under her
chin, and tilted her head backward.

"Ah, you're plumb sick and tired to death of everything, aren't you?"
he said soberly. "You've been up here too long. You sure need a
change. I'll have to take you out and give you the freedom of the
cities, let you dissipate and pink-tea, and rub elbows with the mob for
a while. Then you'll be glad to drift back to this woodsy hiding-place
of ours. When do you want to start?"

"Why, Bill!" she protested.

But she realized in a flash that Bill could read her better than she
could read herself. Few of her emotions could remain long hidden from
that keenly observing and mercilessly logical mind. She knew that he
guessed where she stood, and by what paths she had gotten there. Trust
him to know. And it made her very tender toward him that he was so
quick to understand. Most men would have resented.

"I want to stack a few tons of hay," he went on, disregarding her
exclamation. "I'll need it in the spring, if not this winter. Soon as
that's done we'll hit the high spots. We'll take three or four
thousand dollars, and while it lasts we'll be a couple of--of
high-class tramps. Huh? Does it sound good?"

She nodded vigorously.

"High-class tramps," she repeated musingly.

"That sounds fine."

"Perk up, then," he wheedled.

"Bill-boy," she murmured, "you mustn't take me too seriously."

"I took you for better or for worse," he answered, with a kiss. "I
don't want it to turn out worse. I want you to be contented and happy
here, where I've planned to make our home. I know you love me quite a
lot, little person. Nature fitted us in a good many ways to be mates.
But you've gone through a pretty drastic siege of isolation in this
rather grim country, and I guess it doesn't seem such an alluring place
as it did at first. I don't want you to nurse that feeling until it
becomes chronic. Then we would be out of tune, and it would be good-by
happiness. But I think I know the cure for your malady."

That was his final word. He deliberately switched the conversation
into other channels.

In the morning he began his hay cutting. About eleven o'clock he threw
down his scythe and stalked to the house.

"Put on your hat, and let's go investigate a mystery," said he. "I
heard a cow bawl in the woods a minute ago. A regular barnyard bellow."

"A cow bawling?" she echoed. "Sure? What would cattle be doing away
up here?"

"That's what I want to know?" B