ns dress and
talk is different from the way people outside dress and talk. It doesn't
make much difference about clothes, though, I guess you will want to be
as much like people over here as you can--"

"I don't know," interrupted the little girl shortly, "I ain't seed 'em
yit."

"Well," laughed Hale, "you will want to talk like them anyhow, because
everybody who is learning tries to talk the same way." June was silent,
and Hale plunged unconsciously on.

"Up at the Pine now you said, 'I SEED you when I was A-LAYIN on the
edge of the cliff'; now you ought to have said, 'I SAW you when I was
LYING--'"

"I wasn't," she said sharply, "I don't tell lies--" her hand shot from
his waist and she slid suddenly to the ground. He pulled in his horse
and turned a bewildered face. She had lighted on her feet and was poised
back above him like an enraged eaglet--her thin nostrils quivering, her
mouth as tight as a bow-string, and her eyes two points of fire.

"Why--June!"

"Ef you don't like my clothes an' the way I talk, I reckon I'd better go
back home." With a groan Hale tumbled from his horse. Fool that he was,
he had forgotten the sensitive pride of the mountaineer, even while he
was thinking of that pride. He knew that fun might be made of her speech
and her garb by her schoolmates over at the Gap, and he was trying to
prepare her--to save her mortification, to make her understand.

"Why, June, little girl, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. You don't
understand--you can't now, but you will. Trust me, won't you? _I_ like
you just as you are. I LOVE the way you talk. But other people--forgive
me, won't you?" he pleaded. "I'm sorry. I wouldn't hurt you for the
world."

She didn't understand--she hardly heard what he said, but she did know
his distress was genuine and his sorrow: and his voice melted her fierce
little heart. The tears began to come, while she looked, and when he put
his arms about her, she put her face on his breast and sobbed.

"There now!" he said soothingly. "It's all right now. I'm so sorry--so
very sorry," and he patted her on the shoulder and laid his hand across
her temple and hair, and pressed her head tight to his breast. Almost as
suddenly she stopped sobbing and loosening herself turned away from him.

"I'm a fool--that's what I am," she said hotly.

"No, you aren't! Come on, little girl! We're friends again, aren't we?"
June was digging at her eyes with both hands.

"Aren't we?"

"Y