mind was reacting to it. His concern was not who should own them
all, but what would actually be the fate of each individual
property child of his. Why, he had not even written a will. It
would all go to his wife, of course, and how little he cared to
whom she left it. He would have liked, perhaps, to have given
Rose Mall twenty-five thousand or so--so she could always be
independent of that young husband of hers--snap her fingers at
him if he got to driving her too hard, and crushing out the
flower-like quality of her--but his wife wouldn't have
understood, and he had hurt her enough, in all conscience. The
one thing he might have enjoyed doing, he couldn't. Outside of
that he didn't care who got it. She could leave it to whomever
she liked when her turn came. Not to whom it went, but what would
happen to it--that was what concerned him.

By his side, Rose, sitting so motionless that he was scarcely
conscious of her presence, was dying with him. With that peculiar
gift of profoundly sympathetic natures she was thinking and
feeling much of what he was experiencing. It seemed to her
heart-breaking that Martin must be forced to abandon the only
things for which he cared. He had even sacrificed his lovely Rose
of Sharon for them--she had never been in any doubt as to the
reason for that sudden emotional retreat of his seven years
before. And she knew his one thought now must be for their
successful administration.

He had worked so hard always and yet had had so little happiness,
so little real brightness out of life. She felt, generously, with
a clutching ache, that with all the disappointments she had
suffered through him--from his first broken promises about the