through the one business street of the little town.

At this hour there was little life in Beverly's main street. The farmers
who drove in to trade had now returned home; the town women were busy
getting supper and most of their men were at home feeding the stock or
doing the evening chores. However, they passed an occasional group of
two or three and around the general store stood a few other natives,
listlessly awaiting the call to the evening meal. These cast curious
glances at the well-known forms of the old man and the young girl, for
his two years' residence had not made the testy old Colonel any less
strange to them. They knew all about him there was to know--which was
nothing at all--and understood they must not venture to address him as
they would have done any other citizen.

Cooper's Hotel, a modest and not very inviting frame building, stood
near the center of the village and as Mary Louise and her grandfather
passed it the door opened and a man stepped out and only avoided bumping
into them by coming to a full stop. They stopped also, of necessity, and
Mary Louise was astonished to find the stranger staring into the
Colonel's face with an expression of mingled amazement and incredulity
on his own.

"James Hathaway, by all the gods!" he exclaimed, adding in wondering
tones: "And after all these years!"

Mary Louise, clinging to her grandfather's arm, cast an upward glance at
his face. It was tensely drawn; the eyelids were half closed and through
their slits the Colonel's eyes glinted fiercely.

"You are mistaken, fellow. Out of my way!" he said, and seizing the