n the unveiled
admiration that startled from the eyes of the men, the meaning of her
mother's fears.

Yet withal it was a kindly admiration not unmixed with awe. For there
was about her beauty a touch of the spiritual which set her above the
common run of women, making men feel her purity and sweetness, and
inclining their hearts to worship rather than be bold.

The Boy had been right. Pop Wallis was asleep and out of the way. From a
little shed room at one end his snoring marked time in the silence that
the advent of the girl made in the place.

In the doorway of the kitchen offset Mom Wallis stood with her
passionless face--a face from which all emotions had long ago been
burned by cruel fires--and looked at the girl, whose expression was
vivid with her opening life all haloed in a rosy glow.

A kind of wistful contortion passed over Mom Wallis's hopeless
countenance, as if she saw before her in all its possibility of
perfection the life that she herself had lost. Perhaps it was no longer
possible for her features to show tenderness, but a glow of something
like it burned in her eyes, though she only turned away with the same
old apathetic air, and without a word went about preparing a meal for
the stranger.

Margaret looked wildly, fearfully, around the rough assemblage when she
first entered the long, low room, but instantly the boy introduced her
as "the new teacher for the Ridge School beyond the Junction," and these
were Long Bill, Big Jim, the Fiddling Boss, Jasper Kemp, Fade-away
Forbes, Stocky, Croaker, and Fudge. An inspiration fell upon the
frightened girl, and she acknowledged the introduction by a radiant
smile, followed by the offering of her small gloved hand. Each man in
dumb bewilderment instantly became her slave, and accepted the offered
hand with more or less pleasure and embarrassment. The girl proved her
right to be called tactful, and, seeing her advantage, followed it up
quickly by a few bright words. These men were of an utterly different
type from any she had ever met before, but they had in their eyes a kind
of homage which Pop Wallis had not shown and they were not repulsive to
her. Besides, the Boy was in the background, and her nerve had returned.
The Boy knew how a lady should be treated. She was quite ready to "play
up" to his lead.

It was the Boy who brought the only chair the bunk-house afforded, a
rude, home-made affair, and helped her off with her coat and hat in his
easy, f