ing
in courage; and as she quietly resumed her gloves, hat, and duster, she
was not, perhaps, exactly the young person that it would be entirely
safe for the timid, embarrassed, or inexperienced of my sex to meet
alone. She shut down the piano; and having carefully reclosed all
the windows and doors, and restored the house to its former desolate
condition, she stepped from the veranda, and proceeded directly to the
cabin of the unintellectual Hawkins, that reared its adobe chimney above
the umbrage a quarter of a mile below.

The door opened instantly to her impulsive knock, and the "Fool of
Five Forks" stood before her. Miss Milly had never before seen the man
designated by this infelicitous title; and as he stepped backward,
in half courtesy and half astonishment, she was, for the moment,
disconcerted. He was tall, finely formed, and dark-bearded. Above cheeks
a little hollowed by care and ill-health shone a pair of hazel eyes,
very large, very gentle, but inexpressibly sad and mournful. This was
certainly not the kind of man Miss Milly had expected to see; yet, after
her first embarrassment had passed, the very circumstance, oddly enough,
added to her indignation, and stung her wounded pride still more deeply.
Nevertheless, the arch hypocrite instantly changed her tactics with the
swift intuition of her sex.

"I have come," she said with a dazzling smile, infinitely more dangerous
than her former dignified severity,--"I have come to ask your pardon for
a great liberty I have just taken. I believe the new house above us on
the hill is yours. I was so much pleased with its exterior, that I left
my friends for a moment below here," she continued artfully, with a
slight wave of the hand, as if indicating a band of fearless Amazons
without, and waiting to avenge any possible insult offered to one of
their number, "and ventured to enter it. Finding it unoccupied, as I had
been told, I am afraid I had the audacity to sit down and amuse myself
for a few moments at the piano, while waiting for my friends."

Hawkins raised his beautiful eyes to hers. He saw a very pretty girl,
with frank gray eyes glistening with excitement, with two red, slightly
freckled cheeks glowing a little under his eyes, with a short scarlet
upper-lip turned back, like a rose-leaf, over a little line of white
teeth, as she breathed somewhat hurriedly in her nervous excitement. He
saw all this calmly, quietly, and, save for the natural uneasiness of a