as quick as you can, please, Shade."

After this the matter dropped. Two or three times Johnnie reminded Shade
of his promise to bring the little strips back, and always he had an
excuse ready for her: he had been very busy--the metal he wanted was out
of stock--he would fix them for her just as soon as he could. With every
interview his manner toward herself grew kinder--more distinctly that
of a lover.

The loom-fixers and mechanics, belonging, be it remembered, to a
trades-union, were out of all the mills by five o'clock. It was a
significant point for any student of economic conditions to note these
strapping young males sitting at ease upon the porches of their homes or
boarding houses, when the sweating, fagged women weavers and childish
spinners trooped across the bridges an hour after. Johnnie was
surprised, therefore, one evening, nearly two weeks later, to find Shade
waiting for her at the door of the mill.

"I wish't you'd walk a piece up the Gap road with me, I want to have
speech with you," the young fellow told her.

"I can't go far; I 'most always try to be home in time to help Aunt
Mavity put supper on the table, or anyway to wash up the dishes for
her," the girl replied to him.

"All right," agreed Buckheath briefly. "Wait here a minute and let me
get some things I want to take along."

He stopped at a little shed back of the offices, sometimes called the
garage because Stoddard's car stood in it. Johnnie dropped down on a box
at the door and the young fellow went inside and began searching the
pockets of a coat hanging on a peg. He spoke over his shoulder to her.

"What's the matter with you here lately since you got your raise? 'Pears
like you won't look at a body."

"Haven't I seemed friendly?" Johnnie returned, with a deprecating smile.
"I reckon I'm just tired. Seems like I'm tired every minute of the
day--and I couldn't tell you why. I sure don't have anything hard to do.
I think sometimes I need the good hard work I used to have back in the
mountains to get rested on."

She laughed up at him, and Buckheath's emotional nature answered with a
dull anger, which was his only reply to her attraction.

"I was going to invite you to go to a dance in at Watauga, Saturday
night," he said sullenly; "but I reckon if you're tired all the time,
you don't want to go."

He had hoped and expected that she would say she was not too tired to go
anywhere that he wished her to. His disappointment was di