He was very indignant, very angry still, for he believed her guilty of planning to meet Frank Van Buren at the party and leave him at home, while his heart beat with keen throbs of pain when he remembered that Ethie's first love was not given to him--that she would have gone to her grave more willingly than she went with him to the altar; but he need not have been so harsh with her--that was no way to make her love him.

Kindness must win her back should she ever be won, and impatient to be reconciled, if reconciliation were now possible, Richard chafed at the necessary delays which kept him a day longer in St.Louis than he had at first intended.
Ethie had been gone just a week when he at last found himself in the train which would take him back to Camden.

First, however, he must stop at Olney; the case was imperative--and so he stepped from the train one snowy afternoon when the February light shone cold and blue upon the little town and the farmhouse beyond.

His brothers were feeding their flocks and herds in the rear yard to the east; but they came at once to greet him, and ask after his welfare.

The light snow which had fallen that day was lying upon the front door-steps undisturbed by any track, so Richard entered at the side.