better give me that
handkerchief back."

Cass began to unbutton his coat.

"No! no! Do you want to take your death of cold?" she screamed. And
Cass, to avoid this direful possibility, rebuttoned his coat again over
the handkerchief and a peculiarly pleasing sensation.

Very little now was said until the rattling, bounding descent of the
coach denoted the approach to Red Chief. The straggling main street
disclosed itself, light by light. In the flash of glittering windows
and the sound of eager voices Miss Porter descended, without waiting for
Cass's proffered assistance, and anticipated Mountain Charley's descent
from the box. A few undistinguishable words passed between them.

"You kin freeze to me, Miss," said Charley; and Miss Porter, turning her
frank laugh and frankly opened palm to Cass, half returned the pressure
of his hand and slipped away.

A few days after the stage coach incident, Mountain Charley drew up
beside Cass on the Blazing Star turnpike, and handed him a small packet.
"I was told to give ye that by Miss Porter. Hush--listen! It's that
rather old dog-goned ring o' yours that's bin in all the papers. She's
bamboozled that sap-headed county judge, Boompointer, into givin' it to
her. Take my advice and sling it away for some other feller to pick up
and get looney over. That's all!"

"Did she say anything?" asked Cass, anxiously, as he received his lost
treasure somewhat coldly.

"Well, yes! I reckon. She asked me to stand betwixt Hornsby and you.
So don't YOU tackle him, and I'll see HE don't tackle you," and with a
portentous wink Mountain Charley whipped up his horses and was gone.

Cass opened the packet. It contained nothing but the ring. Unmitigated
by any word of greeting, remembrance, or even raillery, it seemed almost
an insult. Had she intended to flaunt his folly in his face, or had she
believed he still mourned for it and deemed its recovery a sufficient
reward for his slight service? For an instant he felt tempted to follow
Charley's advice, and cast this symbol of folly and contempt in the dust
of the mountain road. And had she not made his humiliation complete by
begging Charley's interference between him and his enemy? He would go
home and send her back the handkerchief she had given him. But here the
unromantic reflection that although he had washed it that very afternoon
in the solitude of his own cabin, he could not possibly iron it, but
must send it "rough dried," stayed his