"What about?"

"Hear what I said about a big man and a little woman?"

"No, what did you say?"

He fumbled with his hands and replied: "No matter what I said then. What I say now is good-bye."

"Good-bye."

She tripped along as if she were glad to be rid of him, but after a time she walked slower as if she were deeply musing. She heard the brisk trotting of a horse, and, looking up, recognized Gideon Batts, jogging toward her. He saw her, and, halting in the shade, he waited for her to come up, and as she drew near he cried out, "h.e.l.loa, young rabbit."

She wrinkled her Greek nose at him, but she liked his banter, and with a.s.sumed offense she replied: "Frog."

"None of that, my lady."

"Well, then, what made you call me a young rabbit?"

"Because your ears stick out."

"I don't care if they do."

"Neither does a young rabbit."

"I call you a frog because your eyes stick out and because you are so puffy."

"Slow, now, my lady, queen of the sunk lands. Oh, but they are laying for you at home and you are going to catch it. I'd hate to be in your fix."

"And I wouldn't be in yours."

"Easy, now. You allude to my looks, eh? Why, I have broken more than one heart."

"Why, I didn't know you had been married but once."

He winced. "Look here, you mustn't talk that way."

"But you began it. You called me a young rabbit."

"That's right, and now we will call it off. What a memory you've got. I gad, once joke with a woman and her impudence--which she mistakes for wit--leaps over all difference in ages. But they are laying for you at home and you are going to catch it. I laughed at them; told them it was nonsense to suppose that the smartest girl in the state was going to marry--"

"You've said enough. I don't need your championship."

"But you've got it and can't help yourself. Why, so far as brains are concerned, the average legislator can't hold a candle to you."

"That's no compliment."

"Slow. I was in the legislature."

"Yes, one term, I hear."

"Why did you hear one term?"

"Because they didn't send you back, I suppose."

"Easy. But I tell you that the Major and your mother are furious. Your mother said--"

"She said very little in your presence."

"Careful. She said a great deal. But I infer from your insinuation that she doesn't think very well of me."

"You ought to know."

"I do; I know that she is wrong in her estimate of me. And I also know that I am right in my estimate of her. She is the soul of gentleness and quiet dignity. But you like me, don't you?"

"I am ashamed to say that I like you in spite of my judgment."

"Easy. That's good, I must say. Ah, the influence I have upon people is somewhat varied. Upon a certain type of woman, the dignified lady of a pa.s.sing generation, I exercise no particular influence, but I catch the over-bright young women in spite of themselves. The reason you think so much of me is because you are the brightest young woman I ever saw. And this puts me at a loss to understand why you are determined to marry that fellow Pennington. Wait a moment. I gad, if you go I'll ride along with you. Answer me one question: Is your love for him so great that you'll die if you don't marry him? Or is it that out of a perversity that you can't understand you are determined to throw away a life that could be made most useful? Louise, we have joked with each other ever since you were a child. In my waddling way I have romped with you, and I can scarcely realize that you are nearly twenty-four years old. Think of it, well advanced toward the age of discretion, and yet you are about to give yourself to a dying man. I don't know what to say."

"It seems not," she replied. And after a moment's pause she added: "If I am so well advanced toward the age of discretion I should be permitted to marry without the advice of an entire neighborhood."

She was now standing in the sun, looking up at him, her half-closed eyes glinting like blue-tempered steel.

"Is marriage wholly a matter of selfishness?" she asked.

"Slow. If you are putting that to me as a direct question I am, as a man who never shies at the truth, compelled to say that it is. But let me ask you if it is simply a matter of accommodation? If it is, why not send out a collection of handsome girls to marry an aggregation of cripples?"

Her eyes were wide open now and she was laughing. "No one could be serious with you, Mr. Gid."

"And no one could make you serious with yourself."

"Frog."

"Young rabbit."

She put her hands to her ears. "I would rather be a young rabbit than a frog."

"Wait a moment," he called as she turned away.

"Well."

"When you go home I wish you'd tell your mother that I talked to you seriously concerning the foolishness of your contemplated marriage. Will you do that much for your old playmate?"

She made a face at him and trippingly hastened away. He looked after her, shook his head, gathered up his bridle reins, and jogged off toward his home.

CHAPTER V.