ownell," suggested Palmerston.

John looked at him blankly. "Why, of course he wouldn't lose anything;
I'd be the loser. But I haven't any notion of doing that. I'm only
wondering whether I ought to tell Emeline about the girl. You see,
Emeline's kind of impulsive, and she's took a dead set against the girl
because, you see, she thinks,"--John leaned forward confidentially and
shut one eye, as if he were squinting along his recital to see that it
was in line with the facts,--"you see, she thinks--well, I don't know as
I'd ought to take it on myself to say just what Emeline thinks, but I
think she thinks--well, I don't know as I'd ought to say what I think
she thinks, either; but you'd understand if you'd been married."

"Oh, I can understand," asserted the young man. "Mrs. Dysart's position
is very natural. But I think you should tell her what Miss Brownell
advises. There is no other woman near, and it will prove very
uncomfortable for the young lady if your wife remains unfriendly toward
her. You certainly don't want to be unjust, Dysart."

John shook his head dolorously over this extension of his moral
obligations.

"No," he declared valiantly; "I want to be square with everybody; but I
don't want to prejudice Emeline against the professor, and I'm afraid
this would. You see, Emeline's this way--well, I don't know as I'd
ought to say just how Emeline is, but you know she's an _awful good
woman_!"

John leaned forward and gave the last three words a slow funereal
emphasis which threatened his companion's gravity.

"Oh, I know," Palmerston broke out quickly; "Mrs. Dysart's a good woman,
and she's a very smart woman, too; she has good ideas."

"Yes, yes; Emeline's smart," John made haste to acquiesce; "she's smart
as far as she knows, but when she don't quite understand, then she's
prejudiced. I guess women are generally prejudiced about machinery; they
can't be expected to see into it: but still, if you think I'd ought to
tell her what this Brownell girl says, why, I'm a-going to do it."

John got up with the air of a man harassed but determined, and went out
of the tent.

The next afternoon Mrs. Dysart put on her beaded dolman and her best
bonnet and panted through the tar-weed to call upon her new neighbor.
Palmerston watched the good woman's departure, and awaited her return,
taunting himself remorselessly meanwhile for the curiosity which
prompted him to place a decoy-chair near his tent door, and exulting