spects?
were the aunt's next inquiries. She shook her head at the answers which
she received; and she also shook her head over her niece's emphatic
denial that her heart was lost to this man. But when their parting came,
the old lady said: "God bless you and keep you, my dear. I'll not try to
manage you. They managed me--" A sigh spoke the rest of this sentence.
"But I'm not worried about you--at least, not very much. You have never
done anything that was not worthy of the Starks. And if you're going
to take him, do it before I die so that I can bid him welcome for your
sake. God bless you, my dear."

And after the girl had gone back to Bennington, the great-aunt had this
thought: "She is like us all. She wants a man that is a man." Nor did
the old lady breathe her knowledge to any member of the family. For she
was a loyal spirit, and her girl's confidence was sacred to her.

"Besides," she reflected, "if even I can do nothing with her, what a
mess THEY'D make of it! We should hear of her elopement next."

So Molly's immediate family never saw that photograph, and never heard
a word from her upon this subject. But on the day that she left for Bear
Creek, as they sat missing her and discussing her visit in the evening,
Mrs. Bell observed: "Mother, how did you think she was?"--"I never saw
her better, Sarah. That horrible place seems to agree with her."--"Oh,
yes, agree. It seemed to me--"--"Well?"--"Oh, just somehow that she
was thinking."--"Thinking?"--"Well, I believe she has something on her
mind."--"You mean a man," said Andrew Bell.--"A man, Andrew?"--"Yes,
Mrs. Wood, that's what Sarah always means."

It may be mentioned that Sarah's surmises did not greatly contribute to
her mother's happiness. And rumor is so strange a thing that presently
from the malicious outside air came a vague and dreadful word--one of
those words that cannot be traced to its source. Somebody said to Andrew
Bell that they heard Miss Molly Wood was engaged to marry a RUSTLER.

"Heavens, Andrew!" said his wife; "what is a rustler?"

It was not in any dictionary, and current translations of it were
inconsistent. A man at Hoosic Falls said that he had passed through
Cheyenne, and heard the term applied in a complimentary way to people
who were alive and pushing. Another man had always supposed it meant
some kind of horse. But the most alarming version of all was that a
rustler was a cattle thief.

Now the truth is that all these meanings