"All day I've been thinking about you--wanting you. Sometimes I can bring people that way."

"And I have wanted you! Betty, may I stay--to-night?"

"Why, yes, dear. Stay until you want to go home. I've been pulling myself together; I'm almost ready to go back to Brace. Come in!

Why--what is it, dear? Come, let me take off your things! There! Now lie back in the chair and tell Betty all about it."

"No, no! Betty, I want to sit so--at your feet. I want to learn all that you can teach me. You have never had your eyes blinded--or you would know how the light hurts."

"Well, then. Put your blessed, tired head on my knee. You're my little girl to-night, Lyn, and I am your--mother."

For a moment Lynda cried as a child might who had reached safety at last. Betty did not check or soothe the heavy sobs--she waited. She knew Lynda was saved from whatever had troubled her. It was only the telling of it now. And presently the dark head was lifted.

"Betty, it is Con and I!"

"Yes, dear."

"I've loved him all my life; and I believe--I _know_--he loved me! Women do not make mistakes about the real thing."

"Never, Lyn, never."

"Betty, once when I thought Con had wronged me, I wanted to come to you--I almost did--but I couldn't then! Now that I am sure I have wronged him, it is easy to come to you--you are so understanding!" The radiance of Lynda's face rather startled Betty. Abandon, relief, glorified it until it seemed a new--a far more beautiful face.

"All my life, Betty, I've been controlling myself--conquering myself. I got started that way and--and I've kept on. I've never done anything without considering and weighing; but now I'm going to fling myself into love and life and--pay whatever there is to pay."

"Why, Lyn, dear, please go slower." Betty pressed her face to the head at her knee.

"Betty, there was another love in Con's life--one that should never have been there."

This almost took Betty's breath. She was thankful Lynda's eyes were turned away; but by some strange magic the words raised Truedale in Betty's very human imagination.

"I sometimes think the--the thing that happened--was the working out of an old inheritance; Con has overcome much, but that caught him in its snare. He was ready to let it ruin his whole future. He would never have flinched--never have known, or admitted if he had known--what he had foregone. But the thing was taken out of his control altogether--the girl married another man!

"When Con came to himself again, he told me, Betty--told me so simply, so tragically, that I saw what a deep cut the experience had made in his life--how it had humbled him. Never once did he blame any one else. I loved him for the way he looked upon it; so many men could not have done so. That made the difference with me. It was what the thing had done to Con that made it possible for me to love him the more!

"He wanted the best things in life but didn't think he was worthy! And I? Well, I thought I saw enough for us both, and so I married him! Then something happened--it doesn't matter what it was--it was a foolish, ugly thing, but it had to be something. And Con thought I had never forgiven the--the first love--that I had sacrificed myself for him--in marriage! And no woman could bear that."

"My poor, dear Lyn."

"Can't you see, Betty, it all comes from the idiotic idea that men--some men--have about women. They put us on a toppling pedestal; when we fall they are surprised, and when we don't they--are afraid of us! And all the time--you know this, Betty--we ought not to be on pedestals at all; we don't--we _don't_ belong on them! We want to be close and go along together."

"Yes, Lyn; we do! we do!"

"Well--after Con misunderstood, I just let him go along thinking I was--well, the kind of woman who could sacrifice herself. I thought he would want me so that he would--find out. And so we've been eating our hearts out--for ages!"

"Why, Lyn! you cruel, foolish girl."

"Yes--and because I knew you would say that--I could come to you.

You--do not blame Con?"

"Blame _him_! Why, Lyn, a gentleman doesn't take a woman off her beastly pedestal; she comes down herself--if she isn't a fool."

"Well, Betty, I'm down! I'm down, and I'm going to crawl to Con, if necessary, and then--I think he'll lift me up."

"He'll never pull you down, that's one sure thing!"

"Oh! thank you, Betty. Thank you."

"But, Lyn--what has so suddenly brought you to your senses?"

"Your little baby, Betty!"

"My--baby!" The words came in a hard, gasping breath.

"I held him when he died, Betty. I had never been close to a baby before--never! A strange thing happened to me as I looked at him. It was like knowing what a flower would be while holding only the bud. The baby's eyes had the same expression I have seen in Con's eyes--in Brace's; I know now it is the whole world's look. It was full of wonder--full of questions as to what it all meant. I am sure that it comes and goes but never really is answered--here, Betty."

"Oh! Lyn. And I have been bitter--miserable--because I felt that it wasn't fair to take my baby until he had done some little work in the world! And now--why, he did a great thing. My little, little baby!"

Betty was clinging to Lynda, crying as if all the agony were swept away forever.

"Sometimes"--Lynda pressed against Betty--"sometimes, lately, in Con's eyes I have seen the look! It was as if he were asking me whether he had yet been punished enough! And I've been thinking of myself--thinking what Con owed _me;_ what _I_ wanted; _when_ I should have it! I hate and despise myself for my littleness and prudery; why, he's a thousand times finer than I! That's what pedestals have done for women. But now, Betty, I'm down; and I'm down to stay. I'm--"

"Wait, Lyn, dear." Betty mopped her wet face and started up. She had seen a tall form pa.s.s the window, and she felt as if something tremendous were at stake. "Just a minute, Lyn. I must speak to Mrs.

Waters if you are to stay over night. She's old, you know, and goes early to bed."

Lynda still sat on the floor--her face turned to the red glow of the fire that was growing duller and duller. Presently the door opened, and her words flowed on as if there had been no interruption.

"I'm going to Con to-morrow. I had to make sure--first; but I know now, I know! I'm going to tell him all about it--and ask him to let me walk beside him. I'm going to tell him how lonely I've been in the place he put me--how I've hated it! And some time--I feel as sure as sure can be--there will be something I can do that will prove it."

"My--darling!"

Arms stronger than Betty's held her close--held her with a very human, understanding strength.

"You've done the one big thing, Lyn!"

"Not yet, not yet, Con, dear."

"You have made me realize what a wrong--a bitter wrong--I did you, when I thought you could be less than a loving woman."

"Oh, Con! And have you been lonely, too?"

"Sweet, I should have died of loneliness had something not told me I was still travelling up toward you. That has made it possible."

"Instead"--Lynda drew his face down to hers--"instead, I've been struggling up toward _you!_! Dear, dear Con, it isn't men and women; it's _the_ man--_the_ woman. Can't you see? It's the sort of thing life makes of us that counts; not the steps we take on the way. You--you know this, Con?"

"I know it, now, from the bottom of my soul."

It was one of Betty's quaint sayings that some lives were guided by flashlights, others by a steady gleam. Hers had always been by the former method. She made her pa.s.sage from one illumination to another with great faith, high courage, and much joyousness. After the night when Lynda made her see what her dear, dead baby had accomplished in his brief stay, she rose triumphant from her sorrow. She was her old, bright self again; she sang in her home, transfigured Brace by her happiness, and undertook her old interests and duties with genuine delight.