Nobody's Child. Dejeans Elizabeth

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      The young people smiled covertly, but Edward asked with genuine concern: "Bear Brokaw rob you, Aunt Carlotta! Why, I remember Bear – I used to go hunting with him. I thought there wasn't an honester man living than Bear Brokaw."

      "He is a thief, Edward," Mrs. Morrison reiterated decidedly.

      Edward looked his surprise.

      "Ben Brokaw bought a tree of Aunt Carlotta Morrison," Judith said demurely. The look she flashed on Baird was a-gleam with mirth.

      Edward glanced casually about the table and caught the covert smiles. "Well?" he questioned more equably.

      Baird had discovered that the interests of the clan were entirely local and centered in themselves; he had not heard a single remark that ventured beyond their native state. They evidently criticized one another freely, but Baird judged that any stranger who essayed the same freedom would be set upon by the entire connection, with the ferocity of a pack of hounds.

      "It was a thoroughly thievish transaction, Edward," Mrs. Morrison maintained warmly. "You know I never approved of the man – a creature that climbs trees like a monkey and sleeps out in the woods like a savage. Your uncle would have known better, but I consented to sell him that tree – you know, one of the big chestnuts down by the cabins. It was dead, and I wanted it down, and I didn't tell Ben I thought he was crazy when he wanted me to sign a slip of paper, just sayin' that I'd sold the tree to him, half shares on the wood. I thought the lumberin' old thing had got some funny notion. But he knew what he was about… Edward, it was a honey-tree! He'd been watching and had seen the bees goin' in and out. He got forty buckets of honey out of that tree!.. If that's not stealing, I don't know what is, and I think the family ought to boycott him."

      Edward kept his countenance in spite of the titter about him. "Did he cord his wood according to agreement?" he asked.

      "Yes, he did," Mrs. Morrison admitted.

      "He was doing up-to-date business – that's all, Aunt Carlotta," Judith remarked.

      "Something more than that," Edward said. "I remember Uncle Morrison broke up some of his traps and warned him off the property. You urged him to it, if I remember, Aunt Carlotta."

      "But think of such revengefulness – after all these years! And your uncle dead, too!"

      "There's a good deal of such undying hatred about," Edward answered evenly. "It's a pity." He looked down at his plate.

      But the younger people were still smiling. "Don't worry, Aunt Carlotta, Bear isn't going to work for any of us," one of the Copeley boys said. "I saw him this evenin' on my way here – he's at the Pennimans'… By the way – he said Coats Penniman was coming home."

      It was Judith's perceptible start and Edward's quick lift of the head that arrested Baird's attention. But neither of them spoke; it was Garvin who asked swiftly, "When is he coming?"

      "To-morrow, Bear said."

      Garvin made no comment, but Mr. Copeley exclaimed, "Why didn't you tell your bit of news sooner, my boy?.. It means Coats will take hold of the place. I'm afraid it does, Ed."

      His remark had some significance that was evidently not clear to other members of the family, for Mrs. Morrison asked, "Why, what difference does it make to you who runs the Penniman place, Edward?"

      Edward paid no attention to her question; he was motioning to one of the servants to bring him more wine, and when his glass was filled he emptied it at a draft. It did not flush him, however; if anything, he looked paler. It struck Baird that the man must be ill, there must be some reason for such persistent pallor.

      The dinner was nearing an end, and Baird himself was warmed through and through. He had been well treated. Priscilla Copeley had played prettily with him across the table, and not been reproved by her mother; she had promised to ride with him the next day. And Elizabeth Dickenson had said that his name would be on the list for the next Assembly Ball. Baird was not particularly fond of dancing, and a formal ball was a nuisance, but he welcomed her invitation to the next Fair Field Hunt Club meet. Colonel Dickenson was president of the club, and Baird knew that he would be well presented to a group of sportsmen who would be useful to him.

      But it was Judith who stirred him. He was alive to his finger tips with admiration, and fully conscious that he had given himself up to a new experience; delighting in it. In the last few days he had merely touched the fringe of the new thing. He had seen very little of society, nothing at all of people such as these, and Judith was the embodiment of caste. Her ancestry spoke in every atom of her. She was a thoroughbred. She was superb; so truly a part of that old Georgian house with its indelible history.

      And Baird loved to see good generalship. Judith had handled that long tableful of people as a gambler would a pack of cards. She had attended to every one's needs, been observant of every face, and at the same time had devoted herself to him. She had furthered the two girls' play with him, and then had drawn him back to her again. She was wonderful and very beautiful. He was giving her the first adoration he had ever experienced.

      This was the first time Baird had seen Judith with shoulders bared, the tantalizingly perfect shoulders and bust of a mature woman, but that realization did not stir him half so much as his capture of the brilliant glance with which she swept the table. It softened into intimacy when he caught it; took him into her confidence. When, on their way to the ballroom, the negro fiddlers paused under the dining-room window and played the first bars of a waltz, and the young people sprang up to follow, leaving their elders to coffee and wine, Baird was as eager as any one of them. Judith had promised him the first dance, she would be in his arms for the first time, but Baird was thinking less of that than he was of what she was going to say to him, a favor she had said she meant to ask.

      VIII

      THE COLONEL IS SUSPICIOUS

      Like most big-framed men who have a sense of rhythm, Baird danced well, though a little lazily. He found Judith an exhilarating partner. A touch of languor would have made her an exquisite dancer, but Baird discovered that her apparently soft curves covered muscles of tempered steel; there was subdued energy and swift grace in every movement of hers; no wonder she was a perfect horsewoman.

      During their first dance Baird told Judith, in his downright fashion, that she was the most delightful hostess he had ever known and the most beautiful woman he had ever seen; a "wonder-woman" he called her, which, for Nickolas Baird, was a poetic flight. When they danced again, he begged her to set him his task: "What is it you are going to ask of me, Wonder-woman?.. I've never had the least inclination to became a knight until I met you. I'm aching to swear allegiance – what is it I'm to do for you?"

      Baird was accustomed to making love somewhat roughly and altogether carelessly, he merely yielded a little to habit when he held Judith closely and spoke in her ear. Nevertheless, it was plain to even an onlooker that the spell of profound respect was upon him. It made his rough strength appealing, the sort of appeal a young man of Baird's virile type usually makes to a woman older than himself. What he was asking was how best to please her; his forgetfulness implied restrained impetuosity, not presumption. And evidently he pleased Judith; her occasional upward glance was not disapproving.

      So Colonel Dickenson thought as he watched them dance. He had forsaken the dining-room for the moment, and, avoiding the drawing-room where the elder women were gathered, had come by the veranda to the ballroom. He had a jovial remark for each couple as they circled by him, and for Judith and Baird also:

      "I couldn't trip it more lightly myself – damme if I could!"

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