A horseman came round a bend in the road, and he stepped off from her, but they did not permit the horseman to pass between them. He did not put his arm about her again, for now they were within sight of her uncle's desolate house. They saw Wash Sanders sitting on the verandah. Tom carried the jug as far as the yard gate. "Won't you come in?" Sanders called. "I ought to be getting back, I guess." "Might come in and rest awhile." Tom hesitated a moment and then passed through the gate. The girl had run into the house. "How are you getting along?" the young man asked as he began slowly to tramp up the steps. "Porely, mighty porely. Thought I was gone last night--didn't sleep a wink. And I don't eat enough to keep a chicken alive." "Wouldn't you like a mess of young squirrels?" Tom asked, as he sat down in a hickory rocking chair. Of late he had become interested in Wash Sanders, and had resented the neighbors' loss of confidence in him. "Well, you might bring 'em if it ain't too much trouble, but I don't believe I could eat 'em. Don't eat enough to keep a chicken alive." He lifted his pale hand, and with his long finger nail scratched his chin. "What's the doctor's opinion?" Tom asked, not knowing what else to say and feeling that at that moment some expression was justly demanded of him. "The doctors don't say anything now; they've given me up. From the first they saw that I was a dead man. Last doctor that gave me medicine was a fellow from over here at Gum Springs, and I wish I may die dead if he didn't come in one of finishin' me right there on the spot." There came a tap at a window that opened out upon the verandah, and the young fellow, looking around, saw the girl sitting in the "best room." She tried to put on the appearance of having accidentally attracted his attention. He moved his chair closer to the window. "How did you know I was in here?" she asked, looping back the white curtain. "I can always tell where you are without looking." "Are you goin' to make fun of me again?" "If I could even eat enough to keep a chicken alive I think I'd feel better," said Wash Sanders, looking far off down the road. "I never did make fun of you," the young fellow declared in a whisper, leaning close to the window. "And I wish you wouldn't keep on saying that I do." "I won't say it any more if you don't want me to." "But I can't eat and can't sleep, and that settles it," said Wash Sanders. "Of course I don't want you to say it. It makes me think that you are looking for an excuse not to like me." "Would you care very much if I didn't like you?" "If I had taken another slug of that Gum Springs doctor's stuff I couldn't have lived ten minutes longer," said Wash Sanders. And thus they talked until the sun was sinking into the tops of the trees, far down below the bend in the river. CHAPTER VII.