Ben, suffering a division of mood, went outside, and led his horse to a livery stable to get him grain and water. Then he bethought himself of his own needs, though hunger seemed far from him. But he headed toward a restaurant. The hour was near sunset. A cool wind came down from the hills. Wild geese were honking overhead.

* * * * *

Dusk had fallen over the Tule Lake basin when Ben Ide rode into the lane that had once known the imprint of his bare feet. Over the distant range a brightness attested to the rising of the moon. Halfway down the lane, in the shadow of a clump of trees, Ben halted his horse and proceeded to walk.

The smell of freshly plowed earth filled the cool air. A sadness, fitting the gloaming hour, pervaded the level land.

All Ben’s boyhood flooded back in swift memories. It seemed long past. None of it could ever return. He was an outcast, sneaking home in the absence of his father. Yet with the shame of it burned a righteous wrath. Somehow the fault had not been all his.

As he turned off the lane toward a gate, indistinct in the shade, the figure of a girl approached him noiselessly.

“Ben?” she called, in shrill whisper.

“Yes, I’m here,” he replied.

She ran into his arms and held him closely, crying low and incoherently. He returned the embrace instinctively. Of course it was his sister. But she was tall, a woman grown, firm and strong of build, and a stranger, except in her voice.

“Why, Hettie!” he whispered, deeply touched.

“Oh, Ben—I’m just—glad to see you,” she replied, moving back from him yet clinging to his arm. “How big you are! It was good of you to come—at once. I owe that Nevada cowboy something. He’s nice…. Ben, I want you to slip in with me and see mother. She’s alone. But somebody might come any minute. You and I can talk afterward. I hope the surprise will not hurt mother. But I just believe it’s what she needs. Come. You’re clumsy, Ben, and your spurs jingle.”

“Hettie, I can’t get over how tall you are,” whispered Ben, permitting himself to be led under the dark trees toward the lighted window of the kitchen. They reached the porch. She cautioned him not to make noise. How tightly she gripped his hand! Ben’s heart throbbed high. The past flashed back stingingly—the many times he had come home in the dark, after a day of running wild against his father’s command, to be protected by his mother. His feet seemed leaden and his spurs clanged. Hettie opened the door. The kitchen was empty. Ben slipped in behind her. Nothing had changed. His father’s new riches were not proclaimed in this homely kitchen. The ticking of the old clock suddenly seemed to smother him. It had ticked like that when his little brother Jude lay dying. So many years ago!

Then Hettie turned toward him in the bright light, her face pale, her eyes bright, a prayer on her lips.