CHAPTER

       I. The Curtain Rises on a Home

      II.  Richard Changes His Plans

     III.  While It Rains

      IV.  Pictures

       V. Richard Pricks His Fingers

      VI.  Unsustained Application

     VII.  A Traitorous Proceeding

    VIII.  Roses Red

      IX.  Mr. Kendrick Entertains

       X. Opinions and Theories

      XI.  “The Taming of the Shrew”

     XII.  Blankets

    XIII.  Lavender Linen

     XIV.  Rapid Fire

      XV.  Making Men

     XVI.  Encounters

    XVII.  Intrigue

   XVIII.  The Nailing of a Flag

     XIX.  In the Morning

      XX.  Side Lights

     XXI.  Portraits

    XXII.  Roberta Wakes Early

   XXIII.  Richard Has Waked Earlier

    XXIV.  The Pillars of Home

     XXV.  A Stout Little Cabin

CHAPTER I

THE CURTAIN RISES ON A HOME

None of it might ever have happened, if Richard Kendrick had gone into the house of Mr. Robert Gray, on that first night, by the front door.  For, if he had made his first entrance by that front door, if he had been admitted by the maidservant in proper fashion and conducted into Judge Calvin Gray’s presence in the library, if he had delivered his message, from old Matthew Kendrick, his grandfather, and had come away again, ushered out of that same front door, the chances are that he never would have gone again.  In which case there would have been no story to tell.

It all came about—­or so it seems—­from its being a very rainy night in late October, and from young Kendrick’s wearing an all-concealing motoring rain-coat and cap.  He had been for a long drive into the country, and had just returned, mud-splashed, when his grandfather, having taken it into his head that a message must be delivered at once, requested his grandson to act as his messenger.

So the young man had impatiently bolted out with the message, had sent his car rushing through the city streets, and had become a still muddier and wetter figure than before when he stood upon the porch of the old Gray homestead, well out in the edge of the city, and put thumb to the bell.

His hand was stayed by the shrill call of a small boy who dashed up on the porch out of the dusk.  “You can’t get in that way,” young Ted Gray cried.  “Something’s happened to the lock—­they’ve sent for a man to fix it.  Come round to the back with me—­I’ll show you.”

So this was why Richard Kendrick came to be conducted by way of the tall-pillared rear porch into the house through the rear door of the wide, central hall.  There was no light at this end of the hall, and the old-fashioned, high-backed settee which stood there was in shadow.