to say it
superiorly, paternally, as an older man might have said it--and was not
altogether successful. The mere sight of her set his blood aswing in the
old throbbing ebb and flow, though, if he had known it, it was pity now
rather than passion that gave the impetus.

"You allow it ain't fittin' for me to be out alone after night?" she
said, with a hard little laugh. "I reckon it ain't goin' to hurt me
none; anyways, I had to come. Paw's been red-eyed for a week, and he's
huntin' for you, Tom-Jeff."

Then Tom recalled Japheth's word of the morning.

"Hunting for me? Well, I'm not very hard to find," he said,
unconsciously repeating the answer he had made to the horse-trader's
warning.

"Couldn't you make out to go off somewheres for a little spell?" she
asked half-pleadingly.

"Run away, you mean? Hardly; I'm too busy just at present. Besides, I
haven't any quarrel with your father. What's he making trouble about
now?"

She put her face in her hands, and though she was silent, he could see
that sobs were shaking her. Being neither more nor less than a man, her
tears made him foolish. He put his arm around her and was trying to find
the comforting word, when the heavens fell.

How Ardea and Miss Euphrasia, going the round-about way from one house
to the other to avoid the dew-wet grass of the lawns, came fairly within
arm's-reach before he saw or heard them, remained a thing inexplicable.
But when he looked up they were there, Miss Euphrasia straightening
herself aloof in virtuous disapproval, and Ardea looking as if some one
had suddenly shown her the head of Medusa.

Tom separated himself from Nan in hot-hearted confusion and stood as a
culprit taken in the act. Nan hid her face again and turned away. It was
Miss Dabney the younger who found words to break the smarting silence.

"Don't mind us, Mr. Gordon," she said icily. "We were going to Woodlawn
to see if your father and mother could come over after dinner."

Tom smote himself alive and made haste to open the foot-path gate for
them. There was nothing more said, or to be said; but when they were
gone and he was once more alone with Nan, he was fighting desperately
with a very manlike desire to smash something; to relieve the wrathful
pressure by hurting somebody. Let it be written down to his credit
that he did not wreak his vengeance on the defenseless. Thomas
Jefferson, the boy, would not have hesitated.

[Illustration: Tom made haste to open the