Now, it is doubtful whether any woman ever loved a man without feeling fully assured that she, more than any other person, was better equipped to decide exactly what was best for that man.  Her woman’s intuition told Nan that Donald McKaye was not to be depended upon to conserve the honor of the McKaye family by refraining from considering an alliance with her.  Also, knowing full well the passionate yearnings of her own heart and the weakness of her economic position, she shrank from submitting herself to the task of repelling his advances.  Where he was concerned, she feared her own weakness—­she, who had endured the brutality of the world, could not endure that the world’s brutality should be visited upon him because of his love for her.  Strong of will, self-reliant, a born fighter, and as stiff-necked as his father, his yearning to possess her, coupled with his instinct for fair play, might and probably would lead him to tell the world to go hang, that he would think for himself and take his happiness where he found it.  By all means, this must be prevented.  Nan felt that she could not permit him to risk making a sorry mess of a life of promise.

Consumed with such thoughts as these, it was obvious that Nan should pursue but one course—­that is, leave Port Agnew unannounced and endeavor to hide herself where Donald McKaye would never find her.  In this high resolve, once taken, she did not falter; she even declined to risk rousing the suspicions of the townspeople by appearing at the general store to purchase badly needed articles of clothing for herself and her child.  She resolved to leave Port Agnew in the best clothes she had, merely pausing a few days in her flight—­at Vancouver, perhaps—­to shop, and then continuing on to New York.

On the morning of her departure, the butcher’s boy, calling for an order, agreed, for fifty cents, to transport her one small trunk on his cart to the station.  The little white house which she and her father had built with so much pride and delight, she left furnished as it was and in perfect order.  As she stood at the front door and looked back for the last time, the ticking of the clock in the tiny dining-and-living room answered her mute, “Good-by, little house; good-by,” and, though her heart was full enough, she kept back the tears until she saw the flag flying bravely at the cupola.

“Oh, my love, my love!” she sobbed.  “I mustn’t leave it flying there, flaunting my desertion in your dear eyes.”

Blinded by her tears, she groped her way back to the house, hauled down the flag, furled it, and laid it away in a bureau drawer.  And this time, when she left the house, she did not look back.

* * * * *

At the station, she purchased a ticket for Seattle and checked her trunk at the baggage-room counter.  As she turned from the counter and started for the waiting-room, she caught the interested eyes of old Hector McKaye bent upon her.  He lifted his hat and walked over to her.