"Surely they are!" said Leslie. "You did right to rescue them from their environment; all the fault that lies with you so far is, that you did not do from the start what you are now doing. The thing that haunts me is this, Mr. Minturn, and I must get it out of my mind before I can sleep soundly again--you will let me tell you--you won't think me meddling in what must be dreadful heartache? Oh you won't will you?"

"No, I won't," said Mr. Minturn, "but it is prolonging heartache to discuss this matter, and wasting time better used in the building of a sod dam--indeed Leslie, tell me about the birds."

"I will, if you'll answer one question," said Leslie.

"Dangerous, but I'll risk it," replied Mr. Minturn.

"I must ask two or three minor ones to reach the real one," explained the girl.

"Oh Leslie," laughed Mr. Minturn. "I didn't think you were so like the average woman."

"A large number of men are finding 'the average woman' quite delightful," said Leslie. "Men respect a masculine, well-balanced, argumentative woman, but every time they love and marry the impulsive, changeable, companionable one."

"Provided she be endowed with truth, character, and common mother instinct enough to protect her young--yes--I grant it, and glory in it," said Mr. Minturn. "I can furnish logic for one family, and most men I know feel qualified to do the same."

"Surely!" agreed Leslie. "You were waiting for Nellie the night she came from the tamarack swamp with me, and she told me you had a little box, and that with its contents you had threatened to 'freeze her soul,' if she had a soul. I'll be logical and fair, and ask but the _one_ question I first stipulated. Here it is: did you wait until you made sure she had a soul, worthy of your consideration, before you froze it?"

James Minturn's laugh was ugly to hear.

"My dear girl," he said. "I made sure she had _not_ three years ago."

"And I made equally sure that she had," said Leslie, "in the tamarack swamp when she wrestled as Jacob at Peniel against her birth, her environment, her wealth, and triumphed over all of them for you and her sons. I can't go on with my own plan for personal happiness, until I know for sure if you perfectly understand that she came to you that night to confess to you her faults, errors, mistakes, sins, if need be, and ask you to take the head of your household, and to help her fashion each hour of her life anew. Did she have a chance to tell you all this?"

"No," said Mr. Minturn. "But it would have made _no difference,_ if she had. It came too late."

"You have not the right to say that to any living, suffering human being!" protested Leslie.

"I have a perfect right to say it to her," said Mr. Minturn. "A right that would be justified in any court in the world, either of lawyers or people."

"Then thank G.o.d, Nellie gets her trial higher. He will understand, and forgive her."

"You don't know what she did," said Mr. Minturn. "What she stood before me and the officers of the law, and admitted she did."

"I don't care what she did! There were men forgiven on the cross; because they sincerely repented, G.o.d had mercy on them, so He will on her, and what's more, He won't have any on _you_, unless you follow His example and forgive when you are asked, by a woman who is as deeply repentant as she was."

"Her repentance comes too late," said Mr. Minturn with finality. "Her error is _not reparable_."

"There is no such thing as true repentance being too late," insisted Leslie. "You are distinctly commanded to forgive; you have got to do it! There is no error that is reparable. Since you hint tragedy, I will concede it. If she had been directly responsible for the death of her child, it was a mistake, criminal carelessness, but not a thing purposely planned; so she could atone for it by doing her best for you and the boys."

"Any mother who once did the things she did is not fit to be trusted again!"

"What nonsense! James Minturn, you amaze me!" said Leslie. "That is a little too cold masculine logic. That is taking from the whole human race the power to repent of and repair a mistake."

"There are some mistakes that cannot be repaired!"

"I grant it," said Leslie. "There are! _You are making one right now!_"

"That's the most strictly feminine utterance I ever heard," said Mr.

Minturn, with a short laugh.

"Thank you," retorted Leslie. "The compliment is high, but I accept it.

I ask nothing better at the hands of fate than to be the most feminine of women. And I've told you what I feel forced to. You can now go on with your plans, knowing they are exactly what she had mapped out, hastily, but surely. She said to me that she must build from the foundations, which meant a new home."

"You are fatuously mistaken!" said Mr. Minturn.

"She said to me," reiterated Leslie forcefully, "that for ten years she had done exactly what she pleased, lived only for her own pleasure, now she would do as _you_ dictated for a like time, live your way--I never was farther from a mistake in my life. If you think it doesn't take courage to tell you this, and if you think I enjoy it, and if you think I don't wish I were a mile away----"

"I still maintain I know the lady better than you do," said Mr.

Minturn. "But you are wonderful Leslie, and I always shall respect and honour you for your effort in our behalf. It does credit to your head and heart. I envy Douglas Bruce. If ever an hour of trial comes to you, I would feel honoured for a chance to prove to you how much I appreciate----"

"Don't talk like that!" wailed Leslie. "It's all a failure if you do!

Promise me that you will _think this over_. Let me send you the note Nellie wrote me before she went away. Won't you try to imagine what she is suffering to-day, in the change from what she went to you hoping, and what she received at your hands?"

"Let me see," said James Minturn. "At this hour she is probably enduring the pangs of wearing the most tasteful afternoon gown on the veranda of whatever summer resort suits her variable fancy, also the discomfiture of the woman she induced to bid high and is now winning from at bridge. I am particularly intimate with her forms of suffering; you see I judge them by my own and my children's during the past years."

"Then you think I'm not sincere?" asked Leslie.

"Surely, my dear girl!" said Mr. Minturn. "With all my heart I believe you! I know you are loyal to her, and to me! It isn't _you_ I disbelieve, child, it is my wife."

"But I've told you over and over that she's changed."

"And I refuse to believe in her power to undergo the genuine and permanent change that would make her an influence for good with her sons, or anything but an uncontrollable element in my home," said Mr.

Minturn. "Why Leslie, if I were to hunt her up and ask her to come to my house, do you think she would do it?"

"I know she would be most happy," said Leslie.

"Small plain rooms, wait on herself, children over the house and lawn at all times--Nellie Minturn? You amuse me!" he said.

"There's no amus.e.m.e.nt in it for me, it is pitiful tragedy," said Leslie. "She is willing, she has offered to change, you are denying her the opportunity."

"You don't think deeply enough!" said the man. "Suppose, knowing her as I do, I agreed to her coming to my house. Suppose I filled it with servants to wait on her, and ruin and make sn.o.bs of the boys; it could only result in a fiasco all around, and bring me again to the awful thing I have been through once, in forcing a separation. The present is too good for the boys, and now they are my first consideration."

"So I see," said Leslie. "Nellie isn't getting a particle and she _is_ their mother, and once she really awakened to the situation, she was hungry to mother them, and to take her place in their hearts. I don't know where she is, but feeling as she did when we parted, I know she's not at any summer resort playing bridge at this minute."

"You are a friend worth having, Leslie; I congratulate my wife on so staunch an advocate," said James Minturn. "And I'll promise you this: I'll go back to the hateful subject, just when I felt I was free from it. I'll think on both sides, and I'll weigh all you've said. If I see a glimmering, I will do this much--I will locate her, and learn how genuine was the change you witnessed, and I rather think I'll manage for you to see also. Will that satisfy you?"

"That will make me radiant, because the change I witnessed was genuine.

I know that wherever Nellie is to-day and whatever she is doing, she is still firm as when she left me in her desire for reparation toward you and her sons. Please think fast, and find her quickly."

"Leslie, you're incorrigible! Go bring Douglas to his surprise. He has a right to be happy."

"So have you," insisted Leslie. "More than he, because you have had such deep sorrow. Good-bye."

Then Leslie took leave of the others, returned to the cabin, and hurried to her room to dress for her trip to bring her lover. Douglas Bruce was waiting when she stopped at the Iriquois and his greeting was joyous. Mr. Winton was cordial, but Douglas noticed that he seemed tired and worried, and inquired if he were working unusually hard. He replied that he was, and beginning to feel the heat a little.

"Then we will drive to the country before dinner to cool off," said Leslie, seeing her opportunity.

Both men agreed that would be enjoyable. After a few minutes of casual talk they relaxed while making smooth pa.s.sage over city streets and the almost equally level highways of the country. At the end of half an hour Douglas sat upright, looking around him.