cy odour of the bark was afterward
associated in Johnnie's mind with what he had then to say.

"Johnnie," he began, facing around and barring her way, when they were
finally alone together between the trees, "do you remember the last time
you and me was on this piece of road here--do you?"

He had intended to remind her of the evening she came to Cottonville:
but instead, recollection built for her once more the picture of that
slope bathed in Sabbath sunshine. There was the fork where the Hardwick
carriage had turned off; to this side went Shade and his fellows, with
Mandy and the girls following; and down the middle of the road she
herself came, seated in the car beside Stoddard.

For a moment memory choked and blinded Johnnie. She could neither see
the path before them, nor find the voice to answer her questioner. The
bleak pathos of her situation came home to her, and tears of rare
self-pity filled her eyes. Why was it a disgrace that Stoddard should
treat her kindly? Why must she be ashamed of her feeling for him?
Shade's voice broke in harshly.

"Do you remember? You ain't forgot, have you? Ever since that time I've
intended to speak to you--to tell you--"

"Well, you needn't do it," she interrupted him passionately.

"I won't hear a word against Mr. Stoddard, if that's what you're aiming
at."

Buckheath fell back a pace and stared with angry eyes.

"Stoddard--Gray Stoddard?" he repeated. "What's a swell like that got to
do with you and me, Johnnie Consadine? You want to let Gray Stoddard and
his kind alone--yes, and make them let you alone, if you and me are
going to marry."

It was Johnnie's turn to stare.

"If we're going to marry!" she echoed blankly--"going to marry!" The
girl had had her lovers. Despite hard work and the stigma of belonging
to the borrowing Passmore family, Johnnie had commanded the homage of
more than one heart. She was not without a healthy young woman's relish
for this sort of admiration; but Shade Buckheath's proposal came with so
little grace, in such almost sinister form, that she scarcely
recognized it.

"Yes, if we're going to wed," reiterated Buckheath sullenly. "I'm
willin' to have you."

Johnnie's tense, almost tragic manner relaxed. She laughed suddenly.

"I didn't know you was joking, Shade," she said good-humouredly. "I took
you to be in earnest. You'll have to excuse me."

"I am in earnest," Buckheath told her, almost fiercely. "I reckon I'm a
fool; but I wan