's--so while they're out now is your chance to get
a hot drink."

As he spoke, a rough man, indeed, passed the carriage in which Tavia
and Sam were riding! Wasn't he rough! Tavia instinctively shrugged up
closer to the old man beside her.

"Uncle Sam, was that a--woodman?"

Tavia fell in quite naturally to calling the station agent Uncle Sam.

"Yep, he's one of the sort," taking care to keep his smile focussed on
the man, who although he was going in the opposite direction was able
to keep his eye on Tavia. "You see they are the most suspicious
set--takes a man a lifetime to know them, a woman an eternity, and
then she has to depend upon their good nature."

Tavia smiled, and hurried the old horse until his ears "sassed her
back." They jogged along--every moment nature was getting more and
more wideawake, until Tavia feared she would really wake up to the
magnitude of her own personal offence, everything else seemed so
straightforward and so upright!

Why in the world had she ever listened to the ravings of that man with
the soft hat and the hard smile?

After all, Dorothy must be right--and she, Tavia, was wrong. Yes, it
was indisputably wrong to do the things that had seemed so smart
before--things that Dorothy could never laugh at.

She sighed heavily. Sam heard it.

"What's wrong?" he asked, looking over his glasses, and under his
wrinkles.

"Oh, nothing," Tavia sighed further. "Only I am wondering what my
friends are thinking--of--me--about me."

"Well, there's scarcely any doubt about that think," he replied. "Like
as not they think you are drowned--no good friend would ever think you
were--stranded!"

Sam's logic was irresistible. Tavia had not thought of this
contingency; they might think her drowned!

"I must hurry to get back," she said suddenly. "I wonder could I do
any little work, at your boarding house, to earn the price of
my--ticket?"

"You couldn't manage to stay over until the afternoon, do you think? I
have some mending I'd be mighty glad to get done--and then I could
give you a ticket," said Sam.

"Oh, that would be splendid!" exclaimed Tavia. "I would willingly wait
over even if I had a chance to go sooner, for you have been so good to
me, Uncle Sam," she said warmly. "I shouldn't want to go until I had
done something for you."

"Then it's a bargain. While you're eatin' your coffee, I'll grab up
the things, and you kin mend over in the station. We'll stick to the
story that yo