"Shoot him, papa, shoot him! Shoot him!" Sweet as a silver bell rang out the girl's voice, more like a ripple of idle song than a murderous request, and then a clear, happy laugh went echoing off through the woods in which the carriage stood. Slowly, steadily, Luke let fall the breech of his gun upon the ground beside him. The engineer smiled grimly and lowered his pistol, while the corps, headed by the surveyor, took up its line of march to the point where work had been so suddenly left off. The young lady clapped her tiny white hands for joy. A big black woodpecker began to cackle in a tree hard by. Luke felt like a man in a dream. The whole adventure, so far, had been clothed in most unreal seeming. It can hardly be told how, by rapid transitions from one thing to another in his talk, the engineer drew Luke's mind away from the late difficulty and gradually aroused in him a kindly feeling. In less than ten minutes the two men were sitting side by side on a log, smoking cigars from the engineer's pouch and chatting calmly, amicably. Luke's eyes often rested steadily fixed in the direction of the carriage. Through the thin veil of tobacco smoke the face of the young girl seemed to the farmer angelic in its beauty. All around the sweets of summer rose and fell, and drifted like scarcely visible shining mists, fraught with the spice of leaf and perfume of blossom, agitated by swells of tricksy wind, going on and on to the mysterious goal of the season. The two men talked on until the corps had pushed the line of survey far past them into the cool, shady deeps of the woods, whence their voices came back fainter and fainter every moment. At length the engineer arose, and stretching out his hand to Luke, said: "Mr. Plunkett, I'm sure I'll be able to serve you some time; let us be friends. I shall be in this vicinity most of the time till the road is built. No doubt I can show a way to profit by the construction of a railroad across your land. If you are sharp it will make your fortune. I like your independent way, sir, and hope to know you better. Here is my card." Luke took the bit of pasteboard without saying a word. They shook hands and the engineer got into his carriage.