"Well, then, why don't you rent the River Farm yourself," said John McIntyre, banteringly, "instead of running off West like this? You and that little Ontario girl would run things just fine down there, and show Mary and me how to do it right." A warm flush mingled with the tan on the younger man's cheek. "Maybe we will, some day," he said, with a wistful note in his voice, "but I'll have to wait till that kid is on his own feet. That won't be long, either. I bet he'll plank down all the money I've lent him before he's through college. And then I'll come scootin' home, an' there'll be a lot o' things happen all at once, 'round about that date." "I hope so, Martin; I hope so. It's a big thing you're doing for that boy. I hope he'll never forget it." "Not him! Bless me, it was a bigger thing he did for me. When he gets to be an M.D. I'll go back to Ontario and get little Annie Laurie, and we'll run Symonds into the river, and set up housekeeping on his tombstone. Well, so-long, John. We're goin' to have a bully day for your honeymoonin' to-morrow. Tell Mary to put up a clothes-basket o' them lemon pies, 'cause I'll be holler 'way down past my boot-soles. Good-night, John." He started off noisily, but turned to shout back through a cloud of dust: "Mind you don't let that snake come any o' his monkey-shines over you, John! Good-night!" The wagon rattled away down the lilac road, the driver's voice rising gaily, if jerkily, above its clatter: "_O-o-o-o-o-o-o-o! They broke the jam on the Gar-ry Rocks, And met a wat-e-ry grave!_" The other man was still smiling as he turned and made his way along the edge of the wood. Good old Martin! Where was there another such a friend as he? When John McIntyre's spirit rose in thankfulness to his Maker for the many temporal blessings lavished upon him, he never forgot to say, "And I thank thee, Lord, most of all, for Martin Heaslip!" The fiery ball had sunk beyond the rim of the sea; the earth was still darkly radiant, pulsating with the thought of his departed glory. The great rose on the eastern horizon was fading to a tender mauve. The wooded glen was dark and silent. From its warm depths arose the perfume of the young, green earth. John McIntyre stood for a moment on the pathway, where its shadows met the lights of the open fields. He threw back his head and looked up into the quivering deep of the heavens. Involuntarily his eyes closed against their glory. He was overcome, too, with the glory of a sudden devout thought. God, away up there, encompassed by ineffable light and beauty, was like His own abiding place--too blindingly radiant to be gazed at by mortal eye, and therefore inscrutable and mysterious, but all-bountiful, nevertheless, sending down each day His largess of blessings, just as the heavens sent down their life-giving rains. At the thought John McIntyre took off his hat.