“You can’t, Lydia.  You’ll just have to reconcile yourself to a misunderstanding with him.”

“But I can’t live that way!” wailed Lydia.

“Well, you have the cottage.  He used to think he’d be perfectly happy if he owned that.”

“Oh, there’s a mortgage on the cottage!” exclaimed Lydia.  “Poor Daddy!  He wants to pay the mortgage with the lands.”

“It’s tough luck!  But there’s nothing for you to do, Lydia, but to stick to it.  Don’t weaken and things will come out all right.  See if they don’t.  And you’ve always got me.  And if I see they’re worrying you too much, I’ll make trouble for ’em.”

A vague, warm sense of comfort and protection was stilling Lydia’s trembling.  She rose and looked up into his face gratefully.  “I don’t see why you’re so good to me,” she said.

“Do you want me to tell you?” began the young man eagerly.

“No!  No!” Lydia began to move hastily toward the door.  “Don’t come home with me, Billy.  I’ll just run back alone.”

Billy’s face in the lantern light was inscrutable.  “I’ll obey to-night, Lydia,” he said, “but the time’s coming, when I won’t,” and he picked up the pitchfork he had dropped.

With the sense of comfort and protection sustaining her, Lydia went homeward under the winter stars.  Kent’s automobile was standing before the gate and Lydia’s heart sank.  It was the first time in her life she ever had been sorry at the thought of seeing Kent.

He was sitting before the base burner with her father and jumped up to help her take her coat off.  He greeted her soberly.

“Your father’s been telling me about your discussion, Lyd,” he said.  “You can’t mean to stick by your decision!”

Lydia sat down wearily.  “Oh, Kent, don’t you begin at me, too.”

“But I think I ought to, Lydia,” replied Kent, his voice dangerously eager.  “I don’t think any of your friends have a right to be quiet when you’re letting a silly scruple ruin your and your father’s future.”

“It certainly won’t ruin my future,” said Lydia.  “And I won’t let it ruin Dad’s.”

“Now look here, Lydia,” began Kent, “let’s begin at the beginning and sift this thing out.”

“But why?” groaned Lydia.  “You know exactly how I feel and why I feel it.  And I know how you feel.  We’ve been debating it for years.”

“Yes, but listen,” persisted Kent, and once more he began his arguments on the Indian question.

Kent had a certain eloquence of speech, yet Lydia, knowing all that he would say, gave little heed to his words while she watched his glowing face.

“Don’t you see?” he ended finally.

“I see how you feel, yes,” replied Lydia.  “But just because you can list what you call average American business deals that are crooked, you aren’t justified in being crooked, are you?”

Kent threw out his hand helplessly, and for a moment there was stance in the room, then he said,