ould only stare, and
before he recovered enough to reply, she turned and beckoned Miss Slocum,
with the idea of completing the impression made, and showing with what
grace she could present him to her cousin.

But the lately acquired style was lost on him this time, overtopped by the
presence of Miss Lavina, who gazed at him with a prolonged and steady
stare.

"And this is your friend, Captain Leek, of the Northern Army, is it?" she
asked, in her very sharpest voice--a voice she tried to temper with a
smile about her lips, though none shone in her eyes. "I have no doubt you
will be very welcome to the camp, Captain Leek."

Mrs. Huzzard had surely expected of Lavina a much more gracious reception.
But Mrs. Huzzard was a bit of a philosopher, and if Lavina chose to be
somewhat cold and unresponsive to the presence of a cultured gentleman,
well, it gave Lorena Jane so much better chance, and she was not going to
slight it.

"Come right in; you must be dead tired," she said, cordially. "Mr. Max,
you'll let Dan know he's here, won't you--that is, when he does show up
again, but no one knows how long that will be."

"Yes, I am tired," agreed the captain, meekly, and not quite at his ease
with the speculative eyes of Miss Slocum on him. "I--I brought up a few
letters that arrived at the Ferry. I can't make up my mind to trust mail
with these Indian boatmen Dan employs."

"They are a trial," agreed Mrs. Huzzard, "though they haven't the bad
effect on our nerves that one or two of the camp Indians have--an awful
squaw, who helps around, and an ugly old man, who only smokes and looks
horrible. Now, Lavina--she ain't used to no such, and she just shivers at
them."

"Yes--ah--yes," murmured the captain.

"Lavina says she knew folks of your name back in Ohio," continued Mrs.
Huzzard, cheerfully, in order to get the two strangers better acquainted.
"I thought at first maybe you'd turn out to know each other; but she says
they was Democrats," and she turned a sharp glance toward him, as if to
read his political tendencies.

"No, I never knew any Captain Leek," said Miss Slocum, "and the ones I
knew hadn't any one in the Union Army. Their principles, if they had any,
were against it, and there wasn't a Republican in the family."

"Then, of course, that would settle Captain Leek belonging to them,"
decided Mrs. Huzzard, promptly. "I don't know much about politics, but as
all our men folks wore the blue clothes, and fought in