longer merits consideration on the
ground of his fatherhood."

"Well, my boy," said Rogers, kindly, "I advise patience an' prudence;
but ef the wust comes to the wust, an' he begins to act mean to the
gal, you'll do right to tek her away. I'll holp you all I kin;
leastways, I'll wink et whut you do. Betsy's too fine a gal--bless her
sweet face--to be made onhappy jes' bekaze her ole daddy's et up with
spitefulness ag'in you an Parson Stone."

Rogers, knowing his wife's old feeling against the Gilcrests--a feeling
compounded of envy on account of the superior social position of the
family at Oaklands, jealousy on account of the friendship between her
husband and Hiram Gilcrest, and resentment against Gilcrest's treatment
of Stone--did not give her an account of his encounter with Gilcrest,
but merely told her that Betsy and Abner loved each other, that her
father did not favor the match, and that he had forbidden Betsy to have
anything more to say to the young man.

"Reckon Hirum an' Jane expaict a dukedom or a king ter marry ther gal,"
remarked Mrs. Rogers, scornfully. "Abner not good 'nough! He's wuth the
whole kit an' bilin' o' Gilcrests an' Temples; an' ef Betsy lets 'em
threaten an' coax or skeer her inteh breakin' her word to him, she
hain't the gal I tek her to be. But, pore thing! she must be havin' a
hard time. An' who'd 'a' thought uv them two a-lovin' each othah lak
thet? Come to think on it, though, it's a wondah I hain't suspicioned
'em foh this; but, la! they're both so young. Abner hain't more'n
twenty-four or twenty-five, an' Betsy hain't but two yeah oldah'n our
Cissy."

"You furgit, Cynthy Ann, thet Betsy's ez old or oldah then you wuz when
you fust begun to mek eyes et me," observed Mason, with a droll smile.

"La, now, I wouldn't wondah ef Cissy didn't know all about Abner an'
Betsy right 'long; her'n' Betsy wuz allus so thick," commented Mrs.
Rogers, ignoring her husband's remark.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE BAR SINISTER

Not even to Mason Rogers could Abner bring himself to mention Hiram
Gilcrest's most insulting insinuation; but the memory of that base
epithet, bastard, cut deeper and deeper into the young man's soul.
"What could the vicious old man possibly have heard or imagined about
my history to lead him to utter so foul a charge?" he thought again and
again. "'A bastard who has no right to the name he bears,' those were
his very words. I wonder I did not throttle him then and there