lk over business matters
with me; no hand at all, and so I don't worry him. I just let him take
his own gait." And a very bad gait it was, if she had but known it,
poor woman!

No more was said about the land, the remainder of the day passed
pleasantly, and it was nearly night-fall when Mrs. Horton again
climbed into the wagon-seat and headed the horses toward home.
Good-bys had been exchanged when, suddenly, she drew in the restless
horses to say: "You tell old Joe, when he comes back, how that fire
got started; tell him that he must be more careful, these dry times,
how he lets such a lot of dry stuff get lodged against the house."
And, with that admonition, she was gone.

CHAPTER VIII

"BEST LAID PLANS"

Joe came home the next day, and his indignation, when Jessie told him
of the fire, and of the manner--presumably--in which it originated,
was nearly as scorching as the fire itself. Nothing in the whole
affair seemed to rouse his wrath to such a pitch as did her recital of
the theories that she and Mrs. Horton had evolved to account for the
threatened disaster.

"W'at sort of fool talk dat?" he inquired, contemptuously, when Jessie
had concluded.

"Why, Joe, the fire must have started in some such way!" Jessie
insisted.

"Honey, yo's done got a forgibbin' sperrit; yo' not only forgibs yo'
inimy, like what de Bible say fur ter do, but yo' eben furgits dat yo'
has one!"

"Oh, Joe! Surely you cannot think that it was the work of an
incendiary?"

"Ob a 'cindery? No, hit ain' dat."

"What do you think, then, Joe?"

"W'at I t'ink? Some low-down sneak sot hit afire. Dat's w'at I t'ink.
An' I wouldn' hab ter hunt long afore I done laid my han's on him,
neider." Jessie looked so shocked, and so cast down, that, chancing to
catch the old man's eye, I shook my head at him warningly. Joe
understood. His beloved master Ralph's tactics had been those of
silence and Joe was willing to follow them to the end. But he muttered
scornfully: "'Cindery? Dat a likely idee; w'en I nebber lef' a heap o'
stuff like dat ag'in' nobody's house en all my life! Look like I'd go
fur ter doin' hit now, w'en dish yer house hole my own fambly!"

He seated himself in the corner with a bit of harness that he had
brought up to the house to mend, in his hand, but presently he began
searching anxiously for some mislaid tool.

"What have you lost, Joe?" I asked.

"W'y I ain' right shore as I done los' anyt'ing, chile, but de nee