When Virginia and Helen came up the path towards the Curtis home, they missed the little figure of Charles Augustus hobbling forth to meet them with joyous greetings.

“We’ll go to the front door,” suggested Helen. So they passed around the house and, ascending the steps, knocked at the weather-beaten front entrance.

“Come in,” cried the shrill voice of Charles Augustus. “I can’t open the door.”

Virginia obeyed the command of the child with a smile of delight. As she swung the door back, the pleasant odor of frying doughnuts assailed her nostrils. Looking through the rooms, she could see Mrs. Curtis in the kitchen, fork in hand, awaiting their entrance with a look of inquiry which melted into a smile of welcome as she recognized them.

In the midst of pillows, Charles Augustus sat in one chair with his legs propped up upon another. As usual, he was bright, cheerful and talkative.

Virginia turned towards the child and then she gave a little gasp of joy as a big fellow with black eyes and a wonderful smile lifted himself with a cane and limped towards her.

“Joe!” she trilled, her sparkling blue eyes revealing her heart’s rejoicing. “Joe!” she repeated, in a voice which breathed its own enchantment.

He was almost to her, his face alight with his happiness.

“Joe!” she whispered again, and gave a startled glance of astonishment as this huge fellow with dancing eyes stood upon one leg, balanced himself with his cane and thrust forth an encircling arm. Rooted to the spot, she could not evade it as it drew her to him and, with fascinated eyes and curious thrills, she watched his head bend slowly towards her.

“Joe”–this time it was the voice of his mother speaking–“Where did you meet Virginia?”

His head went up and his arm dropped at his side. Virginia released his arms which she had clutched and, with reddened, telltale faces, they turned to Mrs. Curtis.

“We met in South Ridgefield, mother,” he told her, and the girl gave an embarrassed nod of agreement.

“Hum,” said Mrs. Curtis. The utterance meant little but her manner much. She disappeared only to return in a moment with a plate of doughnuts and a pitcher of milk. “Who is hungry?” she asked.

Among the young people, famine stalked abroad. In its relief, flushed faces regained their normal color and Helen’s mischievous giggles were quieted sufficiently for her to meet Joe with becoming gravity before giving her attention to her own sweetheart.

But alas, the course of true love is never smooth. Charles Augustus made energetic protest when he became aware that Helen proposed to offer him nourishment by hand after the manner in which infants but recently weaned are treated. “Lemme be! My hands aren’t lame,” he objected. An unhappy look spread over his face. “I get so tired sitting in this old chair. Every little while, too, mother rubs my leg and works it up and down. Ding bust it, that hurts.”

Helen, giving up her attempt to feed the boy, endeavored to sooth and comfort him. “In a week or so you will be running about without a sign of a crutch. Think of that. Won’t that be fine?”

“I should be out now,” he grumbled. “Something might happen to my hornet’s nest.”

“Don’t you worry,” Helen laughed. “Neither man nor beast will interfere with that.”

“How is Miss Knight?” Virginia asked Joe.

“Bossy as ever,” he answered.

“She was a good nurse and she was nice to you, Joe.”

“Yes,” he admitted with a chuckle; “but she is a whole lot nicer to Mike Kelly these days.”

Virginia was all interest.

“He’s as pleased with her as a snow bird at a blizzard. Every time it was Miss Knight’s evening off, he would make an early call upon me dressed in his best clothes.”

There came a knock at the front door.

Hastening to it at a nod from Mrs. Curtis, Helen threw it wide open. Aunt Kate and Obadiah waited without.

“Daddy,” cried Virginia, for the moment blissfully forgetful as she tried to get around Joe without hurting his outstretched leg.

“Obadiah Dale!” It was Mrs. Curtis who spoke from the doorway into the dining room and there was something in her voice which held them all. The happiness had gone from her face, leaving it cold and distorted with passion as Virginia had seen it.

“Obadiah Dale!”–she fairly hissed the words–“What do you want in my house? Would you like to do me greater harm–you robber?” She gave a shrill mirthless laugh and flung her hands towards the sides of the poorly furnished room. “Look about you. There isn’t much left since you got in your devil’s work.”

Mrs. Curtis’s eyes shifted to Virginia as, startled by this strange attack upon her father, she waited at Joe’s side. It was as if the woman struggled between aversion and regard. “I never thought you were his daughter,” she snarled.

White, tense and sickened to the depths of her being by the fear of shameful disclosures, the girl could make no reply.

Joe Curtis was watching his mother with worried eyes. The frightened faces of Helen and Charles Augustus peeped from behind Aunt Kate who, from the subdued exclamations and the indignant glances she gave her brother, was expecting to hear the worst of him.

Clearly, Obadiah was amazed at the woman’s words. He stood irresolute, his throat working as if he were trying to swallow something. At last he regained the power of speech. “Madam,” he began.

“Madam,” sneered the woman, “Octavia Curtis, the widow of Augustus Curtis, the man whose business you ruined by your infernal scheming, whose wife and two children were dragged by your greed and selfishness from a life of comfort–to this. What business have you in my house, you thief?”

Obadiah flushed and quailed under her words. Bewildered and puzzled, a guilty conscience in business catastrophes made him feel it advisable to allow his opponent to develop her case.

Mrs. Curtis’s words affected Virginia differently. Her face flushed and her fears passed. “Stop,” she interrupted, her eyes flashing angrily. “What right have you to speak so to my father?”

“Right?” Again that ugly laugh came from Mrs. Curtis as she urged, “Ask him how he ruined the Curtis mill at Brenton.”

Obadiah gave a start.

Aunt Kate, observing her brother through suspicious eyes, noted this. “As ye sow, so shall ye reap,” she quoted, for his greater comfort.

The mill owner glanced hastily towards the door as if seeking a line of retreat from this assemblage of women and lame men. But Aunt Kate, the inner keeper of the outer gate, barred his way.

Pale of face but with a determined set to her mouth, Virginia said softly, “Daddy, explain please. You must Daddy.”

“It was a perfectly legitimate business deal. The Curtis mill had notes upon the market, protected by a mortgage on the plant. I purchased them. When they became due and were not paid, to protect myself–and you–I foreclosed and took the mill. I suppose this woman was caught in the deal,” Obadiah answered and moved as if to leave the room.

“Stop, Daddy,” the girl commanded. “We must settle this matter now. Either too much or too little has been said.”

“Settle?” Once more that acrimonious laugh came from Mrs. Curtis’s lips. “How are you going to settle for sleepless nights, for worry and for tears? What can pay for those dreary days which grew into weeks and months since hope for my children was torn from my life?” She flung her arms wide in the anguish which tortured her. “How are you going to wipe out the fact that my poor lame baby”–she pointed at Charles Augustus–“had to depend upon charity to be able to play as other boys–plain charity,” she almost screamed. “Or that he”–she indicated Joe–“has been forced into the world to struggle for an education he might have had in comfort.”

“Oh,” moaned Virginia. The misery of the story clouded her eyes as they turned from the passion-torn woman to her father.

The flood of the emotion-driven woman’s words seemed to have made Obadiah helpless. He stood as if awaiting sentence for his evil doing, an old man abject and forlorn.

As she looked at him, a wave of pity swept over Virginia and her love for him struggled in her heart, regardless of all that had been said against him. “My father can’t be to blame for all of this. I couldn’t believe it of him,” she cried.

It was as if the note of grief and entreaty in the girl’s voice tempered the anger of Mrs. Curtis. She dropped into a chair and began to sob. Joe Curtis arose hastily, limped over to her side, and tried to sooth her. At the sound of his mother’s grief, Charles Augustus put his head upon Helen’s shoulder and wept also.

Virginia moved over and gently touched the shoulder of the sobbing woman, who, flinching from contact with the girl’s hand, drew herself sharply away.

“Don’t, mother,” pleaded Joe.

Virginia withdrew her hand, yet she remained by Mrs. Curtis’s chair. “Tell me the whole story,” she begged. “I must know. I have the right to know.”

Even through her own grief, the anxiety and unhappiness of the girl touched the older woman. She raised her brimming eyes. Her temper had died away and she spoke rapidly, almost in a monotone, broken by sob hiccoughs. “At my husband’s death every thing that he left me was invested in our mill. It was a good business and should have given me and my boys the comforts and even the luxuries of life. Before his death, he had borrowed money to make improvements, giving notes secured by a mortgage upon the plant.

“After he had gone, I took charge of the mill and tried to run it myself. I was not a very good business woman. I had a hard time to pay the interest on our indebtedness. When the notes came due, I asked for a renewal but my request was refused. I was thunderstruck. I learned that your father had bought the notes, and wherever I tried to raise money I was refused because of his influence as a rival manufacturer. So I lost my mill and had to meet life, a widow with a baby and a young boy, a little money, and this old farm.”A flash of her anger returned and she pointed at Obadiah. “My boys are raised in poverty while he stands there in the pride of his wealth. When he got the mill he never used it. He closed it, throwing good people who had worked for us for years out of employment. They had to move away and sacrifice their little homes. It brought sorrow to them as well as to me. He, Obadiah Dale, is to blame for all of this.”

Aunt Kate wiped a tear from her eye.

“Daddy,” Virginia said softly, “did you know the harm that you were doing to all of these people?” Her eyes searched his, as if to discover his answer before he could utter it, and her tones beseeched him to justify her love at the altar of her heart.

Obadiah stiffened. He held up his head and returned the look of his daughter squarely. He knew that he was giving battle for her love, aye, even for her respect. The old man was a fighter. “No!” he cried. “It is unjust to charge me with all of the sorrows and tribulations of this family. I built the first mill in this country–took the chances of opening the industry. The Brenton mill was established to compete with me. There was room for one big plant here and only one. Augustus Curtis knew it and expected to put me out of business. Mrs. Curtis”–Obadiah’s voice was firm now–“you have said some hard things about me today in the presence of my daughter and sister. I am entitled in common justice to my defence. I started in business without a dollar. Much worse off, I think, than your husband. Business has been a battle of supremacy with me. I have taken hard licks and I have given them. I have fought my way. Remember, I had to. A man must win or lose in business and many are the weapons used. I struck with the first one at hand and hit the man in front of me. Do you blame a soldier for the suffering of the dependents of those he kills in battle? I think not. Mrs. Curtis,” he continued, “you never met me before.”

“No,” she admitted.

“How did you recognize me?”

“My husband pointed you out to me in South Ridgefield,” she sobbed.

“Did you ever advertise the fact that you were running that mill?”

“I was afraid to,” she moaned. “I used my husband’s name.”

“You see,” said Obadiah to Virginia. “I had no way of knowing that a woman was running the Brenton mill. I plead guilty to fighting men. When I get whipped I smile. When I put a man out of business he starts another. He doesn’t sit down and cry and blame me for what happens to his family ever afterwards. I never fought a woman in all of my life.”

“It’s true, Obadiah. You used to talk back but you never fought with me. I am afraid that you are going to have to get a camel through a needle’s eye; but you wouldn’t fight a woman,” interjected Aunt Kate.

Obadiah disregarded his sister’s fears and went on, “Did you ever hear of Dalton, the New York manufacturer?”

Mrs. Curtis nodded.“Five years ago, he started to put me out of business by buying up the small mills and pooling them against me. To protect myself, I bought negotiable paper, covering mills in this locality wherever I could get it. Where I could get control of the mills, I did it. They were my competitors and would have taken my business or combined against me gladly,” Obadiah’s eyes rested anxiously upon the face of his daughter as he concluded, “I was fighting Dalton, a more powerful man than myself, not widows and orphans.”

Virginia’s face had softened but there was yet a question in her manner.

“I am an old man,” Obadiah continued. “I find that my ideas are changing and my view of life shifting. I have believed that the accumulation of wealth was everything. I know now that the happy man must accumulate other things or he will find himself deserted and miserable with his gold. In my life I have been guilty of many wrongs. I would right those wrongs if I could. Will you forgive me, Mrs. Curtis, for unknowingly harming you and yours?”

“No,” she cried. “You explain your reasons for loosening the forces which injured me; but there is no regret in your heart. You’d do the same thing tomorrow.”

He turned to his daughter. “At least, you understand me, Virginia?”

“I know what you have done, Daddy; but Mrs. Curtis has suffered, and she alone can wipe the slate clean.” The girl’s face had saddened again, and as she spoke it was as if she had forgotten that there were others in the room. “Mother wouldn’t have wanted you to make all of this unhappiness. You brought sorrow and tears where she would have wanted you to carry laughter and joy. I can’t judge you fairly. How I have longed for you during the past weeks and how I have wanted to go home. Unless Mrs. Curtis can forgive you, Daddy, you haven’t found mother’s way to settle this matter.” She gave a queer strained little cry. “I can never go home with you, Daddy, until you learn to follow her way,” she sobbed, and dropped into a chair.

At the girl’s words, Mrs. Curtis had raised her eyes, and as she listened her face softened. As Virginia sank into the chair, the woman was beside her, petting and soothing her.

It seemed as if his daughter’s words had taken the very heart out of Obadiah. It was a haggard old man bowed low with trouble who watched her, the greatness of his longing written plain upon his lined countenance.

Suddenly Mrs. Curtis moved towards him. “Obadiah Dale”–she spoke so gently that it was hard to recognize her as the one who had so recently flung the accusations at him–“a moment ago I told you that I could not forgive you. I was wrong. Your daughter told you that it would have been her mother’s way to have brought laughter and joy to me instead of sorrow and tears. That which your daughter has done for my son, Charles Augustus, fills my heart with joy and brings laughter to my lips. She has followed her mother’s way. I can’t believe that any man altogether bad could be the father of such a daughter.” She held out her hand to him. “I forgive you.”

“When I was at the office of the Board of Health, yesterday, Virginia,” Joe announced, as one discussing a topic of great personal interest, “I was told that your father had agreed to keep the mill waste out of the river.”

There was a scream of delight, and a teary Virginia launched herself into her father’s arms, giving happy cries of endearment. In a moment she faced Mrs. Curtis, and cried, “He’s perfectly grand. He’ll do anything to right your wrongs.”

Mrs. Curtis smiled. “I think that we had better let your father forget my troubles for a moment,” she urged.

“Land sakes,” ejaculated Aunt Kate in a loud whisper, “I’m glad to see that woman laugh. I was afraid that she loved her troubles so much she wouldn’t give them up.”

“Hush, mother, she’ll hear you,” expostulated Helen.

Thus repressed, Aunt Kate delivered a moral lesson to Charles Augustus in a voice heard all over the room. “It is easier to receive thanks for doing nice things, Charles, than to have to beg forgiveness for doing mean ones.”

Fortunately Obadiah, diligently engaged at that moment in erasing the past, was deaf to his sister’s remarks. He told Mrs. Curtis, “I’ll re-open the Brenton mill as soon as I can have it overhauled. I can use it on some contracts I have. The profits shall be yours. When you can repay the amount of the notes from them, I’ll transfer the mill back to you. If you wish, I’ll buy it from you or rent it until your son is capable of assuming charge of it.”

He faced Joe and said, “I understand that you’ll graduate from college this June. There’ll be a position waiting for you in my mill.”

“In South Ridgefield?” Virginia inquired anxiously.

Obadiah gave his daughter a keen glance and then stared at Joe appraisingly before he answered. “Yes, in South Ridgefield, until his mother wants him to take charge of her own business. By that time, if he has brains and follows my plans for him, he should be the finest young mill executive in this part of the country.”

The youthful Charles Augustus came under the mill owner’s eye. “I’ll see that every expense connected with the operation upon this young man is paid. We don’t want outsiders in on that.”

He perceived Helen. “Well, well, how you have grown,” he declared in surprise. “You want to be a teacher. I’ll send you to college.”

“Goodness knows, Obadiah,” protested Aunt Kate, “a body would think it was Christmas.” She viewed him doubtfully. “I am afraid that you were always inclined to be a little extravagant.”

From the moment that his daughter embraced him, happiness had filled the soul of the mill owner. The difficulties of the past few days were forgotten. He beamed at his sister, generosity oozing from every pore. “Your house needs painting, Kate. I’ll have it done. I’ll sell that plug of a horse you have and buy you one that is broken or get you an automobile.”

“Stop right there, Obadiah,” she commanded. “I have managed my affairs for years without your help. When you talk about selling a horse like Archimedes, I doubt your judgment. Look there!” She pointed proudly through the window. “Who’d care to own a finer horse than that?”

Even as the assembled ones followed Aunt Kate’s finger, Archimedes, wearied by the prolonged call, gathered his feet beneath him and with a care for the shafts evidencing practice, sank to the ground. From this position of comfort, usually reserved by most well bred horses for the privacy of the box stall, Archimedes viewed his surroundings apparently with great complacency.