He muttered an excuse and tore open the telegram. His colour faded slightly. “I have to take the first train,” he said. “My father is ill and I am needed.”
He handed the sheet to Elnora. “I have about two hours, as I remember the trains north, but my things are all over Uncle Doc's house, so I must go at once.”
“Certainly,” said Elnora, giving back the message. “Is there anything I can do to help? Mother, bring Philip a glass of buttermilk to start on. I will gather what you have here.”
“Never mind. There is nothing of importance. I don't want to be hampered. I'll send for it if I miss anything I need.”
Philip drank the milk, said good-bye to Mrs. Comstock; thanked her for all her kindness, and turned to Elnora.
“Will you walk to the edge of the Limberlost with me?” he asked. Elnora assented. Mrs. Comstock followed to the gate, urged him to come again soon, and repeated her good-bye. Then she went back to the arbour to await Elnora's return. As she watched down the road she smiled softly.
“I had an idea he would speak to me first,” she thought, “but this may change things some. He hasn't time. Elnora will come back a happy girl, and she has good reason. He is a model young man. Her lot will be very different from mine.”
She picked up her embroidery and began setting dainty precise little stitches, possible only to certain women.
On the road Elnora spoke first. “I do hope it is nothing serious,” she said. “Is he usually strong?”
“Quite strong,” said Philip. “I am not at all alarmed but I am very much ashamed. I have been well enough for the past month to have gone home and helped him with some critical cases that were keeping him at work in this heat. I was enjoying myself so I wouldn't offer to go, and he would not ask me to come, so long as he could help it. I have allowed him to overtax himself until he is down, and mother and Polly are north at our cottage. He's never been sick before, and it's probable I am to blame that he is now.”
“He intended you to stay this long when you came,” urged Elnora.
“Yes, but it's hot in Chicago. I should have remembered him. He is always thinking of me. Possibly he has needed me for days. I am ashamed to go to him in splendid condition and admit that I was having such a fine time I forgot to come home.”
“You have had a fine time, then?” asked Elnora.
They had reached the fence. Philip vaulted over to take a short cut across the fields. He turned and looked at her.
“The best, the sweetest, and most wholesome time any man ever had in this world,” he said. “Elnora, if I talked hours I couldn't make you understand what a girl I think you are. I never in all my life hated anything as I hate leaving you. It seems to me that I have not strength to do it.”
“If you have learned anything worth while from me,” said Elnora, “that should be it. Just to have strength to go to your duty, and to go quickly.”
He caught the hand she held out to him in both his. “Elnora, these days we have had together, have they been sweet to you?”
“Beautiful days!” said Elnora. “Each like a perfect dream to be thought over and over all my life. Oh, they have been the only really happy days I've ever known; these days rich with mother's love, and doing useful work with your help. Good-bye! You must hurry!”
Philip gazed at her. He tried to drop her hand, only clutched it closer. Suddenly he drew her toward him. “Elnora,” he whispered, “will you kiss me good-bye?”
Elnora drew back and stared at him with wide eyes. “I'd strike you sooner!” she said. “Have I ever said or done anything in your presence that made you feel free to ask that, Philip Ammon?”
“No!” panted Philip. “No! I think so much of you I wanted to touch your lips once before I left you. You know, Elnora——”
“Don't distress yourself,” said Elnora calmly. “I am broad enough to judge you sanely. I know what you mean. It would be no harm to you. It would not matter to me, but here we will think of some one else. Edith Carr would not want your lips to-morrow if she knew they had touched mine to-day. I was wise to say: 'Go quickly!'”
Philip still clung to her. “Will you write me?” he begged.
“No,” said Elnora. “There is nothing to say, save good-bye. We can do that now.”
He held on. “Promise that you will write me only one letter,” he urged. “I want just one message from you to lock in my desk, and keep always. Promise you will write once, Elnora.”
She looked into his eyes, and smiled serenely. “If the talking trees tell me this winter, the secret of how a man may grow perfect, I will write you what it is, Philip. In all the time I have known you, I never have liked you so little. Good-bye.”
She drew away her hand and swiftly turned back to the road. Philip Ammon, wordless, started toward Onabasha on a run.
Elnora crossed the road, climbed the fence and sought the shelter of their own woods. She chose a diagonal course and followed it until she came to the path leading past the violet patch. She went down this hurriedly. Her hands were clenched at her side, her eyes dry and bright, her cheeks red-flushed, and her breath coming fast. When she reached the patch she turned into it and stood looking around her.
The mosses were dry, the flowers gone, weeds a foot high covered it. She turned away and went on down the path until she was almost in sight of the cabin.
Mrs. Comstock smiled and waited in the arbour until it occurred to her that Elnora was a long time coming, so she went to the gate. The road stretched away toward the Limberlost empty and lonely. Then she knew that Elnora had gone into their own woods and would come in the back way. She could not understand why the girl did not hurry to her with what she would have to tell. She went out and wandered around the garden. Then she stepped into the path and started along the way leading to the woods, past the pool now framed in a thick setting of yellow lilies. Then she saw, and stopped, gasping for breath. Her hands flew up and her lined face grew ghastly. She stared at the sky and then at the prostrate girl figure. Over and over she tried to speak, but only a dry breath came. She turned and fled back to the garden.
In the familiar enclosure she gazed around her like a caged animal seeking escape. The sun beat down on her bare head mercilessly, and mechanically she moved to the shade of a half-grown hickory tree that voluntarily had sprouted beside the milk house. At her feet lay an axe with which she made kindlings for fires. She stooped and picked it up. The memory of that prone figure sobbing in the grass caught her with a renewed spasm. She shut her eyes as if to close it out. That made hearing so acute she felt certain she heard Elnora moaning beside the path. The eyes flew open. They looked straight at a few spindling tomato plants set too near the tree and stunted by its shade. Mrs. Comstock whirled on the hickory and swung the axe. Her hair shook down, her clothing became disarranged, in the heat the perspiration streamed, but stroke fell on stroke until the tree crashed over, grazing a corner of the milk house and smashing the garden fence on the east.
At the sound Elnora sprang to her feet and came running down the garden walk. “Mother!” she cried. “Mother! What in the world are you doing?”
Mrs. Comstock wiped her ghastly face on her apron. “I've laid out to cut that tree for years,” she said. “It shades the beets in the morning, and the tomatoes in the afternoon!”
Elnora uttered one wild little cry and fled into her mother's arms. “Oh mother!” she sobbed. “Will you ever forgive me?”
Mrs. Comstock's arms swept together in a tight grip around Elnora.
“There isn't a thing on God's footstool from a to izzard I won't forgive you, my precious girl!” she said. “Tell mother what it is!”
Elnora lifted her wet face. “He told me,” she panted,