"No."

The "No--No--No--" was in the monotonous tone a person says "Ninety-nine" when his lungs are being examined.

Mr. Hudson looked at me closely.

"Then--the story!" he said.

I blankly reached for my bag, opened it and took out the blank copy paper.

"Oh--d.a.m.n--" he began, then swallowed.

This awakened me from my trance.

"But he _does_!" I exclaimed in triumph. He _is_--and he's _going to be_!"

"Here?" the editorial voice called out sharply and joyously. "Here in Oldburgh?"

My head bobbed a concise yes.

"Bigger and better than ever?" my questioner tormented.

"A thousand times! Happiness for everybody!--Where there's a family there'll also be a House that's a Home--"

The old fellow began scribbling.

"I reckon he means model cottages," he observed sourly. "They all make a great pretense of loving their neighbor as themselves in this day and time."

"Yes--even if it's a cottage it will certainly be a model one--and what more could one desire?" I asked, rambling again.

"Then--what else?"

"And--oh! Gardens! Gardens--gardens!"

He held up his hand.

"Wait--you go too darn fast!"

"I'm sorry! Maybe I have gone too fast!" I answered, as I settled back in my chair and my face reddened uncomfortably. "Maybe I have gone too fast!"

"You have! You confuse me--talking the way you do and looking the way you do! By rights I ought to make you write the story out yourself--but you don't look as if you could spell 'Unprecedented good fortune in the annals of Oldburgh's industrial career,' to-night!"

"I'm sure I couldn't," I admitted readily. "Please don't ask me to."

"Well--go on with your narrative. What else?"

"Acres and acres! Acres and _acres_!" I impressed upon him. "That's what I've always wanted! I love acres so much better than neighbors--don't you?"

He paused in his writing.

"Of course the Macdermott Realty Company did the stunt?" he asked, scratching his head with his pencil tip and leaving a little black mark along the field of redness. "We mustn't forget to mention each individual member of the firm.--And then--?"

"A schoolhouse," I remembered.

He glared.

"A schoolhouse?" he questioned. "What for?"

"For the children!" I answered, lowering my eyes. "Did you think there wouldn't be any children? How could there be a House that was a Home without them?"

"Oh, and this fellow, Tait, is going to see to it that they're educated, eh? They're going to have advantages that he didn't have--and all that sort of thing? Very praiseworthy, I'm sure!"

I sprang up from my chair.

"I'm going home, Mr. Hudson, please!" I begged. "There _is_ something wrong with my head."

He smiled.

"It's different from any other woman's head I ever saw," he admitted half grudgingly. "It's _level_!"

"But indeed you're mistaken!" I plead. "Right this minute I'm--I'm seeing things!"

Then, when I said this a gentle light stole over his face--such a light I'm sure that few people ever saw there--perhaps n.o.body ever had except Mrs. Hudson the day he proposed to her.

"Visions?" he asked kindly. "A House that's a Home--and _English_ gardens."

"That's not fair!" I warned. "I really ought not to have gone out there to-night--and I don't know whether he'll want all this written up or not--for I didn't mention the _Herald's_ name in our conversation, and--"

"Bosh!" he snapped. "Rot! And piffle! You had a right to go out there if I sent you--and of course he can't object to the public knowing _now_! Why, I expect any one of the reporters could have got as much out of him to-night as you did!"

"Do you really think so?" I asked, from the doorway. "Good night, Mr.

Hudson. You can easily make two columns out of that, by drawing on your--past experience."

He waved me crossly away, without once looking up or saying "Thank you" and I caught a car home. Half an hour later, when the curve was turned into the full face of West Clydemont Place I still thought I was "seeing things." A big motor-car stood before our door, but my heart changed its tune when I got closer. It was not a limousine. It was a doctor's coupe. Mother had suffered a violent chill.

"Grace, I--have no words!" she moaned, as I came into the room.

CHAPTER XIV

THE SKIES FALL

Before morning words began coming to her--gradually. First she moaned, then muttered, then raged. The chill disappeared and fever came on. By daybreak, however, they had both been left with the things that were, and mother slipped into her kimono.

"Go bring me the morning paper," she condescended, after the pa.s.sing of the creamery wagon announced that busy life was still going on.

I rushed out into the front yard. The tree-tops were misty with that white fog which looks as if darkness were trailing her nightrobe behind her; and already on the neighboring lawns the automatic sprinklers were caroming across the green as if they had St. Vitus'