The breeze that ruffled the awnings stirred the thin, gray hair of John Barrett, brought fresh scents of sawdust and sweeter fragrance of seasoning lumber. And [Pg 8]fainter yet came the whiff of resinous balsam from the vast fields of logs that crowded the booms.

[Pg 8]

With that picture backing him in the frame of the open window—mutilated trees, and mills yowling in chorus, and with the scent of the riven logs bathing him—the timber baron politely waited for the young man to speak. He had put off the brusqueness of his business demeanor, for it had not occurred to him that the principal of the Stillwater high school could have any financial errand. He played a little tattoo with his eye-glasses’ rim upon the second button of his frock-coat. One touch of sunshine on Barrett’s cheek showed up striated markings and the faint purpling that indulgence paints upon the skin. The way in which the shoulders were set back under the tightly buttoned frock-coat, the flashing of the keen eyes, and even the cock of the bristly gray mustache that crossed the face in a straight line showed that John Barrett had enjoyed the best that life had to offer him.

“I’ll make my errand a short one, Mr. Barrett,” began Wade, “for I see that others are waiting.”

“They’re only men who want to buy something,” said the baron, reassuringly—“men who have come, the whole of them, with the same growl and whine. It’s a relief to be rid of them for a few moments.”

Frankly showing that he welcomed the respite, and serenely indifferent to those who waited, he brought a box of cigars from the desk, and the young man accepted one nervously.

“I think I have noticed you about the city since your school closed,” Mr. Barrett proceeded. And without special interest he asked, whirling his chair and gazing out of the window at the mills: “How do you happen to be staying here in Stillwater this summer? I supposed pedagogues in vacation-time ran away from their schools as fast as they could.”

[Pg 9]

[Pg 9]

If John Barrett had not been staring at the mills he would have seen the flush that blazed on the young man’s cheeks at this sudden, blunt demand for the reasons why he stayed in town.

“If I had a home I should probably go there,” answered Wade; “but my parents died while I was in college—and—and high-school principals do not 

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