Perhaps his plans would have carried smoothly, and by tomorrow everything would have been straightened out and the business safe. Surely then there could have been found somebody who would have taken over the store for a while till Dad got well. But no! He must not even think of that! Mother must never suspect; Dad must never know what he had given up. Dad would have felt even worse than he did about it. Dad was ambitious for him. Dad would have wanted him to be connected with this great matter!

His father was under opiates and in the hands of a capable nurse from the city. Alan could only tiptoe silently up to the door of the sickroom and peer anxiously into the cool, dim shadows. That sleeping form with the closed eyes, the strange, unnatural breathing, how it stabbed his heart. Of course, he could not have gone off to a desert and left his father like that.

Perhaps it was his need of being reassured after he had visited his father that led his footsteps out across the lawn and down the next street to the Washburn house. His mother did not need him. He had tucked her into her bed for a nice nap, kissed her, patted her, and told her not to worry. He had a strange lost feeling, like the first time he went to kindergarten all alone. So he wandered to his friend’s house.

Sherrill was at the piano, playing, the lamplight falling from the tall shaded lamp on her head and shoulders, bringing out the glint of gold in her hair, the delicate curve of her cheek and chin, the exquisite molding of her slim shoulders. He stood a moment and watched her wistfully. How sweet she was, and wise. What would she have advised him to do? Would she have said he must stay? But of course she would. He could not think of himself even asking her. He would not want her to think there had been any other thought in his mind for an instant, than to stick by his father. And yet— She was young! She was sane! Perhaps he had been over sentimental! He longed to hear her say it. Yet he could never ask her. The only person he could feel like asking was God, and he felt that he already knew what God would have him do.

She had stopped playing now and was wheeling a big chair up to the light. He drifted up to the open window and called her.

“Sherry, come out in the hammock and talk to me.”

She came at once, in her pretty white dress, standing in the doorway, poised for a second, while she called to her mother:

“Only out in the hammock, dearest. I shan’t be long. Alan is here!”

They sat down in the big, capacious swinging seat under the sweet-smelling pines and talked.

Sherrill had had letters from two of the girls. Priscilla Maybrick was in the Catskills having a wonderful time, and Willa Barrington had gone with an aunt to Atlantic City. They talked for a while about the comparative merits of seashore and mountains, and then a silence fell between them, a pleasant silence such as brings no embarrassment between good friends.

“Had a letter from old Hodge today,” said Alan nonchalantly, as if it were a matter of small moment. Somehow he had to let it out to someone, and Sherrill Washburn was safe and sane.

“You did!” said Sherrill interestedly. “What did he have to say? Is he still in that suburb of New York? Keith heard he had resigned.”

“Why no, he isn’t there,” Alan said. “He did resign. Hadn’t you heard? He’s a high mucky-muck in an expedition to Egypt.