t.

How they joked, and tried to tease him! But they couldn't get a breath
ahead. He shot back answers as fast as they could ask questions, while
he cut the branch and untied the horse. He gave the limb and basket to
mother to hold, kissed her good-bye, and me too, before he mounted.
With my arms around his neck--I never missed a chance to try to squeeze
into him how I loved him--I whispered: "Laddie, is it a secret any
more?"

He threw back his head and laughed the happiest.

"Not the ghost of a secret!" he said. "But you let me do the talking,
until I tell you." Then he went on right out loud: "I'm riding up the
road waving the banner of peace. If I suffer repulse, the same thing
has happened to better men before, so I'll get a different banner and
try again."

Laddie mounted, swept a circle in the road, dropped Flos on her knees
in a bow, and waved the branch. Leon began to sing at the top of his
voice, "Nothing but leaves, nothing but leaves," while Laddie went
flashing up the road.

The women went back to the house; the men stood around the gate,
watched him from sight, talked about his horse, how he rode, and made
wagers that he'd get shut out, like every one did, but they said if
that happened he wouldn't come back. Father was annoyed.

"You heard Laddie say he'd return immediately if they wouldn't let him
in," he said. "He's a man of his word. He will either enter or come
home at once."

It was pitch dark and we had supper before some of them left; they
never stayed so late. After we came from church, father read the
chapter and we were ready for bed; still Laddie hadn't come back. And
father liked it! He just plain liked it! He chuckled behind the
Advocate until you could see it shake; but mother had very little to
say, and her lips closed tight.

At bedtime he said to mother: "Well, they don't seem in a hurry about
sending the boy back."

"Did you really think he WOULD be sent back?" asked mother.

"Not ordinarily," said father, "no! If he had no brain, no wit, no
culture, on an animal basis, a woman would look twice before she'd send
him away; but with such fanatics as Pryors, one can't always tell what
will happen."

"In a case like this, one can be reasonably certain," said mother.

"You don't know what social position they occupied at home. Their
earmarks are all good. We've no such notions here as they have."

"Thank God for so much, at any rate," said mother. "How old