“Never!” returned Lettice, steadily. Nevertheless, the telltale blush upon her cheek was not caused by the pink sunbonnet she wore. The little maid of seventeen found it hard to remember her politics when she was listening to the beguiling words of the young New Yorker, who by this time had declared himself her devoted suitor. “Why do you deny me, sweet Lettice?” he said. “Must I leave you altogether? Am I so hateful to you?” This was but the night before, when the two were coming home from a frolic at Becky Lowe’s. “There is Rhoda, you know,” Lettice had answered in a low tone. “Rhoda, yes; but--” he looked down as he gathered Lettice’s hand in his--“but you see, I don’t love Rhoda, nor does she love me.” “How do you know?” Lettice asked, wondering if it were right to allow her hand to lie so long in his clasp. “I know that Rhoda feels toward me as I do toward her. We are excellent friends. I admire and respect her greatly, and to no one would I be more ready to give my confidence, for she is discretion itself; but I know full well who it is that has captured my heart, and besides, did you see your brother James and Rhoda as we passed them just now? I do not think they were thinking of either of us.” “No, I did not notice them, I wasn’t looking; besides, Rhoda doesn’t love James’s politics any more than I do yours.” “Politics? What have sweet lasses like you to do with politics? Let the men settle the affairs of the nation, and let the maidens rule in the court of love, where they are more at home.” Then Lettice sighed and did not draw her hand away. The witching moonlight, the summer night, the low pleading tones of her lover--all these cast a glamour over her, and so swayed her that it seemed that the present alone was the only thing to consider, and Robert walked across the fields to Sylvia’s Ramble, feeling that his wooing would soon come to a happy ending. And yet, the next morning Lettice said never would she go over to the enemy. “I told Brother William I never would. I have promised him,” she said to herself, as she ran swiftly along the path to the old graveyard. Lutie started up from where she was sitting before one of the cabins in the quarter, but Lettice waved her back. “I don’t want you, Lutie,” she said. “You can go back.” “Whar yuh gwine, Miss Letty?” “Never mind where I am going. I don’t need you, and I don’t want you to follow me. Stay where you are.” “Miss Letty gwine whar she gwine. She got no use fo’ nobody dis mawnin’,” Lutie remarked to the old woman before whose cabin she sat.