"Oh, you don't mind a little thing like that," laughed Mary. "It's for the good of your country, my boy. I'm just trying to polish up one of the pillars of the new state that you and mamma and Jack are so interested in. Besides, Pink is so quick to take a hint that it's really interesting to see how much a few suggestions can accomplish." "Humph! You're singing a different tune from what you did at first. You thought he was so tiresome and his laugh so awful and that he had such dreadful taste--" "I still think so," answered Mary, "but I don't notice his wild laugh so much now that I am used to it, and he has many traits which make him very companionable. Besides, I am sorry for him. He'd have been very different if he'd had _your_ opportunities, for instance." "Mary is right," agreed Mrs. Ware, smiling at Norman's grimace. "I think it would be a good thing to ask him to stop when you come back from your ride and have breakfast with us." Norman groaned, then said with a vigorous nod of the head, since his hands were too busy with the skein for gestures, "Well, have him if you want to, but I'll give you fair warning, Mary Ware, if you go to getting off any of your Uncle Jerry remarks on me for his benefit, I'll let the cat right out of the bag." Mary replied with a grimace so much like his own, that it brought on a contest in which the yarn winding was laid aside for a time, while they stood before a mirror, each trying to outdo the other in making grotesque faces. Two mornings after that, in Joyce's khaki riding-suit and the new red Tam-O'-Shanter, Mary swung into the saddle while Pink held both horses, and they were off for an early gallop in the frosty October dawn. The crisp, tingling air of the mountains brought such color into Mary's face, and such buoyancy into her spirits that Pink watched her as he would have watched some rare kind of a bird, skimming along beside him. He had never known such a girl. There was not a particle of coquetry in her attitude towards him. She didn't glance up with pretty appealing side-glances as Sara Downs did, or say little personal things which naturally called for compliments in reply. She was like a boy in her straightforward plain dealing with him, her joking banter, her keen interest in the mountain life and her knowledge of wood lore. One never knew which way her quick-winged thoughts might dart. As they rode on he began to feel as if he was thoroughly awake for the first time in his life.