did actually consider keeping him
out. "I don't know," she blundered. "I'm alone, but I never feel
certain----"

She never felt certain, he concluded, whether her peril might not be
upon her. But he had a sense of present security. He had seen Tenney
disappearing inside the fringe of woods.

"Let me come in," he said quietly. "I want to talk to you. It's cold for
you out here."

She moved aside and he followed her to the kitchen. The room was
steaming with warmth, the smell of apple sauce and a boiling ham. Her
moulding board, dusted with flour, was on the table, and her yellow
mixing bowl beside it. Raven did not think what household duties he
might be delaying, but the scene was sweet to him: a haven of homely
comfort where she ought to find herself secure. There was, in the one
casual glance he took, no sign of the child, and he was glad. That
strange, silent witness, since Nan and Charlotte had both, by a phrase,
banished the little creature into an alien room of its own, had begun to
embarrass him. He wanted to talk to Tira alone.

"Baby's in the bedroom," said Tira, answering his thought. "When he's in
here, I wake him up steppin' round."

Raven stood waiting for her to sit, and she drew forward a chair,
placing it to give her an oblique view from the window. Having seated
herself, she asked him, with a shy hospitality:

"Won't you set?"

He drew a chair nearer her and his eyes sought her in the light of what
Nan had said. Yes, she was beautiful. Her blue calico, faded to a
softness suited to old pictures, answered the blue of her eyes. The
wistful look of her face had deepened. It was all over a gentle
interrogation of sweet patience and unrest.

"So Nan came over," he began. It seemed the only way to pierce her
reserve, at once, by a straight shaft. "You wouldn't do what she wanted
you to."

She shook her head.

"Why wouldn't you?" he urged, and then she did answer, not ungraciously,
but with a shy courtesy:

"I didn't feel to."

"It would be"--he hesitated for a word and found an ineffectual
one--"nice, if you could talk to her. She wouldn't tell."

"I don't," said Tira, still with the same gentle obstinacy, "hold much
with talkin'."

Raven, because he had her to himself and the time was short, determined
not to spare her for lack of a searching word.

"Tira," he said, and she smiled a little, mysteriously to him but really
because she loved to hear him use her name, "things aren't getting