THE doctor did not return in a few days nor in a few weeks. Two months passed before his gate creaked on its hinges and the word ran through the town, “Dr. Izard is back!”

He arrived in Hamilton at nightfall, and proceeded at once to his office. There was in his manner none of the hesitation shown at his last entrance there, and when by chance he passed the mirror in his quick movements about the room he was pleased himself to note the calmness of his features, and the quiet air of dignified reserve once more pervading his whole appearance.

“I have fought the battle,” he quietly commented to himself; “and now to face the new order of things!”

He looked about the room, put a few matters in order, and then stepped out into the green space before his door. Glancing right and left and seeing nobody in the road or in the fields beyond the cemetery, he walked straight to the monument of Polly’s mother and sternly, determinately surveyed it. Then he glanced down at the grave it shaded, and detecting a stray leaf lying on its turf, he picked it up and cast it aside, with a suggestion of that strange smile which had lately so frequently altered his handsome features. After which he roamed through the churchyard, coming back to his door by another path. The chill of early September had touched many of the trees about, and there was something like dreariness in the landscape. But he did not appear to notice this, and entered in and sat down at his table with his former look of concentration and purpose.

Evening came and with it several patients; some from need, some from curiosity. To both kinds he listened with equal calmness, prescribing for their real or fancied complaints and seeing them at once to the door. At ten o’clock even these failed to put in an appearance, and being tired, he was about to draw his shade and lock his door when there came a low knock at the latter of so timid and so hesitating a character that his countenance changed and he waited for another knock before uttering his well known sharp summons to enter.

It came after a moment’s delay, and from some impulse difficult for himself to explain, he proceeded to the door, and hastily opened it. A tall, heavily veiled figure, clad in widow’s weeds, stood before him, at sight of which he started back, hardly believing his eyes.

“Grace!” he ejaculated; “Grace!” and held out his arms with an involuntary movement of which he seemed next moment ashamed, for with a sudden change of manner he became on the instant ceremonious, and welcoming in his visitor with a low bow, he pushed forward a chair, with mechanical politeness, and stammered with intense emotion:

“You are ill! Or your son! Some trouble threatens you or you would not be here.”

“My son is well, and I—I am as well as usual,” answered the advancing lady, taking the chair he offered her, though not without some hesitation. “Clarke is with the horses in front and I have ventured—at this late hour—to visit you, because I knew you would never come to me, even if I sent for you, Oswald.”

The tone, the attitude, the whole aspect of the sweet yet dignified woman before him, seemed to awaken an almost uncontrollable emotion in the doctor. He leaned toward her and said in tones which seemed to have a corresponding effect upon her: “You mistake, Grace. One word from you would have brought me at any time; that is, if I could have been of any service to you. I have never ceased to love you—” He staggered back but quickly recovered himself—“and never shall.”

“I do not understand you,” protested Mrs. Unwin, half rising. “I did not come—I did not expect—” her agitation prevented her from proceeding.

“I do not understand myself!” exclaimed he, walking a step away. “I never thought to speak such words to you again. Forgive me, Grace; you have a world of wrong to pardon in me; add another mark of forbearance to your list and make me more than ever your debtor.” She drooped her head and sitting down again seemed to be endeavoring to regain her self-possession.

“It was for Clarke,” she murmured, “that I came.”

“I might have known it,” cried the doctor.

“He would not speak for himself, and Polly, the darling child, has become so dazed by the experiences of these last two months that she no longer knows her duty. Besides, she seems afraid to speak to you again; says that you frighten her, and that you no longer love her.”

“I never have loved her,” he muttered, but so low the words were not carried to the other’s ears.

“Have you learned in your absence what has taken place here in Hamilton?” she asked.

Rousing himself, for his thoughts were evidently not on the subject she advanced, he took a seat near her and composed himself to listen, but meeting her soft eyes shining through the heavy crape she wore, he said with a slight appealing gesture:

“Let me see your face, Grace, before I attempt to answer. I have not dared to look upon it for fourteen years, but now, with some of the barriers down which held us inexorably apart, I may surely be given the joy of seeing your features once more, even if they show nothing but distrust and animosity toward me.”

She hesitated, and his face grew pale with the struggle of his feelings, then her slim white hand went up and almost before he could realize it, they sat face to face.

“O Grace,” he murmured; “the same! always the same; the one woman in all the world to me! But I will not distress you. Other griefs lie nearer your heart than any I could hope to summon up, and I do not know as I would have it otherwise if I could. Proceed with your questions. They were in reference to Clarke, I believe.”

“No, I only asked if you had kept yourself acquainted with what has been going on in Hamilton since you left. Did you know that Ephraim Earle was living again in the old house, and that Polly is rapidly losing her fortune owing to his insatiable demands for money?”

“No!” He sprang to his feet and his whole attitude showed distress and anger. “I told her to make the fellow give her a proof, an unmistakable proof, that he was indeed the brilliant inventor of whose fame we have all been proud.”

“And he furnished it, Oswald. You mean the medal which he received from France, do you not? Well, he had it among his treasures in the cave, and he showed it to her one day. It was the one thing, he declared, from which he had never parted in all his adventurous career.”

“You are dreaming! he never had that! Could not have had that! It was some deception he practised upon you!” exclaimed the doctor, aghast and trembling.

But she shook her lovely head, none the less beautiful because her locks were becoming silvered on the forehead, and answered: “It was the very medal we saw in our youth, with the French arms and inscription upon it. Dr. Sutherland examined it, and Mr. Crouse says he remembers it well. Besides it had his name engraved upon it and the year.”

The doctor, to whom her words seemed to come in a sort of nightmare, sank into his chair and stared upon her with such horror that she would have recoiled from him in dismay had he been any other man than Oswald Izard, so long loved and so long and passionately borne with, notwithstanding his mysterious words and startling inconsistencies of conduct.

“You do not know why this surprises me,” he exclaimed, and hung his head. “I was so sure,” he added below his breath, “that this was some impostor, and not Ephraim Earle.”

“I know,” she proceeded, after a moment, as soon, indeed, as she thought he could understand her words, “that you did not credit his claims and refused to recognize him as Polly’s father. But I had no idea you felt so deeply on the subject or I might have written to you long ago. You have some reasons for your doubts, Oswald; for I see that your convictions are not changed by this discovery. What is it? I am ready to listen if no one else is, for he is blighting Polly’s life and at the same time shattering my son’s hopes.”

“I said—I swore to Polly that I had no reason,” he declared, gloomily dropping his eyes and assuming at once the defensive.

But she with infinite tact and a smile he could not but meet, answered softly: “I know that too; but I am better acquainted with you than she is, and I am confident that you have had some cause for keeping the truth from Polly, which will not apply to me. Is there not something connected with those old days—something, perhaps, known only to you, which would explain your horror of this man’s pretensions and help her possibly out of her dilemma? Are you afraid to confide it to me, when perhaps in doing so you would make two innocent ones happy?”

“I cannot talk about it,” he replied with almost fierce emphasis. “Ephraim Earle and I—” He started, caught her by the arm and turned his white face toward the door. “Hush!” he whispered, and stooped his ear to listen. She watched him with terror and amazement, but he soon settled back, and waving his hand remarked quietly:

“The boughs are losing their leaves and the vines sometimes tap against the windows like human fingers. You were saying——”

“You were saying that Ephraim Earle and you——”

But his blank looks showed that he had neither understood nor followed her. ............