CHAPTER XII.
AUNTIE SUE TAKES A CHANCE.
So Brian wrote his book that winter.
When the days were fair, he worked with his ax on the mountain-side.

But his notebook was ever at hand, and many a thought that went down on the pages of his manuscript was born while he wrought with his hands in the wholesome labor which gave strength to his body and clearness to his brain.

In the evenings, he wrote in the little log house by the river, with Auntie Sue sitting in her chair beside the table,--the lamp-light on her silvery hair, and her sewing-basket within reach of her hand,--engaged with some bit of needlework, a book, or perhaps with one of her famous letters to some other pupil, far away.

The stormy days gave him many hours with his pen, and so the book grew.
And always as the man endeavored to shape his thoughts for the printed pages that would carry his message to the doubting, disconsolate, and fearful world that he knew so well, he heard in his heart the voices of the river.

From the hillside where he worked in the timber he could see the stream winding through the snowy hills like a dark line carelessly drawn with many a crook and curve and break on the sheet of white.