The red glow of the fire made the woman's form by the hearth vividly distinct, and toward that Dick Travers went as if led by a gleam through a new and strange experience. He knelt by her side and, for a moment, buried his face against her clasped hands; then he looked up and she saw only intensified love and trust upon his young face. She waited for him to speak, her heart was choking her.
"You thought, dear, that I did not know—that I had forgotten? I wonder if any lonely, burdened little chap could forget—what came before you lifted the load and taught me to be a—child? Oh! she was so sweet; such a playfellow. I realize it now even though she has faded into something like a shadowy dream. But I recall, too, the loneliness; the fear that she might leave me alone with no one to care for me. I can remember her fear, too; always the fear that one of us might leave the other alone. The recollection will always stand out in my memory. I shall never forget her nor her sweetness. Afterward you came and my father. Only lately have I understood all of—that part of my life and yours—but I knew he was my father, and I wondered about you, because I could not forget—my mother!
"I learned to love you out of my great need and out of yours, too, I realize now, and slowly, far too early, I saw that the happiest thing I could do for you, who had given me so much, was to seem to forget and rest only on one thought—you were my mother! Can I make you understand, mother, what you are in my life—to-night?"
He kissed the cold hands clutching his hot ones, and with that touch the barrier broke down forever between them. Travers took her in his arms, but she did not burden his young strength as the earlier mother had done. Even in her abandon, they supported each other bravely.
The days that followed were busy ones. Dick's tutor came from New York, plans were laid, and there was small opportunity, just then, for the red-rock shrine.
"You see," Dick said to Ledyard one afternoon, "I've never voiced it before—it seemed presumptuous—but now that I'm going to have the life of a fellow, I can choose a fellow's career. I want, more than anything else, to be a physician."
Ledyard's eyes flashed, but he lowered his lids.
"It's a devil of a life, boy."
"I think it's the finest of all."