When the door opened, a little girl of three bounded in. Ebenezer held out his arms and Elsie sprang into them. "Listen to Mrs. Waldstricker," he laughed. "She said, 'my baby,' and I say, she's mine.... Aren't you my baby, pet?" Helen smiled indulgently. This wee bit of femininity was the one creature who could keep her father amiable from one end of the day to the other. "My girlie wants to eat with daddy?" Ebenezer went on, his face buried in the flaxen hair. "Then she shall." "Elsie wants to eat with daddy," parroted the child. "That's why I say she's spoiled," offered Helen, shrugging her shoulders. "Now her place is in the nursery, but what can I do?" "Her place is right here on her father's knee," replied Waldstricker, "where I always want her, bless her." During the discussion about the child, Frederick got up from the table and went out of doors. As he left the dining room, he had no definite plan; but no sooner had he walked across the front lawn and taken a view of the long road--the way that led to Tessibel and his boy--than his feet, seemingly of their own volition, led him along the grassy path up the hill. If he could only see the two of them without his family knowing! One kiss from his boy, one loving look from Tess, and he felt he could start again to live! To the sick man the distance was considerable, but minute by minute he grew stronger, restored by revivifying hope. An hour, only a short hour, only a little distance further and he would be at the lake; in sight of the willow trees around the shack. He went down the hill to the top of the lane. Here Tess had come to him that long ago night he'd married her. Every familiar spot stung him with bitter memories of the squatter girl. He went slowly down and stopped under a great tree opposite the house where he'd formerly lived. Young had the place now, and Tess lived there and his boy. Ebenezer's insinuations hurt him. His jealousy of Deforrest revived. Remorse for his criminal selfishness burned him, an unquenchable fire. Shaken by conflicting emotions, he went on by the deserted hut under the willows to the lake shore. He'd go out to the ragged rocks and rest, and then he'd try to see Tessibel and the boy. He came to the great gray slab where he'd left Tess the night he told her of Madelene, and sank down in the shade of the overhanging rocks. Screened from the blazing sun, his hot skin rejoiced in the coolness of the damp grotto. With unseeing eyes, he glanced out over the glassy mirror of the placid water. Unheeding, he heard none of the bird-calls, and paid no attention to the intimate little sounds of the lake side. What should he do when at last he saw Tess and the boy? Would he dare claim them?