s by jealousy, had
grown more and more to yearn for Sukey's manifold charms, physical and
temperamental. Billy Little, who did not like Sukey, said her charms
were "dimple-mental"; but Billy's heart was filled with many curious
prejudices, and Tom's judgment was much more to be relied upon in this
case.

One morning when Sukey entered Dic's room she said: "Tom was to see me
last night. He said he would come up to see you to-day."

"He meant that he will come up to see you," replied Dic, teasing her.
"One of these times I'll lose another friend to Indianapolis, and when I
go up there with my country ways you won't know me."

"I'll never go to Indianapolis," Sukey responded, with a demure glance.
"Dear old Blue is good enough for me. The nearer I can live to it, the
better I shall be satisfied." Dic's lands were on the river banks, while
those of Sukey's father were a mile to the east.

"If you lived too close to the river, you might fall in," returned Dic,
choosing to take Sukey's remark in jest.

"I'm neither sugar nor salt," she retorted, "and I would not melt. I'm
sure I'm not sugar--"

"But sugarish," interrupted Dic.

"_You_ don't think I'm even sugarish," she returned poutingly.

"Indeed I do," he replied; "but you must not tell Tom I said so."

"Why not?" asked Sukey. "He's nothing to me--simply a friend."

So the conversation would run, and Sukey, by judicious fishing, caught a
minnow now and then.

* * * * *

During the latter days of Dic's convalescence, Sukey paid a visit to her
friend Rita, and the girls from Blue attracted the beaux of the capital
city in great numbers. For the first time in Sukey's life she felt that
she had found a battle-field worthy of her prowess, and in truth she
really did great slaughter. Balls, hay rides, autumn picnics, and
nutting parties occurred in rapid succession. Tom and Williams were, of
course, as Tom expressed it, "Johnny on the spot," with our girls.

After Rita's stormy interview with Williams she had, through fear,
continued to receive him in friendliness. At first the friendliness was
all assumed; but as the weeks passed, and he, by every possible means,
assured her that his rash act was sincerely repented, and under no
conditions was to be repeated, she gradually recovered her faith in him.
Her heart was so prone to forgive that it was an easy task to impose
upon it, and soon Williams, the Greek, was again encamped within