d at him with her direct, blue-gray eyes, and smiled. And
her smile had no unpleasant uplift at the corners; it was the dimply,
roguish smile of the pastel portrait only several times nicer. Re could
hardly believe it; he just opened his eyes wide and stared. When he came
to a sense of his rudeness, Mona was back in the kitchen helping with
the supper dishes, just as though nothing had happened--unless one
observed the deep, apple-red of her cheeks--while her mother, who showed
not the faintest symptoms of collapse, flourished a dish towel made of
a bleached flour sack with the stamp showing a faint pink and blue XXXX
across the center.

"I knew all the time they wouldn't do anything when it came right
to the point," she declared. "Bless their hearts, they thought they
would--but they're too soft-hearted, even when they are mad. If yuh go
at 'em right yuh can talk 'em over easy. It done me good to hear yuh
talk right up to 'em, Bud." Mrs. Stevens had called hi Bud from
the first time she laid eyes on him. "That's all under the sun they
needed--just somebody to set 'em thinking about the other side. You're a
real good speaker; seems to me you ought to study to be a preacher."

Thurston's face turned red. But presently he forgot everything in his
amazement, for Mona the dignified, Mona of the scornful eyes and the
chilly smile, actually giggled--giggled like any ordinary girl, and shot
him a glance that had in it pure mirth and roguish teasing, and a dash
of coquetry. He sat down and giggled with her, feeling idiotically happy
and for no reason under the sun that he could name.

He had promised his conscience that he would go home to the Lazy Eight
in the morning, but he didn't; he somehow contrived, overnight, to
invent a brand new excuse for his conscience to swallow or not, as it
liked. Hank Graves had the same privilege; as for the Stevens trio, he
blessed their hospitable souls for not wanting any excuse whatever for
his staying. They were frankly glad to have him there; at least Mrs.
Stevens and Jack were. As for Mona, he was not so sure, but he hoped she
didn't mind.

This was the reason inspired by his great desire: he was going to write
a story, and Mona was unconsciously to furnish the material for his
heroine, and so, of course, he needed to be there so that he might study
his subject. That sounded very well, to himself, but to Hank Graves,
for some reason, it seemed very funny. When Thurston told him, Hank