Without touching Jason's hand again, Dorinda walked quickly down the hall and out of the house. Not until they were driving over Gooseneck Creek, did it occur to her that she had not opened her lips at Five Oaks. "I hope you're satisfied, Dorinda," Nathan remarked, with hilarity. "Yes, I'm satisfied." "I fancied you looked kind of down in the mouth while we were in the room. You ain't changed your mind about wanting the farm, have you?" "Oh, no, I haven't changed my mind." "I'm glad of that. You never can tell about a woman. He seemed to think that Lena was good to look at." Though she had believed that her anger was over, the embers grew red and then grey again. Middle age as an attitude of mind might enjoy an immunity from peril, but it suffered, she found, from the disadvantages of an unstable equilibrium. "I wonder if he has forgotten Geneva," she observed irrelevantly. At the reminder of that tragic figure Nathan's hilarity died. "When a thing like that has happened to a man," he responded, "he doesn't usually keep the dry bones lying around to look at." The sun was beginning to go down and the sandy stretch of road, where the shadow of the surrey glided ahead of them, glittered like silver. After the intense heat of the day the fitful breeze was as torrid as the air from an oven. "John Abner promised he would drive me over to the ice cream festival at the church," Lena said hopefully. There were pearly beads on her shell-like brow and Nathan's leathery face was streaming with perspiration. "Poor John Abner! It is so hot and he will be tired!" protested Dorinda, though she was aware that any protest was futile, for Lena possessed the obstinacy peculiar to many weak-minded women. "He needn't stay," retorted the girl. "Somebody will be sure to bring me home." She pressed her pink lips together and smiled with the secret wisdom of instinct. As soon as they reached the house Dorinda slipped into her gingham dress and hurried out to the barn. Milking had already begun, but she knew that it would proceed with negligence if she were long absent. In summer, as in winter, they had supper after dark, and for a little while when the meal was over she liked to rest on the porch with Nathan and John Abner. To-night, John Abner was away with Lena, and when Dorinda came out into the air, she dropped, with a sigh of relief, into the hammock beneath the climbing rose Nathan had planted. "I never felt anything like the heat," she said, "there's not a breath anywhere." Nathan stirred in the darkness and removed his pipe from his mouth. "Yes, if it don't break soon, the drought will go hard with the crops." "And with the dairy too. The ice melts so fast I can't keep the butter firm."