, and murmur:

[Illustration: 'ANNABEL, HOW PURTY YOU LOOK.' 173]

"Annabel, how purty you look. How you've growed, and all purtier. I'm
awfully glad to see you. That's what I most wanted to come home for."

Then his face burned with new blushes to think how much he had said.
They sat down, he still holding her hand, with his eyes fixed upon her
face. Somehow, in the mysterious telegraphy of first love, they so fully
understood one another that words were unnecessary.

Speechless, but fuller of happiness than they ever dreamed was possible
in the world, they sat with clasped hands until Maria came back, calling
out:

"Time's up. The folks say that they can't let Annabel have you any
longer. Come into the sitting-room, both of you. Come along, Si. Come
along, Annabel."

Si rose obediently, but Annabel declined to go. She did not say why,
but Maria, with a woman's instincts, knew that she wanted to be alone to
think it all over. Maria therefore hurried back.

"Good-by, Annabel," he said, pressing her hand again. "I'll write to you
first thing when I git back."

"Good-by, Si. God keep you for me, safe through battles and dangers."

She turned away to hide her bursting tears.

It was astonishing how quick midnight came. When the clock striking 12
smote the ears of the family, nobody had said, heard or asked one tithe
of what he or she was burning eager to, yet the parting was but a little
more than two brief hours away.

With a heart heavier even than when she parted from her boy for the
first time, Mrs. Klegg arose, and sought to distract her thoughts
by collecting as big a package as they could carry of the choicest
eatables. How often she stopped to cry softly into her apron not
even the girls knew, for she was resolved to keep up a brave front,
especially before Si, and would carefully wash all traces of tears from
her face, and clear the sobs from her throat before re-entering the room
where he was.

Shorty had at once been taken to the hearts of everyone, and all the
older men urged him to "come back here as soon as the war's over, marry
a nice girl, and settle down among us."

Si received many compliments upon his development into such a fine,
stalwart man.

One after another said:

"Si, what a fine, big man you've growed into. I declare, you're a credit
to your father and mother and the settlement. We all expect you to come
back a Captain or a Colonel, and we'll run you for Sheriff or County
Comm