hammers. Why, yesterday my heart
was tender because it thought to please her. Discretion! I've got no
discretion. I'm a brute. I murdered an innocent rabbit on my way to your
home--killed it just because I could; and what man is as innocent as a
rabbit? Yes, Alf, I am going to live."

"But you won't hate Guinea, will you? She couldn't help it."

"Oh, I couldn't hate her. No, I won't hate her; I'm going to stand by,
ready to give her my life whenever I think she needs it."

And thus we talked, senseless creatures, sighing in the dark. But so it
is with human life everywhere--a foolish chatter and in the dark a
sighing.

Several days passed and yet we were not summoned to appear at court. I
did not avoid Guinea, neither did I seek her. But often we were
together, sometimes alone, on the oak bench under the tree, at the
spring, on the old and smooth rock at the brink of the ravine; and her
smile none the less bright, was warmer with sympathy. A Sunday had gone
by and Alf had seen Millie, but she was riding to church with Dan
Stuart.

One evening Parker sent us word to be in Purdy early the next day. And
at dawn the next morning the buck-board stood ready for the journey.
Mrs. Jucklin had worked nearly the night through, baking bread and
roasting chickens to tide us over the trip. Alf complained at the load
we were expected to carry, and this grieved her. "You know there's
nothin' fitten to eat there," she said. "You know that Lum Smith stayed
there three days year before last and come home and was sick for a
month. Mr. Hawes, I appeal to you--make him take it."

And off we drove with our bread and roasted chickens. The women stood on
the step and shouted at us, and we waved our hands at them as we turned
a bend in the road. Ours was an important journey, and many of the
neighbors came out as we passed along and cried words of encouragement.
On a hill-top we heard the gallop of a horse, and out of a lane dashed a
girl--Millie. She smiled at us, nodded as her horse jumped, and gave us
a gleam of her white hand as she sped off down into the woods.

"They tell us that the Savior rode an ass," said Alf, "but we have seen
heaven gallop by on a horse." He stood up and gazed toward the woods.
Our horse gradually came to a standstill, but Alf stood there, gazing,
shading his eyes with his hand. "It ain't the sun that dazzles," he
said. "It's her smile."

"She'll make a poet of you, Alf."

"She could do more than that; sh