you
have him near you--seated at your table? I don't know what nerves you
have in your bodies, you and David. There's David, hobnobbing with
him. Even that Fanny talking to him as if he were blameless. Never! If
he were dying I wouldn't go near him."

"Haven't you a spark of humanity in you?" asked Therese, flushing
violently.

"Oh, this is something physical," she replied, shivering, "let me
alone."

Therese went out to Gregoire, who stood waiting on the veranda. She
only took his hand and pressed it telling him good-night, and he knew
that it was a dismissal.

There may be lovers, who, under the circumstances, would have felt
sufficient pride to refrain from going to the depot on the following
morning, but Gregoire was not one of them. He was there. He who only a
week before had thought that nothing but her constant presence could
reconcile him with life, had narrowed down the conditions for his
life's happiness now to a glance or a kind word. He stood close to the
steps of the Pullman car that she was about to enter, and as she
passed him he held out his hand, saying "Good-bye." But he held his
hand to no purpose. She was much occupied in taking her valise from
the conductor who had hoisted her up, and who was now shouting in
stentorian tones "All aboard," though there was not a soul with the
slightest intention of boarding the train but herself.

She leaned forward to wave good-bye to Hosmer, and Fanny, and Therese,
who were on the platform; then she was gone.

Gregoire stood looking stupidly at the vanishing train.

"Are you going back with us?" Hosmer asked him. Fanny and Therese had
walked ahead.

"No," he replied, looking at Hosmer with ashen face, "I got to go fine
my hoss."

VIII

With Loose Rein.

"De Lord be praised fu' de blessin's dat he showers down 'pon us," was
Uncle Hiram's graceful conclusion of his supper, after which he pushed
his empty plate aside regretfully, and addressed Aunt Belindy.
" 'Pears to me, Belindy, as you reached a pint wid dem bacon an' greens
to-night, dat you never tetched befo'. De pint o' de flavorin' is w'at
I alludes to."

"All de same, dat ain't gwine to fetch no mo'," was the rather uncivil
reply to this neat compliment to her culinary powers.

"Dah!" cried the youthful Betsy, who formed one of the trio gathered
together in the kitchen at Place-du-Bois. "Jis listen (to) Unc' Hiurm!
Aunt B'lindy neva tetched a han' to dem bacon an' greens. She tole m