n almost abashed note in his deep voice,
"we'll dispense with the lilacs--they're not needed as retainers, and
I don't deserve them."

"But being good will bring you the lilacs of life; whether you think
you deserve them or not, I'm afraid it's inevitable," answered Rose
Mary, as she smiled up at him with instant appreciation of his change
of mood.

"Well, I'll try it this once and see what happens," answered Everett
with a laugh. "Indeed, I'm ashamed of having shown you any impatience
at all--to think of impatience in this heaven country of hospitality
amounts to positive sacrilege. Shrive me--and then bring on your
lilacs!"

"Then you'll stay with us until it's safe for you to go North and I
won't have to worry about you any more?" exclaimed Rose Mary,
delighted, as she beamed up over Pete's tow-head that had dropped with
repletion on her breast. Shoofly, who, true to her appellation, had
been making funny little dabs of delight at a fly or two which had
buzzed in her direction, had crawled nearer and burrowed her head
under Rose Mary's knee, rolled over on her little stomach and gone
instantaneously and exhaustedly to sleep. Rose Mary adjusted a
smothering fold of her dress and continued in her rejoicing over
Everett's surrender to circumstance inevitable.

"And do you think you can dig some more in the fields? Don't happiness
and hoe mean the same thing to most men?" she questioned with a laugh.

"Yes, hoe to the death and the devil take the last man at the end of
the row, fortune to the first!" answered Everett with a return of his
cynical look and tone.

"Oh, but in the world some men just go along and chop down ugly weeds,
stir up the good, smelly earth for things to grow in, reach over to
help the man in the next furrow if he needs it, and all come home at
sundown together--and the women have the supper ready. That's the kind
of hoeing I want you to do--please dig me up those teeth for Aunt
Viney and I'll have johnny-cake and fried chicken waiting for you
every night. Please, sir, promise!" And Rose Mary's voice sounded its
coaxing, comforting note, while her deep eyes brooded over him.

"I promise," answered Everett with a laugh. "I tell you what I think I
will do. As I understand it, the Briars has about three hundred acres,
all told. I have been all over it for the oil and there is none in any
paying quantities. But in this kind of formation any number of other
things may crop up or out. I am going t