“Well, I know ’twant,” Still repeated, hotly. “If ’twas on thar when he brought it here he got ’t on it himself, and I’ll take my oath to it. Well, that don’t make any difference in the bond, I s’pose? It’s just as good with that on it as if ’twant?” “Oh, yes; that’s so,” said Mr. Dockett. “If it’s all right every other way, that won’t hurt it.” Still looked at him sharply. As they drove home, Still, after a long period of silence, suddenly asked Major Welch, within what time after a case was ended a man could bring a suit to upset it. “Well, I don’t know what the statutes of this State are, but he can generally bring it without limit, on the ground of fraud,” said the Major, “unless he is estopped by laches.” “What’s that?” asked Still, somewhat huskily, and the Major started to explain; but Still was taken with another of his ill turns. That same afternoon, a little before Major Welch’s return, Ruth was walking about the yard, looking, every now and then, across the hill, in the direction of Red Rock, from which her father should soon be coming, when, as she passed near a cherry-tree, she observed that some of the fruit was already ripe. One or two branches were not very high. She had been feeling a little lonely, and it occurred to her that it would be great fun to climb the tree. She had once been a good climber, and she remembered the scoldings she had received for it from her mother, who regarded it as “essentially frivolous,” and had once, as a punishment, set her to learn all the names of all the branches of a tree which hung on the nursery wall, and represented, allegorically, all the virtues and vices, together with a perfect network of subsidiary qualities. She could remember many of them now— “Faith, Hope, Temperance,” and so on. “Dear mamma,”she thought, with a pang of homesickness, “I wish she were here now.” This reflection only made her more lonely, and to overcome the feeling she turned to the more material and attractive tree. “I could climb that tree easily enough,” she said,”and there’s no one to know anything about it. Even mamma would not mind that much. Besides, I could see papa from a greater distance and I’ll get him some cherries for his tea.”