As the winter closed in—it was one of the open, keen, out-of-door winters which have done their share to make the dwellers on the great central plateau of Kentucky so sturdy a race of men—the Thorpe automobile was seen less frequently on the road to Storm. Kate smilingly accused Jemima of neglecting her for the furthering of her social campaign.

"A social campaign in Lexington? How absurd!" shrugged Jemima; to her mother's amusement.

It was difficult to keep pace with the development of Jemima.

"To tell the truth—I did not mean to speak of it until later—but we are finishing a book!"

"'We'?" laughed Kate.

"Yes. James has been at work on it in a desultory way for a number of years, and I am very busy looking up references, and verifying quotations, and prodding. You know scholarly men are inclined to be—procrastinating."

(The word "lazy" was to Jemima's thinking too great an insult to be applied to any one for whom she cared.)

"Is it a novel, with you in it?" demanded Jacqueline, eagerly, with unconscious wistfulness. Once she herself had hoped to be the heroine of a novel; and she surreptitiously read all the book reviews she could lay hands upon to see whether Channing had been able to finish it without her.

"A novel—pooh! It is a treatise on the Psychology of the Feminist Movement; and I think," added Jemima complacently, "that it will be more salable than James' previous works."

"I have no doubt of it," murmured her mother. "But just what is this Feminist Movement I read so much about nowadays, dear? Votes, and strongmindedness in general?"

Jemima looked at her mother, thoughtfully. "If you but knew it, you yourself are a leader in the Feminist Movement. It is seeing such women as you denied the ballot that has made most of us suffragists."

"Good Heavens! Are you that?" gasped her mother.

"All thinking women are 'that' nowadays," replied Jemima, reprovingly. "Besides, it's very smart."

Shortly after the book in question made its appearance, Jemima arrived at Storm one day quite pale with excitement. "It's come," she cried, "it's come at last! James has been offered the Presidency of ——" (she named a well-known Eastern university) "and he's already found a substitute for Lexington, and we're going on at once!"

"To live?" cried Jacqueline.

"Of course! Isn't it splendid? Oh, I've seen it coming ever since that lecture tour, and the book clinched matters."

Jacqueline embraced her sister in unselfish delight. "Think of it—'Mrs. President'! And all the young professors kowtowing, and the nice undergraduates to dance with—and what a wonderful place to live! Dear old Goddy! Oh, I am glad. That famous college! Why, it's perfectly amazing!"

"Nice, of course, but hardly amazing," corrected Jemima, herself once more. "James is a very brilliant man, you know. I always expected recognition for him. He should have had some such position long ago. But he had no knowledge of how to—take advantage of opportunities."

Kate found her voice at last. "I congratulate you, dear," she said quietly—a tribute which the other accepted with a simple nod, as becomes true greatness.

And then, suddenly and quite unexpectedly to herself, the face of the triumphant Mrs. Thorpe crumpled up into a queer little mask of distress, and she flung herself into her mother's arms and wept aloud.

The others tried to console her, weeping too. Mag's baby, dozing in front of the fire, sensed the general grief and lifted up her voice in sympathy. Big Liza, attracted by the commotion, learned the cause of it and added herself to the group with loud Ethiopian howls of dismay. The housemaid came running; and soon it was known throughout the quarters and at the stables that Miss Jemmy was going far away to live, and would never come back any more. There had not been such excitement of gloom at Storm since Basil Kildare was brought into the house dead.

It was, characteristically, Jemima herself who quelled the tides of emotion she had started.

"We mustn't be f-foolish," she gulped, mopping her eyes impartially with her mother's sleeve and Liza's apron. "It isn't as if I was af-afraid to go and live among strangers—I'm used to it. B-but I can't help wondering how you all will manage to get along without me!" The tears flowed again.—"You're such a helpless person, Mother!"

This to the Madam, the famous Mrs. Kildare of Storm! Jacqueline gasped at the irreverence.

But for once Kate was not tempted to smile at the girl's egotism. She was already foretasting the dreariness of life without the critical, corrective, and withal stimulating presence of her elder child.

The Thorpes' going, after a last Christmas together at Storm, left Kate and Jacqueline more than ever dependent upon each other. If Philip had been more exacting as a husband, he might well have complained of his wife's constant attendance on her mother in those days. But he was so far from complaining that it was at his suggestion Jacqueline formed the habit of taking her midday meal at Storm.

It was the first real breaking of ties in Kate's little family, and he knew his lady well enough to realize that her cheerful, quiet exterior concealed a very lonely heart just then. So lonely, indeed, that Kate more than once considered the idea of asking Philip and Jacqueline to come and live with her at Storm, for she missed her old-time confidential talks with Philip almost as much as she missed Jemima.

But Philip was spared at least that test of devotion.

"Young birds to their own nest," she reminded herself, sighing.

Occasionally she sent for Philip as in the old days, for the purpose of discussing business or parish matters. He always came, schooling himself to the manner that might be expected of an affectionate son-in-law, but usually managing to bring Jacqueline with him. She was puzzled and a little hurt by his new intangible reserve. She could not quite understand the change in him, and decided with some bitterness that he had lost interest in her now that she had given him what he wanted of her—namely, Jacqueline. That, she reminded herself, was the way of the world. She who knew men should not have been surprised.

And Jacqueline made up to her as best she could for Philip's defection. She had gone back lately to the ways of her little girlhood, loved to sit at Kate's feet in front of the grate fire, or even in her lap—no small accomplishment, for she was almost as tall a woman as her mother—listening while Kate read aloud, interrupting her frequently with caresses, making love to her as only Jacqueline could. Kate laughed at her for what she called her "mommerish" ways; but she found them very sweet, nevertheless. It was as if the girl were trying to be two daughters in one, and a faithless Philip to boot.

Kate, too, had gone back to old ways that winter, and occupied her hands with much sewing for Mag's baby. She had been, in the days before larger affairs took up so much of her time, a tireless needlewoman, and knew well the mental relaxation that comes to those who occasionally "sit on a cushion and sew a fine seam." She explained smilingly that she was preparing for old age, when nothing would be expected of her but to make clothes for her grandchildren; and meanwhile Mag's baby reaped the benefit.

Small Kitty had grown apace, a placid, dimpled little creature, who stayed with great docility wherever she was put, content to amuse herself with her ten fingers, or the new accomplishment of blowing bubbles out of her mouth. In all characteristics she was so different from what her own two strenuous, exacting babies had been that Kate marveled anew at the power of heredity.

"I wish you'd let me have her!" said Jacqueline one day, renewing an old complaint. "You don't love her half so much as I do, and anyway you've had three of your own."

Kate smiled to herself, and did not make the obvious answer. Instead she said, "It was to me Mag gave her, dear, to be made a 'lady' of."

"Poor Mag! Do you think you can ever do it?"

"I don't know," admitted Kate, rather helplessly. A year ago she would have said "Yes" with confidence; but the year had done much to shake her faith in her own ability. "At least I shall make a useful woman of her, which is more to the point."

Only once any sign had come out of the oblivion which had engulfed Mag Henderson. It was a little cheap string of gilt beads, addressed to Mrs. Kildare and accompanied by a scrap of paper which read:

For little Kitty, so she kin have somethin' purty to remember her mama by.