suspicion. High voices and strange remarks had been overheard by folk
strolling casually, of a pleasant evening, past the Hautville house.

In truth, at first old David Hautville and all his sons except Eugene
had risen against Burr and Madelon, all their pride in arms that she
should return to this man who had once forsaken her for another. But
later they had yielded, for their pride was undermined by their own
gloomy convictions as to Madelon, which they confided not to one
another. However, the boy Richard still greeted Burr surlily, with a
fierce black flash under frowning brows, and scarcely spoke to
Madelon at all until the day before her marriage. That was set some
two months after Dorothy's.

Burr and Madelon, during the days of their betrothal, were as closely
beset by spies on every hand as a party of Madelon's old kindred
might have been, encamped in a wooded country, where every bush
veiled savage eyes and every tree stood in front of a foeman, but
they did not know it. Folk knew when Mrs. Gordon went to visit her
son's betrothed, though 'twas on a dark evening. They knew what she
wore, and how long she stayed. They knew when Madelon returned her
visit; they knew, to remember, in many cases, more details of their
daily lives than Burr and Madelon themselves.

Madelon had few wedding preparations to make. The wedding-garments
which she had stitched with sorrow for her marriage with Lot would
serve her now. She employed her time in increasing still further the
household stores of linen for her father's and brothers' use, when
she should be gone, and in making a great stock of sweet-sauce,
jelly, and cordials from the fruits and berries of the season.

One afternoon in late summer, when the high blackberries were ripe,
Madelon set forth with a great basket on her arm. A fine cordial,
good for many ills, she knew how to make from the berries, and had
planned to brew a goodly quantity this year. She went down the road a
way, then over some bars, with her hands on the highest and a spring
like a willow branch set free, across a pasture where some red cows
were grazing, then over another set of bars, into a rough and shaggy
land sloping gradually into a hill. Here the high blackberries grew
in great thorny thickets, and Madelon pressed among them warily and
began picking. She had not picked long--indeed the bottom of her
basket was not covered--when she heard a rustle in the bushes behind
her and looked over he