not alter her determination to remain at home; only a joint declaration,
amounting to a command and signed by both partners of Hamilton and
Company, had that effect. She consented then, but with reluctance.

The steamer sailed from Boston--Miss Pease's civic loyalty forbade her
traveling on a New York boat--on the thirtieth of June, the week after
Commencement. Mary and Mrs. Wyeth attended the Commencement exercises
and festivities as Crawford's guest. Edwin Smith, Crawford's father, did
not come on from Carson City to see his son receive his parchment from
his Alma Mater. He had planned to come--Crawford had begun to believe he
might come--but at the last moment illness had prevented. It was nothing
serious, he wrote; he would be well and hearty when the boy came West
after graduating.


God bless you, son [the letter ended]. If you knew what it means for
your old dad to stay away you'd forgive him for being in the doctor's
care. Come home quick when it's over. There's a four-pound trout waiting
for one of us up in the lake country somewhere. It's up to you or me to
get him.


Crawford showed the letter to Mary. He was disappointed, but not so much
so as the girl expected.

"I never really dared to count on his coming," he explained. "It has
been this way so many times. Whenever Dad has planned to come East
something happens to prevent. Now it has happened again; I was almost
sure it would. It's a shame! I wanted you to meet him. And I wanted him
to meet you, too," he added.