t rights of the father. The judge concluded by dispassionately
recommending the young couple to betake themselves home, and to try
to live in peace together, or, at any rate, like sane people. Then he
thrust his spectacles up on his forehead, drew a long sigh of dismissal,
and said, with a freshened look of interest, "Mr. Clerk, call the next
case."

The Quimbey and Kittredge factions poured into the hall; what cared
they for the disputed claims of Jenkins _versus_ Jones? The lovers
of sensation cherished a hope that there might be a lawless effort
to rescue the infant Kittredge from the custody to which he had been
committed by the court. The Quimbeys watchfully kept about him in
a close squad, his pink sun-bonnet, in which his head was eclipsed,
visible among their brawny jeans shoulders, as his mother carried him
in her arms. The sheriff looked smilingly after him from the court-house
steps, then inhaled a long breath, and began to roar out to the icy
air the name of a witness wanted within. Instead of a gate there was
a flight of steps on each side of the fence, surmounted by a small
platform. Evelina suddenly shrank back as she stood on the platform, for
beside the fence Absalom was waiting. Timothy hastily vaulted over the
fence, drew his "shooting-iron" from his boot-leg, and cocked it with
a metallic click, sharp and peremptory in the keen wintry air. For a
moment Absalom said not a word. He looked up at Evelina with as much
reproach as bitterness in his dark eyes. They were bright with the anger
that fired his blood; it was hot in his bronzed cheek; it quivered in
his hands. The dry and cold atmosphere amplified the graces of his long
curling yellow hair that she and his mother loved. His hat was pushed
back from his face. He had not spoken to her since the day of his
ill-starred confidence, but he would not be denied now.

"Ye'll repent it," he said, threateningly. "I'll take special pains fur
that."

She bestowed on him one defiant glance, and laughed--a bitter little
laugh. "Ye air ekal ter it; ye have a special gift fur makin' folks
repent they ever seen ye."

"The jedge jes gin him ter ye 'kase ye made him out sech a fibble little
pusson," he sneered. "But it's jes fur a time."

She held the baby closer. He busied himself in taking off his sun-bonnet
and putting it on hind part before, gurgling with smothered laughter
to find himself thus queerly masked, and he made futile efforts to play
"peep-eye"