The sunset, bye and bye, and then the early shadows, crept up the trail behind the lonely woman plodding along; they seemed to swallow her, and only her quick breathing marked her going.

“I can pay—­at last!” She paused and spoke the words aloud.

“Pay back!”

Through the years since her return to The Gap she had saved and saved to return to Doris Fletcher the money advanced to buy the cabin.

Mary had never accepted it as a gift; the cabin could never be really hers until, by the labour of her hands, she had redeemed it.

What matter that her people called her “close” and mean?  She knew what she was about, but in her slow, silent way she had learned, while she laboured apart, to feel an undying gratitude to the woman who had made everything possible for her.

And now she was taking her place beside them who had been her friends.  No longer were they “foreigners.”  Surely Mary had come to realize that quality was not confined to places; it was in the heart and soul, and if anything threatened it, why, then——­ Here Mary drew herself up and raised her face to the stars.

She had tears in her eyes, but her mouth drew in a hard line.  She felt a burning curiosity rising in her consciousness.  What did it all mean?  What had it meant back in Ridge House long ago?

But as the burning rose higher and fiercer Mary battled with it.

It was their secret!  They must keep it—­even from her!  So would she pay though they might never know; must never know!  She would prove herself worthy of the trust they had placed in her; she would even the score and hold danger, whatever the danger was, back.  That should be her part to play!

When Mary reached the clearing on Thunder Peak she stood where Nancy had stood the day before and took in the scene.

Two or three times, after her return to The Gap, she had gone to The Peak and searched among the dirt and rubbish for any trace of old Becky.  She had come to believe, at last, that the woman was dead—­she had never been seen after the death of Sister Angela.

It was years now since Mary had given a thought to the deserted garden and cabin—­the clearing was at the trail’s end and no one ever took it, for it led nowhere.

But now, to Mary’s astonished eyes, the garden appeared almost as well planted as her own, and from the chimney of the tumble-down cabin a lazy curl of smoke rose.  Under the dark pine clump the outlines of a narrow mound could be plainly seen, and beside it lay a spade and a spray of withered azaleas.

Mary’s throat was dry and painful.  People to whom tears are possible never know the agony, but Mary was used to it.

Presently she walked across the open that lay between the edge of the forest and the cabin and stood by the threshold.

The door hung by one hinge, and through the gap Mary saw old Becky!  She had hoped against hope that what she had told Nancy might be true, but she was prepared for the worst.