"Hey? Oh, all right, all right. Stanhope's a fine youngster, but poor, poor."
He would lapse into silence, sucking his pipe, and watching Erie putting away the supper-dishes.
"He'll never find the Scroggie will," he would speak again. "He'll always be poor."
"But, Daddy," the girl would laugh, "we love each other. We are happy and real happiness is worth more than money, isn't it, dear?"
"Aye," he would answer. "Your mother and I were happy in that way. But she was taken away and all I had in her place was heart loneliness—but for you." Then she would kiss him softly and, stealing about her household tasks, sing him to fitful sleep as she moved quietly about the room.
Tonight as Hinter rode through the pine-scented gloom the light-house keeper sat in his big chair beside the window that looked upon the lake. Spent from a trying fit of coughing, his nerves crying for the rest which was denied him, the sick man had gazed across to where the shuttle of sunset was weaving its fabric of changing colors upon sky and water. But he had not seen those glad lights; had not heard the cries of the haven-seeking gulls or the soft plaintive notes of the night birds from the Point forest. The lights had flashed and departed unseen, the wild calls had been voiced and sunk to silence unheard, because a tenderer light, which had belonged to this, his own hour, had vanished; a sweeter song than even night birds could voice had been stilled—the light in his Erie's eyes and the low notes from her glad heart.
He knew why. She had told him. God, Destiny, Fate, had come between her and the man she loved. The man had lost more than life in playing the part of a man. He was blind! Behind him were only memories that could not be buried. Before him only darkness, bleakness, despair. And he had done an heroic thing in giving her up. Helpless, powerless to support her, what else was there for him to do? So, in his love for her, he had dug a grave and in it buried Hope and all that God in His wise ordinance had allowed him to live and feel. And they had kissed and parted, kneeling beside this grave, cold lips to cold lips, broken heart to broken heart. It was the kiss on the cross which each must carry.
So much had she told him, and the light had gone from her eyes, the song from her lips.
The sick man sank lower in his chair, his face working, his heart crying the same pleading cry as cried the heart of Rachel of old for her children—a cry understood only by the heart in which it was born—and God.
And so Hinter found him there before the window in the gloom, his thin hands clutching the arms of his chair, his white face sunk on his breast. "Landon, old friend, asleep?" he asked softly. No answer. Hinter struck a match and lit the lamp on the table. Then he touched the sleeper's arm; still he did not stir.