The source of this manuscript lies in tragedy. My possession of it is purely adventitious. That I have had it long you may know, for it came to me at an inland prairie town, far removed from water or mountain, while for ten years or more my name, above the big-lettered dentist sign, has stood […]

“Good-night.” A lingering of finger tips that touched, as by accident; a bared head; the regular tap of shoes on cement, as a man walked down the path. “Good-night–and God bless thee,” he repeated softly, tenderly, under his breath, that none but he might hear: words of faith spoken reverently, and by one who believes […]

Iowa City is not large, nor are the prospects for metropolitan greatness at all flattering. Even her most zealous citizen, the ancient of the market corner, admits that “there ain’t been much stirrin’ for quite a spell back,” and among the broad fraternity of commercial travellers, the town is a standing joke. Yet, throughout the […]

Nobody in a normal humor would dispute the fact that Clementine Willis was a strikingly handsome girl. One might even be moved, by a burst of enthusiasm, to declare her beautiful. There was about her that subtle, elusive charm of perfection in minute detail, possible only to the wealthy who can discriminate between art and […]

CHAPTER I–SANDFORD THE EXEMPLARY Ordinarily Sandford is sane–undeniably so. Barring the seventh, upon any other day of the week, fifty-one weeks in the year, from nine o’clock in the morning until six at night–omitting again a scant half-hour at noon for lunch–he may be found in his tight little box of an office on the […]

I A new settlement in a new country: no contemporary mind can conceive the possibilities of future greatness that lie in the fulfilment of its prophecy. A long, irregular quadrangle has been hewn from the woods bordering the north bank of the Ohio River. Scattered through the clearing are rude houses, built of the forest […]

I “Steve!” It was the girl who spoke, but the man did not seem to hear. He was staring through the window, unseeingly, into the heart of his bitter foe, Winter. He sat silent, helpless. “Steve!” At last he awoke. “Mollie!–girlie!” An hour had passed since he left the doctor’s office to reel and stagger […]

I In a room, half-lighted by the red rays of a harvest moon, a woman lay in the shadow; face downward, on the bed. It was not the figure of youth: the full lines of waist and hip spoke maturity. She was sobbing aloud and bitterly, so that her whole body trembled. The clock struck […]

A beautiful moonlight night early in September, the kind of night one remembers for years, when the air is not too cold to be pleasant, and yet has a suggestion of the frost that is to come. A kind of air that makes one think thoughts which cannot be put into words, that calls up […]

Springtime on the prairies of South Dakota. It is early morning, the sun is not yet up, but all is light and even and soft and all-surrounding, so that there are no shadows. In every direction the gently rolling country is dotted brown and white from the incomplete melting of winter’s snows. In the low […]

I Calmar Bye was a writer. That is to say, writing was his vocation and his recreation as well. As yet, unfortunately, he had been unable to find publishers; but for that deficiency no reasonable person could hold him responsible. He had tried them all–and repeatedly. A certain expressman now smiled when he saw the […]

“For they have sown the wind, andthey shall reap the whirlwind.” CHAPTER I–PRELUDE Silence, the silence of double doors and of padded walls was upon the private room of the down-town office. Across the littered, ink-stained desk a man and a woman faced each other. Threads of gray lightened the hair of each. Faint lines, […]

I Dense darkness of early morning wrapped all things within and without a square, story-and-a-half prairie farm-house. Silence, all-pervading, dense as the darkness, its companion, needed but a human ear to become painfully noticeable. Up-stairs in the half-story attic was Life. From one corner of the room deep, regular breathing marked the unvarying time of […]