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256 crying. She wants to go home," he said, and my heart sank for I knew I had played my last card and lost.

That night Will had brought home the long-looked-for good news of a position for Oliver. We discussed it quietly at dinner—the three of us with Madge crying upstairs. A friend of Will's, a civil engineer, had said that if Oliver cared to go down into South America to some God-forsaken spot in the Argentine Republic—no place for a woman, by the way—there was an engineering job down there waiting for somebody. The job would take some five or six months; there might or might not be any future—Will's friend couldn't say.

"I'll go. I'll go right off," said Oliver. "Madge is unhappy and wants to go home anyway. I'm sure it's best. It was all a mistake," he admitted sadly to Will, "my taking her away from Glennings Falls. I might have known it wouldn't work." I stared hard at a saltcellar. Will began carving the steak silently. "You can go ahead now and have your people here for Commencement," observed Oliver; "Madge and I will both be gone in a week. I'm relieved it's settled," he added gravely.

It was during our dessert, after Delia had taken up a tray to Madge, that I was told that Mrs. Vars wanted me in her bedroom. I excused myself and slipped upstairs quietly. Madge was in bed; her hair was parted, braided neatly down her back; her tears were dried; her plain little nightgown buttoned at her throat. I had never seen her look so pretty. Her dinner stood beside her bed untouched.

"You wanted me?" I asked.