nner the
stereotyped remarks appropriate for such occasions.

She listened intently, with sudden, little glances from a momentarily
lifted gaze. He grew impatient at the absence of the flattering responses
to which he was largely accustomed. And, dropping abruptly his artificial
courtesy, he maintained a sullen silence, quickened his stride. He drew
some satisfaction from the observation that his reticence hurt her. Her
hands caught and strained together; she looked at him with a longer,
questioning gaze.

"I wanted to tell you," she said finally, with palpable difficulty, "how
sorry I am about ... about things; your home, and--and I heard of the
stage, too. It was a shame, you drove beautifully, and took such care of
the passengers."

"It was that care cost me the place," he answered with brutal directness;
"old Simmons did it; him and his precious Buckley."

She stopped with an expression of instant, deep concern. "Oh! I am so
sorry ... then it was my fault. But it's horrid that they should have done
that; that they should be able; it is all wrong--"

"Right nor wrong don't make any figure I've ever discovered," he retorted;
"Valentine Simmons has the power, he's got the money. That's it--money's
the right of things; it took my house away from me, like it's taken away
so many houses, so many farms, in Greenstream--"

"But," she objected timidly, "didn't they owe Mr. Simmons for things? You
see, people borrow, borrow, borrow, and never pay back. My father," she
proceeded with more confusion, "has lost lots of money in that way."

"I can tell you all about that," he informed her bitterly, proceeding to
mimic Simmons' dry, cordial tones, "'Take the goods right along with you,
pay when you like, no hurry between old friends.' Then, when Zebener
Hull's corn failed, 'I'll trouble you for that amount,' the skinflint
says, and sells Zebener out. And what your father's lost," he added more
directly still, "wouldn't take you on the stage to Stenton. Your father
and Simmons have got about everything worth getting in the county; they've
got the money, they've got the land, they've got the men right in their
iron safes. Right and wrong," he sneered, "it's money--"

"Oh! please," she begged, "please don't be so unhappy, so hard. Life isn't
as dreadful as that."

"It's worse," he declared somberly. They turned by Simmons' store, but
continued in the opposite direction from the one-time Makimmon dwelling.
They passed a hedg