He wondered if this would endure.  He looked down at his wife leaning upon his knee, her face thoughtful and content.  He looked out over the valley once more, at those high, sentinel peaks thrusting up their white cones, one behind the other.  He heard the river.  He saw the foxglove swaying in the wind, the red flare of the poppies at his door.  He smelled the fragrance of wild honeysuckle, the sharp, sweet smells blown out of the forest that drowsed in the summer heat.

It was all good.  He rested in that pleasant security like a man who has fought his way through desperate perils to some haven of safety and sits down there to rest in peace.  He did not know what the future held for him.  He had no apprehension of the future.  He was not even curious.  He had firm hold of the present, and that was enough.  He wondered a little that he should suddenly feel so strong a conviction that life was good.  But he had that feeling at last.  The road opened before him clear and straight.  If there were crooks in it, pitfalls by the way, perils to be faced, pains to be suffered, he was very sure in that hour that somehow he would find courage to meet them open-eyed and unafraid.

THE END