activities. If he had been hard worked before he became superintendent, he was now a driven slave, only that he drove himself and rejoiced in the driving. He was alert, intense, obsessed. Mr. ’Gene Carey, who had a long-drawn battle with the flu and regained his strength very slowly, commented regretfully upon it but did not see where he could help matters.

“I wish I could do more, myself, Luke,” he said remorsefully, when his daughter brought him down to the mill for the first time, gray of face and slow of foot. “But I’m a poor stick these days and that’s the Lord’s truth! And I miss old Ben, somehow ... the old fellow was as much a part of the Altonia as the walls and ceilings....” Weak tears filled his eyes. “Old fool—” he muttered, impatiently. “Think of old Ben sitting out there under[111] an orange tree, watching the well gush oil, and we need him so here!”

[111]

“We’re getting along all right, sir,” his lieutenant assured him. “You don’t see things neglected, do you?”

“No, no! I should say not! Never saw things kept up better in all the years— It isn’t that, Luke; you know it isn’t. I just don’t want you to kill yourself, boy, that’s all!”

Nancy Carey was sitting on the arm of her father’s old office chair, one plump, pale hand on his white head. “And I don’t want to have you kill yourself,” she added softly.

“Of course you don’t!” The old gentleman beamed, putting his arm about her. “Don’t want to see your old Daddy’s one and only right-hand man killed off, so he’ll have to work himself to death, do you? No, of course you don’t!” The light died out of his face and he sighed. “Well, I’ll be getting along home, Lady-bird! Old Doc’s right ... a little goes a long way with me now. But next week, Luke, I reckon I’ll be back on the job!”

The next week found him only slightly stronger, however, and Nancy, tyrannizing prettily over him, brought him down for only an hour a day, and presently his physician ordered him into the Canadian Rockies for two months.

Glen, who had secretly hoped that Luke’s promotion[112] would mean an upward step for her as well, kept her disappointment to herself. Of course, it didn’t matter, really; she wanted to be wherever she could help Luke most, but there would have been great pride and satisfaction in keeping the books of the Altonia. She knew she could do it acceptably; she had taken high marks in bookkeeping at business college. It hurt a 

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