empty goblet under his coat and quickly returned
with another, invitingly frosted.

"Ain' she turr'ble sometimes, Marse Brent?" he asked in a confidential
undertone. "She done tol' me yisterday dat I'se gwine git th'owed clar
to de bottom of hell, an' den criss-cross all over de coals, ef I don'
stop makin' juleps for Marse John an' you! Do you reckon I'se gwine git
all dat misery?"

"Betcher life," Brent answered, taking a few swallows and leaning back
with a sigh of satisfaction. "That's all coming to you; but d'you want
to know what the Colonel and I've decided to do if you quit making us
juleps, you old devil?"

Zack grinned.

"We'll take you out to the tool house, and press your teeth down on a
dry grinding-stone till they get hot and squeak and--"

"Hush, man, hush! In de name of goodness, hush!" Zack covered his
wrinkled mouth. "You makes mah jaws feel all scrouged up!"

And after he was again astride the mule, plodding toward Bob's place,
his hand continued to stroke with affectionate care those jaws that had
been thrown into such spasms of suggested torture, muttering:

"Who ever heerd tell of sech misery as puttin' mah onlies' toof on de
grind-stone!"

A mile from Arden stood a house, too near the road to give it the air of
being a place of many comforts, even were it in other respects
pretentious. But its lightly built porch, precariously nailed to an
unpainted frame front, stamped it with poverty.

Here dwelt Tom Hewlet, proprietor of ten acres and a bad name. It was
said that his first wife had all but died of neglect, and then burst an
artery in her brain while pursuing him with a skillet. The second Mrs.
Hewlet still held on. Both, no doubt, possessed virtues, but neighborly
sympathy clustered around the present incumbent, because she was the
present, and because of a frequently expressed regret that the good Lord
had not spared her predecessor until the skillet and Tom had made
connection. It was but a whispered wish, for Tom's second choice came
from the meek and lowly. He was taking no more chances.

Besides that exciting memory, however, the first Mrs. Hewlet, previously
the widow of a country parson, had left him a daughter by that marriage,
and this girl, Nancy, had stayed--for Tom's house was, after all, the
only place she had to stay. Arden's people and those of Bob's home had
felt in a mild way sorry for this girl, sometimes sending over "things,"
and in other ways showing a long-dist