me. Of course, I _know_ better,
but I pretend not to, and often I can fool myself for half an hour at a
time. And of course I shouldn't care to have that dog find out that this
apparently Peavey world--flawlessly Peavey--has a streak of Lansdale
running through it--that it has even its moments of curious, hard
suspicion, of distrust, of downright disbelief in all the good
things,--in short, its Miss Katherine Lansdale moments, if you will
pardon that hastily contrived metaphor."

Perceiving that further concealment would be unavailing, I added quite
openly: "Now, young woman, you see that I know your secret. I felt it in
the dark of our first meeting; it has since become plainer,--too plain.
You know too much--far more than is good for either Jim or me to know.
You can't believe enough--all those things that Jim and I have found it
best to believe. I myself always fear that I shall be led into ways of
unbelief in your presence. That is why I can't trust Jim with you alone,
and why I could hardly trust myself there without Jim's sustaining
looks--that is why, in fact, that I shall try to shun you in all but
your approximately Peavey moments. I trust now that this shall be the
last time I must ever speak bitterly in your presence. You are
sufficiently warned."

While I spoke she had ceased rowing, and we drifted with the current. A
long time we drifted, and I rejoiced to see that I had taunted Miss
Lansdale into something like interest. I saw that she was uncertain as
to the degree of seriousness I had meant my words to convey. Once she
began as if they were wholly serious, and once again as if they had been
wholly unserious. If she at last appeared to suspect that she must
effect a compromise, I dare say she was as nearly correct as I could
have put her with any words I knew.

"But you had that dog from the first," she at length decided to say,
clearly in self-defence, "and still you are worried and obliged to guard
him from evil companions."

"You confess," I exclaimed in triumph.

"You had him as a puppy. Could you have expected so much of him if he
had run wild, in a world where any number of good dogs learn unbelief,
where they are shocked into it, all in a moment?"

"I didn't have myself from the first," I reminded her, "and I believe
only a few trifles less than Jim does. I know that robins ascend without
visible means, for example, if you run at them; but I believe it's good
to run at them just the same, e