The roses came early that June.  Truedale and Lynda went often on their walks to the little church nestling deep among the trees in the Jersey town.  They got acquainted with the old minister and finally they set their wedding day.  They, with Brace, went over early on the morning.  Lynda was in her travelling gown for, after a luncheon, she and Truedale were going to the New Hampshire mountains.  It was such a day as revived the reputation of June, and somehow the minister, steeped in the conventions of his office, could not let things rest entirely in the hands of the very eccentric young people who had won his consent to marry them.  An organist, practising, stayed on, and always Lynda was to recall, when she thought of her wedding day, those tender notes that rose and fell like a stream upon which the sacred words of the simple service floated.

“The Voice That Breathed O’er Eden” was what the unseen musician played.  He seemed detached, impersonal, and only the repeated strains gave evidence of his sympathy.  An old woman had wandered into the church and sat near the door with a rapt, wistful look on her wrinkled face.  Near the altar was a little child, a tiny girl with a bunch of wayside flowers in her fat, moist hand.

Lynda paused and whispered something to the little maid and then, as she went forward, Truedale noticed that the child was beside Lynda, a shabby, wee maid of honour!

It was very quaint, very touchingly pretty, but the scene overawed the baby and when the last words were said and Truedale had kissed his wife they noticed that the little one was in tears.  Lynda bent over her full of tenderness.

“What is it, dear?” she whispered.

“I-I want-my mother!”

“So do I, sweetheart; so do I!”

The wet eyes were raised in wonder.

“And where is your mother, baby?”

“Up-up-the hill!”

“Why, so is mine, but you will find yours-first.  Don’t cry, sweetheart.  See, here is a little ring.  It is too large for you now, but let your mother keep it, and when you are big enough, wear it-and remember-me.”

Dazzled by the gift, the child smiled up radiantly.  “Good-bye,” she whispered, “I’ll tell mother-and I won’t forget.”

Later that same golden day, when Kendall bade his sister and Truedale good-bye at the station he had the look on his face that he used to have when, as a child, he was wont to wonder why he had to be brave because he was a boy.

It made Lynda laugh, even while a lump came in her throat.  Then, as in the old days, she sought to recompense him, without relenting as to the code.

“Of course you’ll miss us, dear old fellow, but we’ll soon be back and”-she put her lips to his ear and whispered-“there’s the little sister of the Morrells; play with her until we come home.”

There are times in life that stand forth as if specially designed, and cause one to wonder, if after all, a personal God isn’t directing affairs for the individual.  They surely could not have just happened, those weeks in the mountains.  So warm and still and cloudless they were for early June.  And then there was a moon for a little while-a calm, wonderful moon that sent its fair light through the tall trees like a benediction.  After that there were stars-millions of them-each in its place surrounded by that blue-blackness that is luminous and unearthly.  Securing a guide, Truedale and Lynda sought their own way and slept, at night, in wayside shelters by their own campfires.  They had no definite destination; they simply wandered like pilgrims, taking the day’s dole with joyous hearts and going to their sleep at night with healthy weariness.

Only once during those weeks did they speak of that past of Truedale’s that Lynda had accepted in silence.

“My wife,” Truedale said-she was sitting beside him by the outdoor fire-“I want you always to remember that I am more grateful than words can express for your-bigness, your wonderful understanding.  I did not expect that even you, Lyn, could be-so!”

She trembled a little-he remembered that afterward-he felt her against his shoulder.

“I think-I know,” she whispered, “that women consider the effect of such-things, Con.  Had the experience been low, it would have left its mark; as it is I am sure-well, it has not darkened your vision.”

“No, Lyn, no!”

“And lately, I have been thinking of her, Con-that little Nella-Rose.”

“You-have?  You could, Lyn?”

“Yes.  At first I couldn’t possibly comprehend-I do not now, really, but I find myself believing, in spite of my inability to understand, that the experience has cast such a light upon her way, poor child, that-off in some rude mountain home-she has a little fairer space than some.  Con, knowing you, I believe you could not have-lowered her.  She went back to her natural love-it must have been a strong call-but I shall never believe her depraved.”

“Lyn,” Truedale’s voice was husky, “once you made me reconciled to my uncle’s death-it was the way you put it-and now you have made me dare to be-happy.”

“Men never grow up!” Lynda pressed her face to his shoulder, “they make a bluff at caring for us and defending us and all the rest-but we understand, we understand!  I think women mother men always even when they rely upon them most, as I do upon you!  It’s so splendid to think, when we go home, of the great things we are going to do-together.”

A letter from Brace, eventually, made them turn their faces homeward.  It was late July then.

     LYN, DEAR: 

When you can conveniently give me a thought, do.  And when are you coming back?  I hope I shall not shock you unduly-but it’s that little sister of the Morrells that is the matter, Elizabeth Arnold-Betty we call her.  I’ve got to marry her as soon as I can.  I’ll never be able to do any serious business again until I get her behind the coffee-urn.  She haunts me day and night and then when I see her-she laughs at me!  We’ve been over to look at that church where you and Con were married.  Betty likes it, but prefers her own folk to stray old women and lost kids.  We think September would be a jolly month to be married in, but Betty refuses to set a day until she finds out if she approves of my people!  That’s the way she puts it.  She says she wants to find out if you believe in women’s voting, for if you don’t, she knows she never could get on with you.  She believes that the thing that makes women opposed, does other things to them-rather unpleasant, unfriendly things.

     I told her your sentiments and then she asked about Con.  She says
     she wouldn’t trust the freest woman in the East if she were married
     to a slave-believing man.

     By all this you will judge what a comical little cuss Betty is,
     but all the same I am quite serious in urging you to come home
     before I grow desperate.

     BRACE.

Truedale looked at Lynda in blank amazement.  “I’d forgotten about the sister,” he said, inanely.

“I think, dear, we’ll have to go home.  I remember once when we were quite little, Brace and I, mother had taken me for a visit and left him at home.  He sent a letter to mother-it was in printing-’You better come back,’ he said; ’You better come in three days or I’ll do something.’  We got there on the fourth day and we found that he had broken the rocking chair in which mother used to put him to sleep when he was good!”

“The little rowdy!” Truedale laughed.  “I hope he got a walloping.”

“No.  Mother cried a little, had the chair mended, and always said she was sorry that she had not got home on the third day.”

“I see.  Well, Lyn, let’s go home to him.  I don’t know what he might break, but perhaps we couldn’t mend it, so we’ll take no chances.”

Truedale and Lynda had walked rather giddily upon the heights; the splendour of stars and the warm touch of the sun had been very near them; but once they descended to the paths of plain duty they were not surprised to find that they lay along a pleasant valley and were warmed by the brightness of the hills.

“It’s-home, now!” whispered Truedale as he let himself and Lynda in at the front door, “I wish Uncle William were here to welcome us.  How he loved you, Lyn.”

Like a flood of joy memory overcame Lynda.  This was how William Truedale had loved her-this luxury of home-and then she looked at Truedale and almost told him of the money, the complete assurance of the old man’s love and trust.  But of a sudden it became impossible, though why, Lynda could not have said.  She shrank from what she had once believed would be her crowning joy; she decided to leave the matter entirely with Dr. McPherson.

After all, she concluded, it should be Con’s right to bring to her this last touching proof of his uncle’s love and desire.  How proud he would be!  How they would laugh over it all when they both knew the secret!

So the subject was not referred to and a day or so later Betty Arnold entered their lives, and so intense was their interest in her and her affairs that personal matters were, for the moment, overlooked.

Lynda went first to call upon Betty alone.  If she were to be disappointed, she wanted time to readjust herself before she encountered other eyes.  Betty Arnold, too, was alone in her sister’s drawing room when Lynda was announced.  The two girls looked long and searchingly at each other, then Lynda put her hands out impulsively: 

“It’s really too good to be true!” was all she could manage as she looked at the fair, slight girl and cast doubt off forever.

“Isn’t it?” echoed Betty.  “Whew! but this is the sort of thing that ages one.”

“Would it have mattered, Betty, whether I was pleased or not?”

“Lynda, it would-awfully!  You see, all my life I’ve been independent until I met Brace and now I want everything that belongs to him.  His love and mine collided but it didn’t shock us to blindness, it awakened us-body and soul.  When that happens, everything matters-everything that belongs to him and me.  I knew you liked Mollie, and John is an old friend; they’re all I’ve got, and so you see if you and I hadn’t-liked each other, it would have been-tragic.  Now let’s sit down and have tea.  Isn’t it great that we won’t have to choke over it?”

Betty presided at the small table so daintily and graciously that her occasional lapses into slang were like the dartings of a particularly frisky little animal from the beaten track of conventions.  She and Lynda grew confidential in a half hour and felt as if they had known each other for years at the close of the call.  Just as Lynda was reluctantly leaving, Mrs. Morrell came in.  She was darker, more dignified than her sister, but like her in voice and laugh.

“Mollie, I wish I had told you to stay another hour,” Betty exclaimed, going to her sister and kissing her.  “And oh!  Mollie, Lynda likes me!  I’ll confess to you both now that I have lain awake nights dreading this ordeal.”

When Lynda met Brace that evening she was amused at his drawn face and tense voice.

“How did you like her?” he asked feebly and at that moment Lynda realized how futile a subterfuge would have been.

“Brace, I love her!”

“Thank God!”

“Why, Brace!”

“I mean it.  It would have gone hard with me if you hadn’t.”

To Truedale, Betty presented another aspect.

“You can trust women with your emotions about men,” she confided to Lynda, “but not men!  I wouldn’t let Brace know for anything how my love for him hobbles me; and if your Con-by the way, he’s a great deal nicer than I expected-should guess my abject state, he’d go to Brace and-put him wise!  That’s why men have got where they are to-day-standing together.  And then Brace might begin at once to bully me.  You see, Lynda, when a husband gets the upper hand it’s often because he’s reinforced by all the knowledge his male friends hand out to him.”

Truedale met Betty first at the dinner-the little family dinner Lynda gave for her.  Morrell and his wife.  Brace and Betty, himself and Lynda.

In a trailing blue gown Betty looked quite stately and she carried her blond head high.  She sparkled away through dinner and proved her happy faculty of fitting in, perfectly.  It was a very merry meal, and later, by the library fire, Conning found himself tete-a-tete with his future sister-in-law.  She amused him hugely.

“I declare,” he said teasingly, “I can hardly believe that you believe in the equality of the sexes.”  They were attacking that problem at the moment.

“I-don’t!” Betty looked quaintly demure.  “I believe in the superiority of men!”

“Good Lord!”

“I do.  That’s why I want all women to have the same chance that men have had to get superior.  I-I want my sisters to get there, too!”

“There?  Just where?” Truedale began to think the girl frivolous; but her charm held.

“Why, where their qualifications best fit them to be.  I’m going to tell you a secret-I’m tremendously religious!  I believe God knows, better than men, about women; I want-well, I don’t want to seem flippant-but truly I’d like to hear God speak for himself!”

Truedale smiled.  “That’s a common-sense argument, anyway,” he said.  “But I suppose we men are afraid to trust any one else; we don’t want to-lose you.”

“As if you could!” Betty held her small, white hand out to the dog lying at her feet.  “As if we didn’t know, that whatever we don’t want, we do want you.  Why, you are our-job.”

Truedale threw his head back and laughed.  “You’re like a whiff of your big mountain air,” he said.

“I hope I always will be,” Betty replied softly and earnestly, “I must keep-free, no matter what happens.  I must keep what I am, or how can I expect to keep-Brace?  He loved this me.  Marriage doesn’t perform a miracle, does it-Conning? please let me call you that.  Lynda has told me how she and you believe in two lives, not one narrow little life.  It’s splendid.  And now I am going to tell you another secret.  I’ll have to let Lynda in on this, too, she must help me.  I have a little money of my very own-I earned every cent of it.  I am going to buy a tiny bit of ground, I’ve picked it out-it’s across the river in the woods.  I’m going to build a house, not much of a one, a very small one, and I’m going to call it-The Refuge.  When I cannot find myself, when I get lost, after I’m married, and am trying to be everything to Brace, I’m going to run away to-The Refuge!” The blue eyes were shining “And nobody can come there, not even Brace, except by invitation.  I think”-very softly-“I think all women should have a-a Refuge.”

Truedale found himself impressed.  “You’re a very wise little woman,” he said.

“One has to be, sometimes,” came the slow words.  And at that moment all doubt of Betty’s serious-mindedness departed.

Brace joined them presently.  He looked as if he had been straining at a leash since dinner time.

“Con,” he said, laying his hand on the light head bending over the dog, “now that you have talked and laughed with Betty, what have you got to say?”

“Congratulations, Ken, with all my heart.”

“And now, Betty”-there was a new tone in Kendall’s voice-“Mollie has said you may walk back with me.  The taxi would stifle us.  There’s a moon, dear, and a star or two-

“As if that mattered!” Betty broke in.  “I’m very, very happy.  Brace, you’ve got a nice, sensible family.  They agree with me in everything.”

The weeks passed rapidly.  Betty’s affairs absorbed them all, though she laughingly urged them to leave her alone.

“It’s quite awful enough to feel yourself being carried along by a deluge,” she jokingly said, “without hearing the cheers from the banks.”

But Mollie Morrell flung herself heart and soul into the arranging of the wardrobe-playing big sister for the first and only time in her life.  She was older than Betty, but the younger girl had always swayed the elder.

And Lynda became fascinated with the little bungalow across the river, known as The Refuge.

The original fancy touched her imagination and she put other work aside while she vied with Betty for expression.

“I’ve found an old man and woman, near by,” Betty said one day, “they were afraid they would have to go to the poor-house, although both are able to do a little.  I’m going to put them in my bungalow-the two little upstair rooms shall be theirs.  When I run down to find myself it will be homey to see the two shining, old faces there to greet me.  They are not a bit cringing; I think they know how much they will mean to me.  They consider me rather immoral, I know, but that doesn’t matter.”

And then in early October Brace and Betty were married in the church across the river.  Red and gold autumn leaves were falling where earlier the roses had clambered; it was a brisk, cool day full of sun and shade and the wedding was more to the old clergyman’s taste.  The organist was in his place, his music discriminately chosen, there were guests and flowers and discreet costumes.

“More as it should be,” thought the serene pastor; but Lynda missed the kindly old woman who had drifted in on her wedding day, and the small, tearful girl who had wanted her mother.