eugene Wellington's countenance, and her own vague fear--unguessed then--that he might not resist in the supreme test. But idols die hard. Eugene was her idol. He couldn't die at once. He was so handsome, so true, so gracious, so filled with a love of beautiful things. How could she understand the temptation to the soul of an artist in such lovely settings as "Eden" offered? It was all Aunt Jerry's fault, and he would overcome it. He must. It was so easy to blame Aunt Jerry. It made everything clear. He had yielded to her cleverness and never known he was being ruled. With all her flippant, careless youth, inexperience, and selfishness, Jerry was a keener reader of human nature than her lack of training could account for. She knew just the lines Aunt Jerry had laid, the net spread for Eugene's feet. But--Oh, things must come out all right. He would change. This one thought rang up and down her scale of thinking, as if repeating would make true what Jerry knew was false. "'If a man went right with himself.' Oh, Eugene, Eugene!" she murmured, half aloud. "You hitched your wagon to a star, but to what kind of a star--to what kind of a star?" Then came a greater query: "Shall I go back to 'Eden,' to Aunt Jerry's rule, to Eugene, to love, to easy, dependent, purposeless living? Shall I?" A blank wall seemed suddenly to be flung across her way. Should she climb over it, hammer an opening through it, or turn back and run from it? With these questions stalking before her she had come out to dinner and York Macpherson's genial, entertaining conversation, and to Laura Macpherson's gracious intuition and soothing sympathy. Early in the evening, as the Macphersons with their guest sat watching the splendor of the sunset sky, Jerry said, suddenly: "It has been two weeks to-day since I came here. Quite long enough for a stranger's first visit."