The Waterbury Democrat., 1938-01-20
CHAPTER XIV

I'm going home" Connie told Eloise a few days later. The words held an emptiness-for how could any place be "home," when Bret would not be there!
 Yet, it was because of Bret that she was leaving. He had scarcely looked at her these past few days, not once directly, deep into her eyes; he had had only the few ne- cessary words to say, He had meant it when he had said everything was over between them. Now the work in the camps office was lighter, so nearly was the bridge completed, that old Pop Walters could man. age without Comics help.
 There was a time" Eloise said, "when I would have been glad. But not now. You know shall hate to see you go; you know I'll miss you. "
 Connie said that she, too, would miss her friend. She was packing her few belongings into the imita- tion leather bag; its gilt letter K. B." did not look so bright, some how. But she would carry 1t. She would wear the navy blue suit and the perky little hat.
 No one, besides Bret, must know until she had returned, her true identity.
 Someone else will miss you, toe" /" EloiSe said, smiling her shy, quiet smile. There was no hurt in the grave eyes now. She had so come to love her friend that she could put aside her own hearts desire for her. Bret always had been her big brother; that he would remain, she knew.
 Connie shook her golden head. She could not trust herself to speak for a moment or two. She had stayed on, hoping that Bret would really forgive her, really un- derstand, that he would see she was the same girl with whom he had fallen in love, that all her millions did not matter But now, having failed, she could no longer bear to stay. On an impulse she had decided she must go at once.
 I do things on an impulse she thought bitterly; it had been an i'm pulse-a crazy, thrilling one-that had brought her here. It seemed fitting that another should take her away.
 "Ill catch the midnight train,' sho said to Eloise. Tt stops, when it's Jagged, at the junction. Bret won't know I've gone until morn ing. By then I'll be miles and miles away-as he claimed am, anyway in another world entirely different from this"
 "You shouldn't go without tell ing Brett" the other girl protested. You may have quarreled-I know something has gone wrong between you. But don't you know that old saying about true love? And yours and Bret's-is true, if any love ever was."
 You're a darling Eloise," Con- nie said softly She did not think she could have been as fine, had Bret loved someone else. The thought brought stab of pain. Bret might yet come to do that very thing. He might, in time, find that Eloise was the only girl in the world for him. His love might have been true, but it had not stood the test of cents and dollars, after all. He would not marry her because she had so much money. And all her life she had been afraid to &C., cept anyone, even Kidney, for fear he would be marrying her for her millions!
 Surely you'll leave some mes- sage for Bret" Eloise urged. When he finds you're gone, he'll ask me if you didn't leave message"
 Connie shook her head again. She snapped the lock on the bag. T don't believe he will" she said. But if he did!-her heart skipped beat that would mean he still cared a little. She must leave some word for him; something to let him know that she cared, too, and would forever and ever"
 If he asks" Connie said, tell him that I loved him because I didn't think he was afraid Of any thing. Tell him that wouldn't be If he had loved me enough-and that he has forgotten that love is the strongest, the biggest thing in the world. Bigger than all the hills or mountains, bigger than all the gold; bigger even than life itself"
 "Ill tell him-everything you said," Eloise promised. Her eyes were filled with slow tears. She did not understand all that her friend meant by the message. But she knew that love was the biggest thing in this world, perhaps in all the worlds to come.