e impressed by it. He rubbed his hair the wrong way, and distorted
his face into a purely muscular grin, as he reflected.

"I've a mind to go and see Poindexter," Lysander announced presently.
"Poindexter's a smart man, and I b'lieve he's a square man. 'T enny
rate, it can't do any good to keep it a secret. Folks'll find it out
sooner or later. You stay here a minute, M'lissy, and I'll go on up the
canon."

The young girl seated herself, with her back against a ledge of rocks,
and her bare feet straight out before her. She was used to waiting for
Lysander. Their companionship antedated everything else in Melissa's
memory, and she early became aware that Lysander's "minutes" were
fractions of time with great possibilities in the way of physical
comfort hidden in the depths of their hazy indefiniteness.

She took off her corded sunbonnet, and crossed her hands upon it in her
lap. The shifting sunlight that fell upon her through the moving leaves
of the sycamores lent a grace to the angularity of her attitude. She
closed her eyes and listened drearily to the sounds of the canon. The
water fretting its way among the boulders below, the desultory gossip of
the moving leaves, the shrill, iterative chirp of a squirrel scolding
insistently from a neighboring cliff,--all these were familiar sounds to
Melissa, and had often brought her relief from the rasping discomfort of
family contention; but to-day she refused to be comforted. She had the
California mountaineer's worship of water, and the gurgle of the stream
among the sycamores filled her with vague rebellion.

"Why couldn't he 'a' let us alone?" she mused resentfully. "As long as
he had a share o' the spring it didn't show any signs o' dryin' up.
Mother never said nothin' about Flutterwheel to him; it was all his
doin's. But it's no use." She dropped her hands at her sides with a
little gesture of despair. "He never done it, but mother'll always think
so. She does hate him so--so--_pizenous_."

There was a sound of approaching footsteps, and the girl scrambled to
her feet. It was not Lysander coming at that businesslike pace.
Sterling, hurrying along the path, became conscious of her standing
there, in the rigid awkwardness of unculture, and touched his hat
lightly.

"Your father says the spring has stopped flowing," he said, pushing
aside the ferns where the rocks were yet slimy and moss-grown. "It is
certainly very strange."

"Yes, sir," faltered the girl, rubbing