With this end in view he went up to the summit house at his usual hour, when the day's work was over, at sundown. On the lawn the invalid's flat carriage was tilted at an angle which enabled him to see the delectable mountains bathed in the light reflected from that other country--the cloud-land beyond the golden river of the horizon, in which the sun, like a pilgrim, was going down. The elder daughter was reading to him. Durgan had no mind to disturb them. He had come hoping that the paralytic would have been put away for the night. He disliked encountering Claxton; and, had he disliked the man less, the wrestling soul that shone through the eyes of the almost inanimate face would have distressed him. Bertha, who was sitting at a short distance from the pair, and out of their sight, saw the visitor and came across the grass. They went for a stroll together up on the higher rocks. "I am very idle in these days," said Bertha. "All the children in my nursery have grown up and are too big to be nursed. There is nothing to do, even in the garden." "But the care of your father must absorb all your time and thought." As he said this there was a questioning inflection in his mind that he kept out of his tone. She hung her head as she walked. After a while she spoke, a beautiful flush on her face. "In the old days father loved me better than Hermie, because I was better-looking, and I always thought all that he did was perfect. I thought I loved him far more than Hermie did, because she often tried to persuade him that what he did was wrong. Now----" Durgan waited. "Now he does not want to see me. He does not like me to talk or read to him. It makes it hard for Hermie, for she has everything to do. She thinks father is shy of me and that it will wear away." "I have no doubt it will." "No," she sighed; "you are both wrong. Father, in spite of his helplessness, sees far more clearly. He was always quick to read everyone. He knows"--her voice faltered--"that I cannot love him now that I know what he did. Oh, I hate him for deserting Hermie and letting her bear it!" She pressed her hand to her side, as if speaking of some disease that gave her pain. "How can I help it, Mr. Durgan? I despise him, and he knows it." "I dare say he does. He knows, of course, that the whole world could regard him with no feelings but those of hatred and scorn." She stopped short in her walk. In a minute she said, "I think I will go back again, Mr. Durgan. I cannot bear that you should speak that way to me about my own father." He smiled. "You seem to have some filial affection left." "Did you only say it to make me feel angry?" "Yes; that is why I said it; but, at the same time, you must remember that the world would certainly judge as you have said; and if the ties of kindred did not give a closer embrace than the world does, there would be no home feeling for any of us; there would be no bright spark of the sacred fire of the next world in this."