ged widow had been hired, at a
fabulous price, to come and do the most of the work for them, thus
releasing Flaxen from the weight of the hard work, which perhaps was
all the worse for her. Hard work might have prevented the unbearable,
sleepless pain within. She hated the slatternly Mrs. Green at once for
her meddling with her affairs, though the good woman meant no offence.
She was jocose in the broad way of middle-aged persons, to whom a
love-affair is legitimate food for raillery.

But Gearheart's keen eye was on Flaxen as well. He saw how eagerly she
watched for the mail on Tuesdays and Fridays, and how she sought a
quiet place at once in order to read and dream over her letters. She
was restless a day or two before a certain letter came, with an eager,
excited, expectant air. Then, after reading it, she was absent-minded,
flighty in conversation, and at last listlessly uneasy, moving slowly
about from one thing to another, in a kind of restless inability to
take continued interest in anything.

All this, if it came to the attention of Anson at all, was laid to the
schooling the girl had had.

"Of course it'll seem a little slow to you, Flaxie, but harvestin' is
comin' on soon, an' then things'll be a little more lively."

But Gearheart was not so slow-witted. He had had sisters and girl
cousins, and knew "the symptoms," as Mrs. Green would have put it. He
noticed that when Flaxen read her letters to them there was one which
she carefully omitted. He knew that this was the letter which meant the
most to her. He saw how those letters affected her, and thought he had
divined in what way.

One day when Flaxen, after reading her letters, sprang up and ran into
her bedroom; her eyes filled with sudden tears, Gearheart crooked his
finger at Ans, and they went out to the barn together.

It was nearly one o'clock on an intolerable day peculiar to the Dakota
plain. A frightfully hot, withering, and powerful wind was abroad. The
thermometer stood nearly a hundred in the shade, and the wind, so far
from being a relief, was suffocating because of its heat and the dust
it swept along with it.

The heavy-headed grain and russet grass writhed and swirled as if in
agony, and dashed high in waves of green and yellow. The corn-leaves
had rolled up into long cords like the lashes of a whip, and beat
themselves into tatters on the dry, smooth spot their blows had made
beneath them; they seemed ready to turn to flame in the pit