e any point her lover might raise, but this seemed
so trivial that she laughed a happy laugh as she answered caressingly:

"I have always walked whenever and wherever I chose around here. I like
it, dear."

"That don't make any difference; it ain't good for any woman to walk eight
miles at one time," John answered shortly.

Unable to see the reason for laying stress upon the danger in doing a
thing she had done for years without harm to herself, Elizabeth was
surprised into continuing the argument without at all caring whether she
ever walked again or not.

"I've walked that much a hundred times in my life, and I'll probably walk
it a hundred times more," she replied with a laugh.

"Not if you live with me," John Hunter announced, standing as solid as a
rock on the issue now that he had raised it.

"But why not?" the girl inquired, still but little concerned, and looking
her betrothed over with a girl's eye for correct combinations of collar,
tie, and driving gloves. Those gloves had been the chief objection
Elizabeth's brothers had been able to raise against the Eastern man, and
gave colour to the spiteful "dude" with which John Hunter was mentioned by
the envious.

"Why not?" John repeated after her. "Because it don't look well."

The ridiculous and inadequate reply drew the girl still deeper into the
discussion. She began to reason with him quite earnestly. She had always
walked a great deal; she loved it. Walking was jolly fun. Everybody knew
she was not as dependent upon being taken as the ordinary woman. When,
however, John would not give in and insisted that things were different
now that they were engaged, she ceased to say more.

"You see," he concluded, "people expect me to take you. They'll think
something's happened and that I don't want to. If I want to take my future
wife, she ought to be willing to be taken. I don't want you ever to walk
home again."

Elizabeth Farnshaw was young, the experiences of her night at home had
made her covet peace, she was unaware that she was being moulded, or that
her lover considered the Hunter ways, as such, especially desirable.
Willing to pay the price, rather enjoying the masterful way in which her
betrothed insisted upon serving her, reflecting that no one had ever been
willing to serve her at all, and feeling that it was a minor matter, she
gave up.

"All right! I like to walk, but if you look at it in that way I won't do
it again," she promised, and in th