a
certain ostentation of parting which struck Mr. Jack Brace, who was
lingering at the doorway, into a state of utter bewilderment.

Here was Miss Nellie Wynn, the belle of Excelsior, calm, quiet,
self-possessed, her chaste cambric skirts and dainty shoes as fresh as
when she had left her father's house; but where was the woman of the
brown duster, and where the yellow-dressed apparition of the woods? He
was feebly repeating to himself his mental adjuration of a few hours
before when he caught her eye, and was taken with a blush and a fit of
coughing. Could he have been such an egregious fool, and was it not
plainly written on his embarrassed face for her to read?

"Are we going down together?" asked Miss Nellie, with an exceptionally
gracious smile.

There was neither affectation nor coquetry in this advance. The girl
had no idea of Brace's suspicion of her, nor did any uneasy desire to
placate or deceive a possible rival of Low's prompt her graciousness.
She simply wished to shake off in this encounter the already stale
excitement of the past two hours, as she had shaken the dust of the
woods from her clothes. It was characteristic of her irresponsible
nature and transient susceptibilities that she actually enjoyed the
relief of change; more than that, I fear, she looked upon this
infidelity to a past dubious pleasure as a moral principle. A mild,
open flirtation with a recognized man like Brace, after her secret
passionate tryst with a nameless nomad like Low, was an ethical
equipoise that seemed proper to one of her religious education.

Brace was only too happy to profit by Miss Nellie's condescension; he
at once secured the seat by her side, and spent the four hours and a
half of their return journey to Excelsior in blissful but timid
communion with her. If he did not dare to confess his past suspicions,
he was equally afraid to venture upon the boldness he had premeditated
a few hours before. He was therefore obliged to take a middle course of
slightly egotistical narration of his own personal adventures, with
which he beguiled the young girl's ear. This he only departed from
once, to describe to her a valuable grizzly bearskin which he had seen
that day for sale at Indian Spring, with a view to divining her
possible acceptance of it for a "buggy robe;" and once to comment upon
a ring which she had inadvertently disclosed in pulling off her glove.

"It's only an old family keepsake," she added, with easy men