ldren in Arcadia. He
wanted no wife who would accept her husband's kiss as a matter of
necessity. He had seen them, and cynically watched the husband casting
furtive, longing looks at her who swore to cherish him unto death.

Thus spoke the chaste, the alluring mistletoe to his heart. These
thoughts surprised him, and he hurried along in vague discomfort over
the little slope (the natives called it a hill) and up to the straggling
village, called in his papers of description Cherokee Garden for no
earthly reason whatever.

"Is this Cherokee Garden?" he asked of the wrinkled white woman sitting
in the doorway of the solitary suburban residence.

"This ain't the hull of it, young man," she answered severely, taking
her corn-cob pipe out of her mouth and looking at Ellesworth as if he
had cast an aspersion upon a city. "Ye kin ride down the road a right
smart bit until ye come to the kyars. The post office is on the other
side o' the track." This she said with an accent of resentment.

"Do you know where a man called William Benson lives, whom I understand
has a--a farm here somewhere?"

When Ellesworth had finished his question the old woman got up and,
supported by her stick, tottered to his side, and peered up into his
face.

"Air ye any kin ter Bill Benson? Air ye an'thin' to him?"

"No, no," stammered Ellesworth, taken aback. "I only wanted to call on
him. Why?"

"Ye'll hev'ter go right smart ways to find Bill Benson," replied the old
woman, grimly.

She peered up into his face again, and shook her head. Ellesworth,
wondering whether his creditor had "skipped to Cuba to avoid payment,"
awaited information.

"Bill Benson" (she stopped to take a whiff, and then proceeded with a
tone of awe caught from Methodist preachers) "hez gone to glory!"

"Where?" asked Boston, ignorant of the longitude and latitude of that
strange place.

"To glory, young man!" repeated the old woman, impressively. "Elder
Jones buried Bill in Tantallon buryin' ground, four mile from hyar down
the track," added the woman, severely.

Her voice dropped to a whisper on the last words, and she looked to see
their effect upon the horseman. The red handkerchief, tied over her head
and under her chin, had fallen down behind her neck and revealed a bald
head. The cock crew from the step of the hut.

Benson dead! This, then, accounted for the note so long overdue. Benson
had been sick, and could not pay. Why had Ellesworth not known this