ained," said the Harvester. "It was decided on very
suddenly, and rather sadly, on account of the death of Mrs. Jameson. I
forced Ruth to marry me and come with me. I grow rather frightened when
I think of it, but it was the only way I knew. She absolutely refused my
other plans. You see before you a wild man carrying away a woman to his
cave."

"Don't believe him, Doctor!" laughed the Girl. "If you know him, you
will understand that to offer all he had was like him, when he saw my
necessity. You will come to see us soon?"

"I'll come right now," said the doctor. "I'll bring my wife and arrive
by the time you do."

"Oh no you won't!" said the Harvester. "Do you observe the bed of
this wagon? This happened all 'unbeknownst' to us. We have to set up
housekeeping after we reach home. We will notify you when we are ready
for visitors. Just you subside and wait until you are sent for."

"Why David!" cried the astonished Girl.

"That's the law!" said the Harvester tersely. "Good-bye, Doc; we'll be
ready for you in a day or two."

He leaned down and held out his hand. The grip that caught it said all
any words could convey; and then Betsy started up the hill.

CHAPTER XIII. WHEN THE DREAM CAME TRUE

At first the road lay between fertile farms dotted with shocked wheat,
covered with undulant seas of ripening oats, and forests of growing
corn. The larks were trailing melody above the shorn and growing fields,
the quail were ingathering beside the fences, and from the forests on
graceful wings slipped the nighthawks and sailed and soared, dropping
so low that the half moons formed by white spots on their spread wings
showed plainly.

"Why is this country so different from the other side of the city?"
asked the Girl.

"It is older," replied the Harvester, "and it lies higher. This was
settled and well cultivated when that was a swamp. But as a farming
proposition, the money is in the lowland like your uncle's. The crops
raised there are enormous compared with the yield of these fields."

"I see," said she. "But this is much better to look at and the air is
different. It lacks a soggy, depressing quality."

"I don't allow any air to surpass that of Medicine Woods," said the
Harvester, "by especial arrangement with the powers that be."

Then they dipped into a little depression and arose to cross the
railroad and then followed a longer valley that was ragged and unkempt
compared with the road between cultivated f