tears that shut out the glow of moon and stars. And he did not go
toward Kedsty's, but trudged heavily in the direction of the
river, for he knew that Kent had called his lie, and that they had
said their last farewell.





CHAPTER IV


It was a long time after O'Connor had gone before Kent at last
fell asleep. It was a slumber weighted with the restlessness of a
brain fighting to the last against exhaustion and the inevitable
end. A strange spirit seemed whirling Kent back through the years
he had lived, even to the days of his boyhood, leaping from crest
to crest, giving to him swift and passing visions of valleys
almost forgotten, of happenings and things long ago faded and
indistinct in his memory. Vividly his dreams were filled with
ghosts--ghosts that were transformed, as his spirit went back to
them, until they were riotous with life and pulsating with the red
blood of reality. He was a boy again, playing three-old-cat in
front of the little old red brick schoolhouse half a mile from the
farm where he was born, and where his mother had died.

And Skinny Hill, dead many years ago, was his partner at the bat--
lovable Skinny, with his smirking grin and his breath that always
smelled of the most delicious onions ever raised in Ohio. And
then, at dinner hour, he was trading some of his mother's cucumber