"Sir," returned Wholesome, approaching him and quite forgetting his plain speech to make it plainer, "your manners do little credit to your age or your place. Listen: I told you to speak no more of this matter;" and he seized him by the lappel of his coat and drew him aside a few paces. "For your own sake, I mean. Let it die out, with no more of talk or nonsense." "For my sake!" exclaimed the overseer; "and why? Most surely thee forgets theeself." "For your own sake," said Wholesome, drawing him still farther away, and bending toward him, so that his words were lost to Schmidt and Priscilla, "and for your son John's. It was he I struck to-day." Mr. Oldmixon grew white and staggered as if stricken. "Why did thee not come and tell me?" he said. "It had been kinder; and where is that unhappy man?" "I do not know," returned Wholesome. "Nevertheless, be it he or another, thee was in the wrong, and I have done my duty,--God help us all! and is my son yet alive?" and so saying, he turned away, and without other words walked through the house with uncertain steps and went down the street, while Wholesome, with softened face, watched him from the doorstep. Then he went back quietly into the garden, and turning to Schmidt, said, "Will you oblige me by leaving me with Mistress White? I will explain to thee by and by." Schmidt looked up surprised, but seeing how pale and stern he looked, rose and went into the house. The woman looked up expectant. "Priscilla, the time has come when thee must choose between me and him." "He has come back? I knew always he would come." "Yes, he has come back: I saw him to-day," said Wholesome, "and the John Oldmixon of to-day is more than ever cruel and brutal. Will thee trust me to make thee believe that?" "I believe thee," she returned; "but because he is this and worse, shall I forget my word or turn aside from that which, if bitter for me, may save his soul alive?" "And yet you love me?" "Have I said so?" she murmured with a half smile. The young man came closer and seized both hands in his: "Will it not be a greater sin, loving me, to marry him?" "But he may never ask me, and then I shall wait, for I had better die fit in soul to be yours than come to you unworthy of a good man's love." He dropped her hands and moved slowly away, she watching him with full eyes. Then he turned and said, "But should he fall--fall as he must--and come to be what his life will surely make him, a felon whom no woman could marry--" "Thee makes duty hard for me, Richard," she answered. "Do not make me think thee cruel. When in God's good time he shall send me back the words of promise I wrote when he went away a disgraced man, to whom, nevertheless I owed my life, then--Oh, Richard, I love thee! Do not hurt me. Pray for me and him." "God help us!" he said. "We have great need, to be helped;" and suddenly leaning over he kissed her forehead for the first time, and went away up the garden and into the house. EDWARD KEARSLEY.