The little ones ?" No one was in sight around the ranch.

Never had it appeared more peaceful and pastoral to Jean.

The grazing cattle and horses in the foreground, the haystack half eaten away, the cows in the fenced pasture, the column of blue smoke lazily ascending, the cackle of hens, the solid, well-built cabins--all these seemed to repudiate Jean's haste and his darkness of mind.

This place was, his father's farm.
There was not a cloud in the blue, summer sky.
As Jean galloped up the lane some one saw him from the door, and then Bill and Guy and their gray-headed father came out upon the porch.

Jean saw how he' waved the womenfolk back, and then strode out into the lane.