had not met.

It seemed to Horace that his mother purposely looked away from him as he
tried to pull himself together, and answer nonchalantly that he believed
that Mrs. Latham was Sylvia's own mother, though she did appear very
young, and that of course she was acting the part of a Geisha girl, a
tea-seller, which would account for her sprightly manner, etc.,
unconsciously putting what he wished in the place of what he knew, adding
with a heartiness that almost made his voice tremble that Miss Sylvia
certainly did seem different, and as if she was no kin of her mother's.

"I guess, then, likely it isn't her step-mother, but that she's worried
in her mind about her beau," continued the loquacious woman, pleased at
having such a large audience for her news. "I heard some folks say,--when
I was waitin' about for my cream, and havin' a good look at all the
millionnaires, which they didn't mind, but seemed to expect, the same
bein' fair enough, seein' as it's what I paid to go in for,--that the
man they call Mr. Bell, that's been hangin' around the Bluffs since
spring, is courtin' her steady, but she can't seem to make up her mind.
Thinks I to myself, I don't wonder, for I've had a good look at him, and
he's well over forty, and though he dresses fine, from his eyes I
wouldn't trust him, if he was a pedler, even to weigh out my rags and
change 'em for tin, without I'd shook the scales well first. The same
folks was sayin' that he's a grass widower, anyway, and I shouldn't think
her folks would put up with that, fixed as they be, yet they do say," and
here her voice dropped mysteriously, "that Mrs. Latham's a kind of grass
widder herself, for her husband hasn't turned up in all the year she's
been here, and nobody's so much as seen his name to a check."

At this point Mrs. Bradford made an effort to turn the conversation into
other channels; for friendly as she always was with her neighbours of all
degrees, she never allowed unkind gossip in her house, and only a
newcomer would have ventured upon it. As it was, the loquacious one felt
the rebuke in the air, and made hasty adieus on the plea of having to set
bread, leaving the rest to talk to their host of themselves, their
pleasure at his return, and the local interests of Pine Ridge.

When they had all gone, Horace locked the back door, after filling an
old yellow and bronze glazed pitcher, which bric-a-brac hunters would
have struggled for, at the well, as he had done ev