My wife's 4th grade teacher awarded this book to my wife for her perfect attendance, with a note that the author lived around Fort Wayne. For whatever reason, the book sat on our shelf for all these years, unread. Because we recently visited Gene Stratton Porter's home, I decided to read the book.

What a straight-forward, sweet story, set within a simpler time around the late nineteenth century or the early twentieh century. It is a story about a young man, Freckles, orphaned as a baby, who knows nothing about his past. He is hired to stand guard and protect a lease allowing the harvest of native timber growing within the Limberlost Swamp. He is a young man of honor, integrity, and loyalty who can't be swayed to close a blind eye to his duty to protect the lease. Although ashamed of his disfigurement - he is missing his right hand - and his unknown heritage and past, he is of such a character that he is loved by almost everyone he meets. But he is unable to see past his handicap, and feels he is not worthy of love and respect. One day he meets 'The Angel' and falls deeply in love with her, but 'knows' he can never attain her love in return.