Two women stood in deep conclave over by the Poteet
gate, and the subject of the council was a small bundle of flannel and
lawn displayed with evident pride by a comely young woman in a pink
calico dress. Seeing Rose Mary at the wall, they both smiled and
started in her direction, the bearer of the bundle stepping carefully
across the ditch at the side of the walk.

"Lands alive, Rose Mary, you never did see nothing as pretty as this
last Poteet baby," exclaimed Mrs. Plunkett enthusiastically. "The year
before last one, let me see, weren't that Evelina Virginia, Mis'
Poteet? Yes, Evelina Virginia was mighty pretty, but this one beats
her. I declare, if you was to fail us with these spring babies, Mis'
Poteet, it would be a disappointment to the whole of Sweetbriar. Come
next April it will be seven without a year's break, astonishing as it
do sound."

"It would be as bad as the sweetbriar roses not blooming, Mrs.
Poteet," laughed Rose Mary as she held out her arms for the bundle
which cuddled against her breast in a woman-maddening fashion that
made her clasp the mite as close as she dared.

"Yes, I tell you, seven hand-running is enough for any woman to be
proud of, Mis' Poteet, and it ought to be taken notice of. Have you
heard the news of the ten acres of bottom land to be given to him,
Rose Mary? That's what all the men are a-joking of Mr. Poteet about
over there at the store now. They are a-going to make out the deed
to-night. They bought the land from Bob Nickols right next to Mr.
Poteet's, crops and all, ten acres of the best land in Sweetbriar. I
call it a nice compliment. 'To Tucker Poteet, from Sweetbriar, is to
go right in the deed."

"'Tucker Poteet,' oh, Mrs. Poteet, have you named him for Uncle
Tucker?" exclaimed Rose Mary with beaming eyes, and the rapture of her
embrace was only modified by a slight squirm from the young heir of
all Sweetbriar.

"Well, I had had that name in my mind from the first if he come a boy,
but when Mr. Poteet got down to the store for some tansy, when he
weren't a hour old, he found all the men-folks had done named him that
for us, and it looked like we didn't have the chance to pass the
compliment. We ain't told you-all nothing about it, for they all
wanted Mr. Tucker to read it in the deed first."

"And ain't them men a-going to have a good time when they give Mr.
Tucker that deed to read? Looks like, even if it is some trouble, you
couldn't hardly begrudge Sweetbriar t