"No, don't leave me; just set; I'll be better in a spell." He fetched her a glass of water, from which she gulped spasmodically, clutching with cold, wet fingers to his wrist. Then the tension relaxed, her breathing grew more normal. "It's by now," she proclaimed unsteadily. "I'm going back the road for a little ginger," he told her from the edge of the porch; "we'd best have the bottle filled." The drug store was dark, closed for the night, and Gordon continued to Simmons' store. The row of swinging, kerosene lamps cast a thick yellow radiance over the long counters, the variously laden shelves. The store was filled with the odor of coffee, the penetrating smell of print muslins. "Mr. Simmons wants you a minute in the office," the clerk responded indirectly to his request for ginger. Gordon instinctively masked a gathering premonition of trouble. "Fill her up the while," he demanded, pushing forward the empty bottle. Valentine Simmons was a small man with a pinkly bald head ornamented with fluffs of white hair like cotton wool above his ears, and precise, shaven lips forever awry in the pronouncing of rallying or benevolent sentences; these, with appropriate religious sentiments, formed nine-tenths of his discourse, through which the rare words that revealed his purposes, his desires, flashed like slender and ruthless knives. He was bending over a tall, narrow ledger when Gordon entered the office; but he immediately closed the book and swung about in his chair. The small enclosure was hot, and filled with the odor of scorching metal, the buzzing of a large, blundering fly. "Ah!" Valentine Simmons exclaimed pleasantly; "our link with the outer world, our faithful messenger.... I wanted to see you; ah, yes." He turned over the pages of a second, heavier ledger at his hand. "Here it is--Gordon Makimmon, good Scotch Presbyterian name. Five hundred and thirty dollars," he said suddenly, unexpectedly. Gordon was unable to credit his senses, the fact that this was the sum of his indebtedness; it was an absurd mistake, and he said so. "Everything listed against its date," the other returned imperturbably, "down to a pair of white buck shoes for a lady to-day--a generous present for some enslaver." "My sister," Gordon muttered ineptly. Five hundred and thirty dollars, he repeated incredulously to himself. Five hundred.... "How long has it been standing?" he asked. The other consulted the book. "Two years, a month and four days," he returned exactly. "But no notice was served on me; nothing was said about my bill." "Ah, we don't like to annoy old friends; just a little word at necessary intervals."