d by
judgment, "you goin' to the picnic?"

Oliver looked at her in wonder.

"Why, no," said he slowly.

"Didn't you promise 'Delia you'd go?"

"No, I guess not. I said mebbe I'd be round if I had time, but I ain't
found the time. These 'taters have got to be dug."

The red had surged into Isabel's full cheeks. She looked an eloquent
remonstrance.

"Oliver," she said impetuously, "'Delia's sittin' on the front steps,
waitin' for you to come. She'll be terrible disappointed if you put her
aside like this."

Oliver took off his hat and passed a hand over his forehead. She
noticed, as she had a hundred times, how fine his hair was at the roots,
and was angry again because he would not, with his exasperating ways,
let any woman love him as she might. He seemed to have nothing to say,
but she knew the picture of lone 'Delia sitting on the steps was far
from moving him. It did cause him an honest trouble, for he was kind;
but not for that would he postpone his work.

"Oliver," she continued, "did you ever know what 'twas that made me tell
you we must break off bein'--engaged?"

He was looking at her earnestly. His own mind seemed returning to a past
ache and loss.

"I understood," he said at length--"I understood 'twas because you
kinder figured it out we shouldn't get along well."

She stood there, a frowning figure, her lips compressed, her eyes
stormy. Then she turned to him, all frankness and candor.

"Oliver," she said, "I never give you any reasons. What's the use? I was
terrible fond of you. I was. I don't know 's any girl ought to say that
when you're engaged to somebody else, and I'm engaged myself, and happy
as the day is long. But what 'twas--what come between us--you never made
me have a good time."

He stood leaning upon his hoe, very handsome, very stern in his
attention to her, and, as she could see, entirely surprised. The child
in her, that rare, ingenuous part she kept in hiding, came out and
spoke:--

"Why, Oliver, we never had any fun! You were awful good to me. You'd
worry yourself to pieces if I was sick; but we never had more'n one or
two good times together, long 's it lasted, and them I planned. And I
got terrible tired of it, and I says to myself, 'If it's so now, when
we're only goin' together, it'll be a million times worse when we're
married.' And then when you took a fancy to 'Delia, I was real pleased.
I says to myself. 'Maybe she'll know how to manage him. Maybe 'twas
somethi