“Thought I’d help,” he said in a low voice, to keep Pearl from overhearing. “You must be tired and bewildered, and washing up for nine people is no joke. Give me the glasses first,” he added casually as he reached for the wire soap shaker that hung on a nail above the sink. “Oh, please,” Sally gasped in consternation. “I can do them. It won’t take me any time. Why, at the Home, six of us girls would wash dishes for three hundred. They wouldn’t like it,” she added in a terrified whisper, her eyes fluttering first toward the dining room door, then toward the big pantry where Mrs. Carson was picking over her blackberries. “I like to wash dishes,” David said firmly, and that settled it, at least so far as he was concerned. Sally was trotting happily between table and cupboard when Pearl came in, stormy-eyed, sullen-mouthed. “Well, I must say, you’re a quick worker—and I don’t mean on dishes!” she snapped at Sally. “So this is the way you have to study, Mr. David Nash! But I suppose she pulled a sob story on you and just roped you in. You’d better find out right now, Miss Sally Ford, that you can’t shirk your work on his farm. That’s not what Papa got you for—” “I insisted on helping with the dishes, Pearl,” David interrupted the bitter tirade in his firm, quiet way. “Want to get a dish cloth and help dry them?” There was a twinkle in his eyes and he winked ever so slightly at Sally. “I’ve got to dress. Five or six of the bunch are coming over to dance to the radio music. Did you hear what I said about you?” Pearl answered, her shallow blue eyes coquetting with David. “About me?” David pretended surprise. “Is that all, Sally? Well, I’ll go on up to my room and study awhile, if I can stay awake.” “You’re going to dance with me—with us,” Pearl wailed, her flat voice harsh with disappointment. “I told Ross Willis to bring another partner for himself, because I was counting on you—” “Awfully sorry, but I’ve got to study. I thought I told you at supper that I had to study,” David reminded her mildly, but there was the steel of determination in his casual voice. Pearl flung out of the room then, her face twisted with the first grimaces of crying. “We’d better wash out and rinse these dish cloths,” David said imperturbably, but his gold-flecked eyes and his strong, characterful mouth smiled at Sally. “My mother taught me that—and a good many other things.” A little later, under cover of the swishing of water in the granite dish pan, David spoke in a low voice to the girl who worked so happily at his side: “Take it as easy as you can. They’ll work you to death if you let them. And—if you need any help, _day or night_,” he emphasized the words significantly, so that once again a pulse of fear throbbed in Sally’s throat, “just call on me. Remember, I’m an orphan myself. But it’s easier for a boy. The world can be mighty hard on a girl alone.”