Still, in the end, her honest soul knew that it was not help for herself she was seeking, but guidance for the children whose best interests she must serve.

And then, as one looks back over the path he has travelled while he pauses before going on, Doris Fletcher saw how the love of David Martin had been transformed for her sake into friendship that it might brighten her way. She had never been able to give him what he desired, but so precious was she to him--and full well she knew it--that he had become her friend.

Out of such stuff one of two things is evolved--a resentful man, or the most sacred thing, that can enter a woman's life, a true friend.

Martin had made a success of his profession; his unfulfilled hopes had seemed to broaden his sympathies instead of damming them.

As the clock struck nine Martin appeared at the doorway--a tall, ma.s.sive figure, the shoulders inclined to droop as though prepared for burdens; the eyes, under s.h.a.ggy brows, were as tender as a woman's, but the mouth and chin were like iron.

"David, it was good of you to come." Doris met him on the steps and led him to his favourite chair, drawn close to the blazing fire.

"To take any chance leisure of yours is selfish--but I had to!"

Martin took the outstretched hands and still held them as he sat down.

After all the silent years the old thrill filled his being.

"This is a great treat," he said in his big, kind voice. "I was just back in the office. I steered two small craft into port this afternoon--I need a vacation."

Doris recalled how this phase of Martin's profession always exhausted him, and she smiled gently into his eyes. Just then the tray she had ordered was sent up. He looked at it and his tired face relaxed; the deep eyes betrayed the boyish delight in the thought that had prompted the act.

"You must need me pretty bad to pay so high!" he said, watching Doris pour the thick cream into his cup of chocolate.

"I do, David, but really I'm not buying; I'm indulging myself. May I chatter while you eat? There are three kinds of sandwiches on the plate.

Take them in turn, they are warranted to blend." Then quite suddenly:

"David, it's about the children. They are over nine. What happens, physiologically, when children--girls--are--are nearly ten?"

"Deviltry, often. At nine they are too old to spank, too young to reason with--it's the dangerous age, at least the outer circle of the dangerous age." Martin tested the second sandwich.

"And the prescription? What do you prescribe for the dangerous age?"

Doris felt that it was best to edge toward the vital centre by circuitous routes.

"Barrels and bungholes or what stands for barrels and bungholes--a good school where a mixture of discipline with home ideals prevail. I know of several where giddy little flappers are marvellously licked into shape without danger of breaking. I've felt for some time that your kids needed--well, not love and care, surely, but a practical understanding."

"Why didn't you tell me, David?"

"People never appreciate what they do not pay for. Now that you have offered up this tribute to the animal of me, I know you are ready for the other."

"The other, David?"

"Yes, the best of me. That always belongs to you."

This was daring, and it sent Doris to cover while she caught her breath.

David calmly ate on. After the sandwiches there was a bit of fruit cake made from the recipe handed down from the days of Grandfather Fletcher.

"David, do you think mothers, I mean real mothers, have divine intuitions about their children? Intuitions that, well, say, adopted mothers never have?"

"No, I don't. The majority of mothers are vamps. They think they have a strangle hold on their offspring; a right to mould or bully them out of shape. The best school I know is run by a woman who says it takes her a year to shake off the average mother; after that the child becomes an individual and you can get a line on it."

"That's startling, David. It's hard, too, on mothers."

"Oh! I don't know. I often think if mothers could be friends to their children, _real friends_, I mean, and not claim what no human being has a right to claim from another, they'd reap a finer reward. I'd hate to love a person from duty. The fifth commandment is the only one with a promise. It needs it! What is the stuffing in this third sandwich, Doris? It comes mighty near perfection."

"I never give away the tricks of my trade, David! And let me tell you, you are mighty like a sandwich yourself--light and shade in layers; but I reckon you are right about the friend part in mothers. Then, too, I think an adopted mother has this to her credit--she doesn't dare presume."

"No, often she bullies. She thinks she paid for the right. After all, the best any of us can do for a child is to set it free; point out the channels and keep the lights burning!"

"David, you are wonderful. You should have had children." The tears were in Doris's eyes.

"Oh! I don't know--I'd have to have too many other things tacked on. All children are mine now, in a sense."

David pushed the tray away and leaned luxuriously back in his chair.

"Now," he said, with his peculiar smile that few rarely saw, "let's have it! The skirmish is over."

Then Doris told him--feeling her way as she poured her confession into the ears of one who trusted her so fully and who asked so little. She saw his startled glance when she, beginning with Meredith's death, struck the high note of the real matter. Martin was not resenting her past reticence, but he was taken off his guard, and that rarely happened to him.

Once, having controlled his emotions, he was placid enough. He noted the outstretched hands in Doris's lap and estimated her weariness and her need of him. After all, those were the big things of the moment. In Martin's thought any act of Doris's could easily be explained and righted. He did not interrupt her, he even saw the humour of her account of the scene with Thornton, years before, when she presented both children to his horrified eyes. Martin shook with laughter, and that trivial act did more to strengthen Doris than anything he could have done. It relieved the tension.

"How did you manage to create the impression, among us all, that these children are twins?" Martin, seeing that Doris had finished with the vital matter, turned to details. "I cannot recall that you ever said so--and there seems to be no reason why they should be twins."

"That's it, David, there never was a reason, really, and I did not intend, at first, to give the impression--I simply said nothing. Things like this grow in silence until they are too big to handle. It was the telling of plain half-truths that did the mischief--and letting the conclusions of others pa.s.s. Of course I did not hesitate with George Thornton, he mattered; the others did not seem to count--no one but you, David. I have felt I wronged your faith, somehow."

Martin, at this, began to defend Doris.

"Oh, I don't agree to that. It was entirely your own affair. You wrote to me while you were away about Meredith. I realized how cut up you were, and G.o.d knows you had reason to be. Until you needed me, I don't see but what you had a right to act as you saw fit about the children."

"David, I always need you. It is because I need you so much that I have decency to keep my hands off!"

Martin's brows drew close, his mouth looked stern, but he was again controlling the old, undying longing to possess the only woman he had ever loved, and shield her from herself!

Then he gave his prescription:

"Doris, get rid of Mary. Find a proper place for her and forget whatever doubts you may have. Remember only her years of service; she gave the best she had. Then send the children to Miss Phillips'. Of course, you must write to Thornton. Tell him as much or as little as you choose.

He's rightfully in the game. We're all three playing with a dummy." How Doris blessed Martin for that "we three!" He had come into the game and, once in, Martin could be depended upon.

"You've run amuck among accepted codes," he was saying with that curious chuckle of his, "and yet, by heaven! you seem to have established a divinely inspired one for the kids."

"You think that, David? You are not trying to comfort me?"

Martin got up. He seemed suddenly in a hurry to be off. He had given what he could to meet Doris's need--given it briefly, concisely, as was his way.

Doris brought his coat and held it for him--her face lifted to his with that yearning in her eyes that always unnerved him. It was the look of one who must offer an empty cup to another who thirsted. Then she spoke, after all the silent years:

"David, I have always loved you, but I am beginning to understand at last about love. I had not the 'call' in my soul. Merry had it, the mountain mother had it--but it never came to me. Without it, I dared not offer to pay the cost of marriage. That would have been unjust to you. I did realize that, but the deeper truth has only come recently. I wonder if you can understand, dear, if I say now, even _now_, that I would be glad for you to marry and be happy--as you should be?"

"Doris, I counted that all up years ago. It did not weigh against you!"

Martin's voice was husky.