LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER I

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      Eden was sitting in the library of the old house where she had lived all her life. She was going over some papers in the big library desk. Her father had asked her to give special attention to them as soon as she would get home from his funeral service and be alone.

      She had eaten quietly and conscientiously of the delicious supper that the devoted sorrowing servants had lovingly prepared for her. She had tried to keep a cheerful face during their ministrations and then had told them that she wouldn't need them anymore to-night and they must go to their beds and rest, for they had had a hard day. They had blessed her for her thoughtfulness and gone off to finish the few remaining household duties. Then they went silently to their rooms.

      At least they had seemed to go, though they had not all gone to sleep. One of them did not even go to her room but was still alert for Eden's movements. The old nurse, Janet, who had been a part of the household menage ever since Eden was born, did not even pretend to retire. She merely sat down in the servants' dining room and waited with a listening ear for her young lady. Her sharp bright eyes were hiding quick tears that she had not dared to shed before the others, and her kindly old lips that carried and would cherish to the end a Scotch accent from the old country were quivering with pain for the young girl left so alone in the world that had always been so satisfyingly filled with the presence of a tender father. Tabor, too, was sitting in the upper hall within hearing. So Eden was not really alone.

      But Eden, having waited for this moment ever since her father had breathed his last on earth, thought she was alone now. She drew a sigh of relief and went over to the desk, taking out the small key that hung on a slender chain concealed about her neck.

      It seemed almost as if her father had a rendezvous with her. She knew he had planned it during those last few days of his illness, after his accident, when he knew that his hours were numbered. It was the thought of this last farewell message from her father that had kept her up during the hard hours after he was gone. It was as if she were under orders and had not time to mourn for him yet, because he had left her something to do. He had said it would be something that would make it easier for her to go on.

      Eden was very young to have to meet a crisis like this: the shock of an accident that resulted in the death of her only near and dear one, from whom she had almost never been separated. For she could scarcely remember her mother. Her father had been both mother and father to her. With old Janet to minister to her bodily needs, Eden had lived a happy, carefree life.

      And so she sat alone, with old Janet out beyond hall and pantry and kitchen, on sorrowful, unsuspected guard.

      Eden fitted the small key into the lock of the drawer to which her father had often directed her attention, turned it, and opened the drawer. Catching her breath a little, as one who understands a momentous thing is about to happen, she looked within.

      And there, right on the top, was a folded paper bearing her name, in her father's beloved hand. For an instant it almost seemed as if she were looking upon that dear dead countenance that they had just laid to rest in the old cemetery. And then she remembered what he had said to her about this moment, and how when she unlocked that drawer she would find his last words to say good-bye and comfort her.

      She closed her eyes for a brief instant and then put out her hand for the paper and drew it toward her, handling it as one touches a very precious treasure.

      Softly, carefully, she unfolded it. It was not long but very clearly written, somewhat like the letters he had written her during his few brief business absences from home, but her eyes lit with pleasure as she recognized the old sweet greeting "Dear little lass." That had always been his dearest way of addressing her, even since she had grown into lovely girlhood.

      She held the paper closer and settled back to draw comfort from her father's last words. There was an earnest look of eagerness upon her young face.

      It was just at that moment that the door opened silently and someone came into the room. He stepped so inaudibly that at first she did not sense his entrance.

      Then suddenly with an inner sense she realized that she was not alone, and looking up she saw him.

      He was a handsome young man with a very engaging smile, nicely camouflaging a flippant sneer on the lips that were not turned to gentleness.

      She had not seen him for three years, but she had never liked

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