e axe in hand she came
to him. Her large hazel eyes held a mystic charm behind the long lashes
which seemed actually to melt into the soft pinkness of her skin.

"Good-morning, Alfred," she greeted him, her lips curling in a smile. "I
know this ain't where you sell goods, but I thought it might save me a
trip to town to ask you if you keep axes at your store. This old plug of
a thing is about as sharp as a sledgehammer."

"I've got a few poked away behind the counters somewhere," he laughed,
as he always did over her droll and original speech, "but the handles
ain't in them, and that is a job for a blacksmith, if they are ever made
to hold. Let me see that thing." He took the axe from her, and ran his
thumb along the blunt and gapped edge. "Look here, Dixie," he said, "I
thought you was too sensible a farmer to discard good tools. This axe is
an old-timer; you don't find such good-tempered steel in the axes made
to sell these days, with their lying red and blue labels pasted on 'em.
Give this one a good grinding and it will chop all the wood you'll ever
want to cut. Let me have it this morning. I've got a grindstone at the
store, and I'll make Pomp put a barber's edge on it."

"Of course you'll let me pay--"

"Pay nothing!" he broke in. "That nigger is taking the dry rot; he's
asleep under the counter half the time. The idea of you delving in the
hot sun with a tool that won't cut mud! You oughtn't to chop wood,
nohow. You ain't built for it. Your place is in the parlor of some rich
man's house, leaning back in a rocking-chair, with a good carpet under
foot."

"That's the song mother and Aunt Mandy sing from morning to night," the
girl smiled, showing her perfect teeth. "They want me to quit work, and
get some man to tote my load. I reckon if the average young fellow out
looking for a wife could see behind the hedge he'd think twice before he
jumped into the thorns."

Henley laughed again, his eyes resting admiringly on her animated face.
"I reckon the gals wouldn't primp so much either if they could see the
insides of their prize-packages," he returned. "I reckon neither side is
as wise while courting is going on as they are after the knot is tied.
Folks hereabouts certainly have plenty to say about me and my venture."

There was a frank admission of the truth of his remark in the girl's
reply. "Well, if I was you, I wouldn't let anything they say bother me,"
she said, sympathetically. "Mean people will say mean