itched ye. But let's go home ter the
mountings, ter yer mother, an' see ef she can't straighten out any
tangle yer feelin's hev got inter."

It needed only this--the allusion to her commonplace mother, the
recollection of the forlorn little mountain home, the idea of her
mother's insistent championship of Justus Hoxon--to bring the avowal
so long trembling on her lips.

"I won't! I ain't likin' ye nowadays, Justus Hoxon, nor fur a long
time past. I ain't keerin' nothin' 'bout ye."

There was something in her tone that carried conviction.

"Air ye in earnest?" he said, appalled.

"Dead earnest."

He gazed at her in the ever dulling light, that yet was clear enough
to show every lineament--even the long black eyelashes that did not
droop or quiver above her great blue eyes.

"Then thar's no more to be said." He spoke in a changed voice, calm
and clear, and she stared at him in palpable surprise. She had
expected an outburst of reproach, of beseechings, of protestation. She
had braced herself to meet it, and she felt the reaction. She was
hardly capable of coping with seeming indifference. It touched her
pride. She missed the tribute of the withheld pleadings. She sought to
rouse his jealousy.

"It's another man I like," she said, "better--oh, a heap better--than
you-uns."

"That's all right, then."

He wondered to hear the words so glibly enunciated. His lips seemed to
him stiff, petrifying. He looked very white about them. She did not
heed. She was angered, wounded, perplexed, by his acquiescence, his
calmness, his taciturnity. A wave of anxiety that was half regret
went over her. She felt lost in the turmoil of these complex emotions.
With that destructive impulse to hurl down, to tear, to strike, that
is an element of a sort of blind irritation, she went on tumultuously:

"He is a man ez hev got eddication, an' a place, an' a fine chance an'
show in life--it's--it's--yer brother Walter."

Her aim was true that time. Her shaft struck in the very core of his
heart: but the satisfaction of this knowledge was denied her. He
looked very white, it is true, but the pale moonlight was on his face;
and he only said in an undertone:

"Walter!"

She laughed aloud, a sort of mockery of glee. She had expected to
enjoy the revelation, and her laughter was an incident of the scene as
she had planned it.

"We war a-courtin' consider'ble o' the time whilst ye war off
electioneerin'," she said, with the side glance