, an' she knows it. My
God, I may lose 'er--actually lose 'er, after all!"

For the next week Henley really suffered; the gravest doubts had beset
him; as close as Dixie had been to him, she now seemed farther away than
ever. He was constantly wavering between the hungry impulse to go
directly to her and the abiding fear that such an intrusion might offend
her beyond pardon.

One day, however, he felt that he could stand his suspense no longer. It
was the day his lawyer at Carlton had written him that he was a free
man. Surely, he argued, he would have the right to inform her of such an
important fact, after all that had passed between them, simply as a
friend, if nothing more. He left the store early in the afternoon, and
on his way home, and with a chill of doubt on him, he stopped at Dixie's
cottage.

Mrs. Hart was seated behind the vines on the little box-like porch, and
she rose at the click of the gate-latch and stood peering at him under
her thin hand.

"Oh, it's you, Alfred!" she cried, in pleased surprise. "I was just
wondering what had become of you. Did you want to see Dixie?"

"Yes, I thought I'd ask if she was about the house," Henley made reply,
in a jerky sort of fashion. "There is a little matter I wanted to speak
to her about."

"So the poor child is right, after all," the old woman sighed. "Well, I
reckon you must protect your own interests, Alfred, let the burden fall
where it may. She's done 'er best to pay out, an' if she can't do it,
why, she'll have to give in, that's all. She's undertaken too much,
anyway."

"I don't understand, Mrs. Hart." Henley was unable to follow her drift,
and, with his hat in hand and a puzzled expression on his face, he stood
silent.

"Why, for the last week, Alfred, Dixie hain't done a thing but fret and
worry about the money she owes you," Mrs. Hart explained, plaintively.
"Why, when you advanced the money to get her out of old Welborne's
clutch she was so happy she sung day and night, and me and her Aunt
Mandy thought the worst was over, because--well, because you seemed so
kind and friendly that we felt like you would not push her, that you'd
give her plenty o' time to make the payments. But now that her cotton
fell short of her expectations and the overflow killed half her
potato-crop she's all upset. She didn't say, in so many words, that you
was going to sue for your rights, but we couldn't, to save us, see what
she was so upset for, if you hadn't, at le