I thought of Whittier's lines,

"The outward, wayward life we see
The hidden springs we may not know."

At the back of the little brown book we found a faded water-color
sketch of a young girl--such a slim, pretty little thing, with
big blue eyes and lovely, long, rippling golden hair. Paul
Osborne's name was written in faded ink across the corner.

We put everything back in the box. Then we sat for a long time
by my window in silence and thought of many things, until the
rainy twilight came down and blotted out the world.



IX. SARA'S WAY

The warm June sunshine was coming down through the trees, white
with the virginal bloom of apple-blossoms, and through the
shining panes, making a tremulous mosaic upon Mrs. Eben Andrews'
spotless kitchen floor. Through the open door, a wind, fragrant
from long wanderings over orchards and clover meadows, drifted
in, and, from the window, Mrs. Eben and her guest could look down
over a long, misty valley sloping to a sparkling sea.

Mrs. Jonas Andrews was spending the afternoon with her
sister-in-law. She was a big, sonsy woman, with full-blown peony
cheeks and large, dreamy, brown eyes. When she had been a slim,