expected discovery of a
visitor quite astonished Wickersham.

"By Jove! who would have believed it!" he said to himself.

Within two minutes after she had taken her seat on the sofa near
Wickersham, that young envoy had conceived a plan which had vaguely
suggested itself as a possibility during his journey South. Here was an
ally to his hand; he could not doubt it; and if he failed to win he
would deserve to lose.

The old squire had no sooner left the room than the visitor laid the
first lines for his attack.

Why was she surprised to see him? He had large interests in the
mountains, and could she doubt that if he was within a thousand miles he
would come by to see her?

The mantling cheeks and dancing eyes showed that this took effect.

"Oh, you came down on business? That was all! I know," she said.

Wickersham looked her in the eyes.

Business was only a convenient excuse. Old Halbrook could have attended
to the business; but he preferred to come himself. Possibly she could
guess the reason? He looked handsome and sincere enough as he leant
over and gazed in her face to have beguiled a wiser person than Phrony.

She, of course, had not the least idea.

Then he must tell her. To do this he found it necessary to sit on the
sofa close to her. What he told her made her blush very rosy again, and
stammer a little as she declared her disbelief in all he said, and was
sure there were the prettiest girls in the world in New York, and that
he had never thought of her a moment. And no, she would not listen to
him--she did not believe a word he said; and--yes, of course, she was
glad to see any old friend; and no, he should not go. He must stay with
them. They expected him to do so.

So Ferdy sent to Ridgely for his bags, and spent several days at Squire
Rawson's, and put in the best work he was capable of during that time.
He even had the satisfaction of seeing Phrony treat coldly and send away
one or two country bumpkins who rode up in all the bravery of long
broad-cloth coats and kid gloves.

But if at the end of this time the young man could congratulate himself
on success in one quarter, he knew that he was balked in the other.
Phrony Tripper was heels over head in love with him; but her
grandfather, though easy and pliable enough to all outward seeming, was
in a land-deal as dull as a ditcher. Wickersham spread out before him
maps and plats showing that he owned surveys which overlapped those
under which t