Stephen O'Mara hesitated just the fraction of a moment before he started methodically down the stairs. And immediately Caleb's amazement at the thought that those clothes had once been worn by him gave way to a newer wonder. For the boy, in spite of the fact that his small face above the pleated collar was burning hot with consciousness of self, wore them in a fashion unforgettable. Then Caleb realized how great an effort it must be costing the boy to make that slow descent in the face of his goggle-eyed stare, and with the most casual of good mornings he led the way to the table. There was something in Sarah's fluttering delight over the boy's appearance that morning which awoke an almost hysterical impulse in her brother. For he knew, as completely as though he had heard it from the boy's own lips, that nothing in the world but the knowledge that "Miss Sarah" wished it would have carried Steve through the ordeal of his first appearance. They had a word together--Sarah and Caleb--after breakfast. "Did you ever see anything like him, Cal?" she demanded of her brother. "Did you! Oh, I never dared hope he would look like that!" Caleb pulled reflectively at his lower lip. "I never did," he admitted. And then, offhandedly: "What--did he say anything, last night, when you told him to wear those things, this morning." "Why, no," Miss Sarah laughed a little. "No. But he--Cal, he just sat and looked at me, oh, so soberly, for the longest time. He made me think somehow of a puppy that knows he's going to be scrubbed and--and dreads it exceedingly. It's because of those dreadful things he's been wearing, don't you suppose so?" "No doubt of it," her brother said. "No doubt! And now I'm going over to invite Dexter Allison to come and take a look at him. I was telling him only yesterday that a gentleman had to be a gentleman born." When Caleb came back, an hour later, with Allison at his heels, he searched the house through without finding the boy. In his perplexity he appealed to Sarah, who followed him to the front door. "Where's Stephen?" he asked. Sarah nodded to Allison. "Why, I waited a half-hour, Cal," she said, "and then, when I thought you wouldn't be back for a while, I sent him downtown--I sent him to the village----" Caleb seemed fairly to shrink. "You sent him down to the village?" he echoed. "Did he--did he change his clothes?" "For some eggs," Sarah rounded out the sentence. "And of course he didn't!" Suddenly her brother's face alarmed her. "Cal," she exclaimed, "I haven't done anything I shouldn't have done, have I?" Caleb turned a wry face toward Allison. "In--that--outfit!" he groaned. "Down to the village, and it's a lumber town! He's gone, and if he doesn't have to fight his way back then I----" Sarah's alarm changed to fear instantly. She stepped out upon the porch. "I never thought of that," she whispered. "But you don't really think----"