She looked after them, yearning.  Although they were so far, she could see them plainly in the thin mountain air.  They were running mostly, once in a while stopping to throw a stone or look up into a tree.  Then they scampered on like squirrels, the fox-terrier bounding ahead.

* * * * *

Now they were at the top where the road turned.  Perhaps, after all, they would remember and glance back and wave their hands to her.

* * * * *

Now they had disappeared, without a backward look.

* * * * *

She continued gazing at the vacant road.  It seemed to her that the children had taken everything with them.

* * * * *

A gust of icy wind blew down sharply from the mountain, still snow-covered, and struck at her like a sword.  She turned and went back shivering, into the empty house.

PART I

CHAPTER III

OLD MR. WELLES AND YOUNG MR. MARSH

An Hour in the Life of Mr. Ormsby Welles, aet. 67

     March 15, 1920.
        3:00 P.M.

Having lifted the knocker and let it fall, the two men stood gazing with varying degrees of attention at the closed white-painted old door.  The younger, the one with the round dark head and quick dark eyes, seemed extremely interested in the door, and examined it competently, its harmoniously disposed wide panels, the shapely fan-light over it, the small panes of greenish old glass on each side.  “Beautiful old bits you get occasionally in these out-of-the-way holes,” he remarked.  But the older man was aware of nothing so concrete and material.  He saw the door as he saw everything else that day, through a haze.  Chiefly he was concerned as to what lay behind the door. . . .  “My neighbors,” he thought, “the first I ever had.”

The sun shone down through the bare, beautiful twigs of the leafless elms, in a still air, transparent and colorless.

The handle of the door turned, the door opened.  The older man was too astonished by what he saw to speak, but after an instant’s pause the younger one asked if Mr. and Mrs. Crittenden were at home and could see callers.  The lean, aged, leather-colored woman, with shiny opaque black eyes, opened the door wider and silently ushered them into the house.

As long as she was in sight they preserved a prudent silence as profound as hers, but when she had left them seated, and disappeared, they turned to each other with lifted eyebrows.  “Well, what was that, do you suppose?” exclaimed the Younger.  He seemed extremely interested and amused.  “I’m not so sure, Mr. Welles, about your being safe in never locking your doors at night, as they all tell you, up here.  With that for a neighbor!”