s. "And Mr. Steering,
Piney,--has Uncle Bernique told Mr. Steering this fantastic tale?"

"Yes'm."

"And what did Mr. Steering say and do, Piney?"

The memory of what Steering had said and done seemed to come on to Piney
like an inspiration. "Miss Sally, he set his jaw an' he ketched Unc'
Bernique by the arm an' helt him an' made him swear like this, 'You by
your love for Piney's young mother, I by my love for Salome Madeira,
that never, s'help us God, will you or I carry word of this to
Crittenton Madeira and his daughter Salome'--sumpin like that, Miss
Sally. I don' adzackly remember the words."

The dulness had all gone out of her eyes, the colour beat back into her
cheeks. She had forgotten Crittenton Madeira. "'I by my love for
Salome'--are you sure, Piney?"

"I'm sure, Miss Sally. An' so I thought as wuzn't nobody else to tell
you, I'd tell you. I d'n know as I done rat," the boy's face was all
a-quiver, too, as he looked up at the girl on the misty heights of her
passion. His self-abnegation, his young heroism made him for the moment
as finely luminous as she was. Sally Madeira took his head between her
hands and gazed into his eyes tenderly, caressingly, and there was in
her touch something large and sweet and tender that comforted and
soothed the boy while it made his heart leap within him.

"Ah, Darling," she said, "how bitter-sweet it is, this loving! But be
patient. Some day it will all seem right." She took her hands away from
him and stood up straightly.

"I'm going in to my father now, Piney. There's a mistake somewhere. You
wait for me here until I get it all explained. Wait here till I come
back."

She went off toward the house then, a fragrant shower of orchard
blossoms falling upon her and shutting her away from the boy's eyes as
she went.

_Chapter Sixteen_

MADEIRA'S PEACE

Sally Madeira crept to the door of her father's study and listened. In
the pallid light that was stealing up to her from Piney's story her face
was shadowy, with hurtful doubt, ashamed fear, and she steadied herself
by the wall with hands that shook. She had stopped to put on a white
gown that her father loved and her lustrous hair lay banded closely, a
halo, about her shapely head. Her face looked like a saint's.

"It is not so much to save Bruce Steering's inheritance for him, it's to
save my father for myself." Her lips moved stiffly as she whispered. "My
old dream-father, my idol, I cannot live without