Carnac's Folly, Volume 1.

was rather crudely built, and it needed its grove of maples to make it pleasant to the

A woman rose to meet him. She was dressed in black. Her dark hair, slightly streaked with grey, gave her distinction. Her eyes had soft underst

ohn," she said in a g

"Yes, I'm home early,

iness, and I've bought

? But he's gone, and th

o marry a woman th

; the bright eyes stared and stared, and the lips

he ain't c

to do?" she asked

father-try to do me in the

that?" "Junia,

t? Who told her that?" aske

se, that child. I w

oice; his shoulders hunched; his hands were thrust down in his poc

s catching a bit of the city from t

ard he was here. I

y good," was the sad reply.

's a genius," s

know

o and f

Truth was, she did not wish him luck in this. She watched him leave by the French

is too full of independence. He wants nothing from anybody. He need

s progress, and broke into the space by the pear-tree where Carnac sat with palette

m, that even as a small child, to be in the same room for any length of time vexed him. Much of that had passed away. The independence of the life he lived, the freedom from resting upon the financial

eye. With his habit of visualization, he saw behind John Grier, as he came on now, the long procession of logs and timbers which had made his fortune, stretch back on the broad St. Lawrence, from the Mattawan to the Madawaska, from the Richelieu t

e. He's deser

h to say in reply, "At la

has h

day, and I hear he's

o told you that?" a

hale-she

knows a lot, but ho

t, and I belie

ou, his own father!" wa

uld be a lowd

than your not helping yo

son. The wilful, splendid character of the yout

th the faint brown moustache, the fine, showy teeth, the

as they might. Belloc and the others make difficult

ly. "Well, I've lost it, and it never was e

, eh? I always thought

rn

mes the brains of your brother. You're not like me, and you're not like your mother; there's something in you that means vi

in the young man's eyes, but at the sound of the m

her. I'm happy enough.

, and what's the good of it all? Have you ever thought of that? What's there in it for you or anyone else? Have you no blood and bones, no sting of life in you? Look what I've done

no good. I don't think money is the end of life. I don't think success is compensation for all you've done and still must do. I want to stand out of it. You've had you

't know for sure-you're twenty-five years

ng-to Heaven by and by!" T

ld of something that mat

hing-the thing I ought

ian's gone. I want you

ve

, I'll stay here in the business, and you can go to the Madawaska. Show me what to do here; tell me how to do it, and I'll

t on the roofs of the city; then turned to his fath