I will," deliberately answered Young.

"Nope, I air goin' to stay here," snapped Tess. "I can fish and live
likes I have been doin' till Daddy comes. I promised him I'd stay. I can
read the Bible now," she ejaculated, promptly producing the book from
under the blankets of the bed. "I's a-readin it every day.... If ye
don't believes, ye can listen and see."

She tossed back the curls from her shoulders as she ended emphatically:
"I air a goin' to bring Daddy home through this here book--the student
says."

Again the terrible jealousy of the handsome student flashed alive in the
professor. Tess had opened the Bible to a chapter she had never read
before.

"And straightway in the morning," she spelled, "the chief priests--Aw,
that ain't no good! Wait till I find about Daddy."

Then suddenly she threw the Bible down upon the floor.

"There air places what says as how Daddy air a comin' home. The student
says it air there. I ain't found it yet but I air a-lookin' for it every
day. 'Tain't in that place where I just read about them geezers, the
priests."

The lawyer stood up. A pain seized him. He would save this ignorant girl
in spite of herself, marry her in spite of Frederick Graves. It would be
as difficult as scaling the icy mountains, but he would force her to
love him more than the whole world.

"You understand," he said shortly, "that these good people have given
money toward helping your father come home. It will be some time before
the trial will come up, but when it does--I will bring him back to you."

The assurance in his tones brought Tess to his side.

"Ye be a lawyer," she said abruptly, "and the squatters says as how
lawyers air liars and tramps, but ye ain't no tramp, and ye ain't no
liar, ye ain't--and when I sells a lot of fish I air bringin' ye the
money for what ye air a doin' for Daddy and me. I says once and I says
again as how ye air Daddy's friend, and I air glad that the student's
meeting-house folks gived ye a little money to help us."

Mist had gathered in her eyes and she slipped her fingers into Professor
Young's. She laid her lips upon his hand, covering it with tears and
kisses. Opening the shanty doors, she said:

"I likes ye, I likes ye, but how much a squatter's brat likes don't make
no difference. Ye go now, for the tracks get dark about five."

"I have my horse at the top of the hill," replied Young, confusedly.

The sensation from the moist lips upon his flesh prompted hi