Crompton Place crept over him.  Amy would live there, of course, just as she did now, even if he should marry, as he might, and there came up before him the memory of a rainy night and a helpless little girl sitting on a mound of stones and dirt and crying with fear and pain.  He had seen Jack’s interest in Eloise with outward indifference, but with a growing jealousy he was too proud to show.  He admired her greatly, and thought that under some circumstances he might love her.  As a Crompton he ought to look higher, and if he proved to be the heir it would never do to think of her even if Jack were not in his way.  All this passed like lightning through his mind as he read the telegram and handed it to Jack, who, he insisted, should return with him to Crompton.

“I feel awfully shaky, and I want you there if anything happens,” he said, while Jack, whose first thought had been that he would be in the way, was not loath to go.

Eloise was in Crompton, and ever since he left it, a thought of her had been in his mind.

“If I find her as sweet and lovely as I left her, I’ll ask her to be my wife, and take her away from Mrs. Biggs,” he was thinking as the train sped on over the New England hills toward Crompton, which it reached about two P.M.

Peter was at the station with Sam, and to Howard’s eager questions answered, “Pretty bad.  No change since morning.  Don’t seem to know anybody except Mrs. Amy and Miss Eloise.  She’s with him all the time, and he tries to smile when she speaks to him.”

“Who?” both the young men asked in the same breath, and Peter told them all he knew of the matter during the rapid drive to the house.

Howard was incredulous, and made Peter repeat the story twice, while his brain worked rapidly with a presentiment that this new complication might prove adverse to him.

“What do you think of it?” he asked Jack, who replied, “I see no reason to doubt it,” and he was conscious of a pang of regret that he had not asked Eloise to be his wife before her changed circumstances.

“She would then know that I loved her for herself, and not for any family relations,” he thought.

He had no doubt that Amy was Col.  Crompton’s daughter, and if so, Eloise’s position would be very different from what it had been.

“I’ll wait the course of events, as this is no time for love-making,” he decided, as they drove up to the door, from which the doctor was just emerging.

“Matter of a few hours,” he said to Howard.  “I am glad you have come.  Evidently he wants to see you, or wants something, nobody can make out what.  You have heard the news?”

Howard bowed, and entering the house, ran up to his uncle’s room.  The Colonel was propped on pillows, laboring for breath, and trying to articulate words impossible to speak, while, if ever eyes talked, his were talking, first to Amy and then to Eloise, both of whom were beside him, Amy smoothing his hair and Eloise rubbing his cold hands.