Ah, and the fine spirit of her, the buoyant, proud, scornful spirit!  He stretched out his arms to her, drew closer, smiling as if she could meet and welcome his caress, and then remembered that this was a thing of canvas and paint—­a bright shadow; no more.

To the second picture he turned with a deeper hope, but his heart fell at once, for all he saw was an enlarged photograph, two mountains, snow-topped in the distance, and in the foreground, first a mighty pine with the branches lopped smoothly from the side as though some tremendous ax had trimmed it, behind this a ranch-house, and farther back the smooth waters of a lake.

He turned away sadly and had reached the door when something made him turn back and stand once more before the photograph.  It was quite the same, but it took on a different significance as he linked it with the two other objects in the room, the picture of his mother and the revolver box.  He found himself searching among the forest for the figures of two great grey men, equal in bulk, such Titans as that wild country needed.

West it must be, but where?  North or South?  West, and from the West surely that grey man at the Garden had come, and from the West John Bard himself.  Those two mountains, spearing the sky with their sharp horns—­they would be the pole by which he steered his course.

A strong purpose is to a man what an engine is to a ship.  Suppose a hull lies in the water, stanchly built, graceful in lines of strength and speed, nosing at the wharf or tugging back on the mooring line, it may be a fine piece of building but it cannot be much admired.  But place an engine in the hull and add to those fine lines the purr of a motor—­there is a sight which brings a smile to the lips and a light in the eyes.  Anthony had been like the unengined hulk, moored in gentle waters with never the hope of a voyage to rough seas.  Now that his purpose came to him he was calmly eager, almost gay in the prospect of the battle.

On the highest hill of Anson Place in a tomb overlooking the waters of the sound, they lowered the body of John Bard.

Afterward Anthony Bard went back to the secret room of his father.  The old name of Anthony Woodbury he had abandoned; in fact, he felt almost like dating a new existence from the moment when he heard the voice calling out of the garden:  “John Bard, come out to me!” If life was a thread, that voice was the shears which snapped the trend of his life and gave him a new beginning.  As Anthony Bard he opened once more the door of the chamber.

He had replaced the revolver of John Bard in the box with the oiled silk.  Now he took it out again and shoved it into his back trouser pocket, and then stood a long moment under the picture of the woman he knew was his mother.  As he stared he felt himself receding to youth, to boyhood, to child days, finally to a helpless infant which that woman, perhaps, had held and loved.  In those dark, brooding eyes he strove to read the mystery of his existence, but they remained as unriddled as the free stars of heaven.