ng. "Joe!" she
called, and her voice had the tremulous cadence of a bird summoning its
mate; but it died away in a little smothered cry, for not a rod away was
Joe, and sitting on a large stone was Sarah Norton. They had their backs
towards her, and were engaged in such an earnest conversation that they
did not hear her. Sarah's shoulders moved with her quick breathing; she
had a hand on Joe's arm. Esther stood staring, her thin draperies
circling about her, and her childish face pale. Then she turned, with a
swift impulse to escape, but again she paused, her eyes riveted in the
opposite direction. From where she stood the back door of her future
home was visible, and two men were carrying out furniture. Involuntarily
she opened her lips to call Joe, but no sound came. Yes, they had the
bureau; they would probably take the spindle-legged stand next. A strong
protective instinct is part of possession, and to Esther that sight was
as a magnet to steel. Down the grassy lane she sped, but so lightly that
the couple by the wall were as unobservant of her as they were of the
wind stirring the long grass.

Sarah Norton rose. "I run every step of the way to get here in time.
Please, Joe!" she panted.

He shook his head. "It's real kind of you and your mother, Sarah, but I
guess I ain't going to touch any of the money you worked for and earned,
and I can't help but think, when I talk to Lanham--"

"I tell you, you can't reason with him in his state!"

"Well, I'll raise it somehow."

"You'll have to be quick about it, then," she returned, concisely.
"He'll be here in a few minutes, and it's cash down for the first three
months, or he'll let the other party have it."

"But he promised--"

"That don't make any difference. He's drunk, and he thought father'd
offer to make you an advance; but father just told him to come down
here, that you were being married, and say he'd poke all your things out
in the road without you paid."

The young man turned. Sarah blocked his way. She was a tall,
good-looking girl, somewhat older than Joe, and she looked straight up
into his face.

"See here, Joe; you know what makes father act so, and so do I, and so
does mother, and mother and I want you should take this money; it'll
make us feel better." Sarah flushed, but she looked at him as directly
as if she had been his sister.

Joe felt an admiration for her that was almost reverence. It carried him
for the moment beyond the considerati