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BEACHED KEELS

turmoil that otherwise would come to a timely end.'"

"Hm!"—he pondered. "It seems her father may not need so much information as we supposed. She fails as an actress," he thought with joy. Then he took the liberty of closing the book and putting it away in the scholar's drawer, where Helen should not see the odious words. He sat thinking. "Old Lehane was not the worst person she must be saved from," he concluded.

Through the battered door she entered, her face streaked with tears. She went swiftly to the foot of the stairs, then turned, fled to him, and for an instant stood with her hands on his shoulders and her tousled head pressed against him.

"Oh, Hugh," she whispered. "He is a good man. And so were you to tell me. The little boy is to be—we agreed—up there by Arthur's cross. It's little enough, is n't it? He is a good man."

She hurried from him and up the stairs. When her door had closed, Archer turned to the window, and stood looking out.