what in the deuce!" he exclaimed, not in anger, but in amazement.

"Blossom, wait for me!" called Molly, and would have slipped to the
ground had not Gay reached out and held her in the saddle.

Then the figure of Blossom, which had waited there evidently since their
first passing, vanished like an apparition into the grey twilight.
The pallid face floated from them through the grape-scented mist, and
Molly's call brought no answer except the cry of a whip-poor-will from
the thicket.

CHAPTER XII

ONE OF LOVE'S VICTIMS

A week later Jim Halloween stopped with a bit of news at Bottom's
Ordinary, where old Adam Doolittle dozed under the mulberry tree in a
rush chair which had been brought over in his son's oxcart.

"Have you all heard that our Mr. Mullen has accepted a call to larger
fields?" he inquired, "an' that Judy Revercomb has gone clean daft
because he's going to leave us?"

"She didn't have far to go," observed Mrs. Bottom.

"Well, you'd never have known it to look at her," commented young Adam,
"but 'tis a true sayin' that you can't tell the quality of the meat by
the colour of the feathers."

"You'd better be speakin' particular, suh, an' not general," retorted
old Adam, who was in a querulous mood as the result of too abrupt an
awakening from his nap. "What you ain't known it doesn't follow other
folks ain't, does it? Human natur is generally made with a streak of
foolishness an' a streak of sense, just as fat an' lean runs in a piece
of bacon. That's what I say, an' I reckon I ought to know, bein' turned
ninety."

"All the same thar's some folks that ain't streaked at all, but a solid
lump of silliness like Judy Hatch," returned his son.

This was too much for the patience of the patriarchial spirit, and old
Adam began to shake as though he were suddenly smitten with palsy.

"What do you mean by contradictin' me, suh? Didn't I bring you into the
world?" he demanded.

A reproachful shake of the head passed round the group.

"You oughtn't to contradict him, young Adam. Ain't he yo' pa?" said Mrs.
Bottom, rebukingly.

"I warn't contradictin', I was talkin'," replied young Adam, abashed by
the evident disapprobation that surrounded him.

"Well, don't talk, suh, until you can talk sense," rejoined his father.
"When a talker has turned ninety an' can meet me on equal ground, I'll
consent to argue with him."

His lower lip protruded threateningly from his toothless gums, while
two tear