girl. He recalled his throb of gratitude that Claude lived at a
safe distance, and his subsequent pang of remorse at doubting,
for an instant, Rose's fidelity.

So at length April came, the Saco was still high, turbid, and
angry, and the boys were waiting at Limington Falls for the
"Ossipee drive" to begin. Stephen joined them there, for he was
restless, and the river called him, as it did every spring. Each
stubborn log that he encountered gave him new courage and power of
overcoming. The rush of the water, the noise and roar and dash,
the exposure and danger, all made the blood run in his veins like
new wine. When he came back to the farm, all the cobwebs had been
blown from his brain, and his first interview with Rose was so
intoxicating that he went immediately to Portland, and bought, in
a kind of secret penitence for his former fears, a pale pink-flowered
wall-paper for the bedroom in the new home. It had once been voted
down by the entire advisory committee. Mrs. Wiley said pink was
foolish and was always sure to fade; and the border, being a mass of
solid roses, was five cents a yard, virtually a prohibitive
price. Mr. Wiley said he "should hate to hev a spell of sickness
an' lay abed in a room where there was things growin' all over
the place." He thought "rough-plastered walls, where you could
lay an' count the spots where the roof leaked, was the most
entertainin' in sickness." Rose had longed for the lovely
pattern, but had sided dutifully with the prudent majority, so
that it was with a feeling of unauthorized and illegitimate joy
that Stephen papered the room at night, a few strips at a time.

On the third evening, when he had removed all signs of his work,
he lighted two kerosene lamps and two candles, finding the