aimed. "Come in, come in. I'll make a place
for you to sit in a minute." He shoved the couch away from before the
fire, and removing a pair of trousers and a heap of hose from one of his
splint-bottomed chairs, he threw them in a corner and placed it before
the hearth. "You walked, didn't you? And your feet are wet, of course.
Sit here and dry them."

She pushed back her sunbonnet and held out to him a quaint little basket
made of willow withes, which she carried, but she took no step forward.
Although her lips smiled a fleeting wraith of a smile that came and went
in an instant, he thought her eyes looked troubled as she lifted them to
his face.

He took the basket and lifted the cover. "I brought you some pa'triges,"
she said simply.

There lay three quail, and a large sweet potato, roasted in the ashes on
their hearth as he had seen the corn pone baked the evening before, and
a few round white cakes which he afterwards learned were beaten biscuit,
all warm from the fire.

"How am I ever to repay you people for your kindness to me?" he said.
"Come in and dry your feet. Never mind the mud; see how I've tracked it
in all the morning. Come."

He led her to the fire, and replenished it, while she sat passively
looking down on the hearth as if she scarcely heeded him. Not knowing
how to talk to her, or what to do with her, he busied himself trying to
bring a semblance of order to the cabin, occasionally dropping a remark
to which she made no response. Then he also relapsed into silence, and
the minutes dragged--age-long minutes, they seemed to him.

In his efforts at order, he spread his rug over the couch, tossed a
crimson cushion on it and sundry articles beneath it to get them out of
his way, then occupied himself with his book, while vainly trying to
solve the riddle which his enigmatical caller presented to his
imagination.

All at once she rose, sought out a few dishes from the cupboard, and,
taking a neatly smoothed, coarse cloth from the basket, spread it over
one end of the table and arranged thereon his dinner. Quietly David
watched her, following her example of silence until forced to speak.
Finally he decided to question her, if only he could think of questions
which would not trespass on her private affairs, when at last she broke
the stillness.

"I can't find any coffee. I ought to have brought some; I'll go fetch
some if you'll eat now. Your dinner'll get cold."

He showed her how he had made tea