no. What was it?"

"Mr. Ramsey come mighty near gettin' killed." The old woman enjoyed
deeply the dramatic pallor and distortion of the girl's face.

"Why--why--what do you mean?"

"Wal, if he hadn't a lammed one feller with a bucket he'd a been laid
out sure. So Richards says; as it is, it's the other feller that has the
head." She laughed to see the girl's face grow rosy again.

"Then--Mr. Ramsey isn't hurt?"

"Not a scratch! The funny part of it is, they've been going around here
for a week, quiet as you please. I wouldn't have known anything about it
only for Richards."

"Oh, isn't it dreadful?" said the girl.

"Yes, 'tis!" the elder woman readily agreed; "but why don't you ask what
it was all about?"

"Oh, I don't want to know anything more about it; it's too terrible."

Mrs. Richards was approaching the climax.

"It was all about you."

The girl could not realize what part she should have with a disgraceful
row in the barnyard of her uncle's farm.

"Yes, these men--they're regular tramps; I told Richards so the first
time I set eyes on 'em--they made a little free with your name, and Art
he overheard them and he went for 'em, and they both come at him, two
to one, and he lammed both out in a minute--so Richards says. Now I call
that splendid; don't you? A young feller that'll stand up for his girl
ag'in two big tramps----"

The Major had been motioning for Edith to drive on down toward the gate,
and she seized the chance for escape. Her lips quivered with shame and
anger. It seemed already as if she had been splashed with mire.

"Oh, the vulgar creatures!" she said, in her throat, her teeth shut
tight.

"There, isn't that a fine field?" asked the Major, as he pointed to the
cabbages. "There is a chance for an American imitator of Monet--those
purple-brown deeps and those gray-blue-pink pearl tints--What's the
matter, my dear?" he broke off to ask. "Are you ill?"

"No, no, only let's go home," she said, the tears coming into her eyes.

He got in hastily.

"My dear, you are really ill. What's the matter? Has your old enemy the
headache--" He put his arm about her tenderly.

"No, no! I'm sick of this place--I wish I'd never seen it! How could
those dreadful men fight about me? It's horrible!"

The Major whistled.

"Oh, ho! that's got around to you, has it? I didn't know it myself until
yesterday; I was hoping it wouldn't reach you at all. I wouldn't mind
it, my dear. It's the shadow every