"I'm glad I wasn't in hearing distance!" "You might have heard to your advantage. I told him that I considered marriage to some determined girl your only chance of reformation." "Marriage!" he almost rose out of his chair. "Heavens, Miss Liz! I've got an alarm clock that does that sort of thing!" "Alarm clock?" she gasped. "Pray, what do you suppose marriage is?" "I've never tried to suppose! I don't want to suppose" She arose with dignity and went toward the door. There was another minute, while he stood making humble apologies to which she seemed indifferent, and then her voice came like the crackling of dry twigs. "I bid you good morning, Mr. McElroy!" CHAPTER IX AT THE UNPAINTED HOUSE Brent sat down and took a deep breath, as men do when they have narrowly escaped disaster. He saw Zack on a mule, heading for the gate, and called him. "Uncle Zack," he whispered, when the old darky had come hat in hand up the steps, "rustle me another julep!" "Lawd, Marse Brent," he cast a suspicious glance toward the front hall, "I'se gotter go clar to Marse Bob's an' cut his haih!" But, translating the look, Brent gave a low laugh, saying: "She won't be out again for awhile. Hustle, Zack! I've just been frozen to death!" The old man thrust the empty goblet under his coat and quickly returned with another, invitingly frosted. "Ain' she turr'ble sometimes, Marse Brent?" he asked in a confidential undertone. "She done tol' me yisterday dat I'se gwine git th'owed clar to de bottom of hell, an' den criss-cross all over de coals, ef I don' stop makin' juleps for Marse John an' you! Do you reckon I'se gwine git all dat misery?" "Betcher life," Brent answered, taking a few swallows and leaning back with a sigh of satisfaction. "That's all coming to you; but d'you want to know what the Colonel and I've decided to do if you quit making us juleps, you old devil?" Zack grinned. "We'll take you out to the tool house, and press your teeth down on a dry grinding-stone till they get hot and squeak and--" "Hush, man, hush! In de name of goodness, hush!" Zack covered his wrinkled mouth. "You makes mah jaws feel all scrouged up!" And after he was again astride the mule, plodding toward Bob's place, his hand continued to stroke with affectionate care those jaws that had been thrown into such spasms of suggested torture, muttering: "Who ever heerd tell of sech misery as puttin' mah onlies' toof on de grind-stone!" A mile from Arden stood a house, too near the road to give it the air of being a place of many comforts, even were it in other respects pretentious. But its lightly built porch, precariously nailed to an unpainted frame front, stamped it with poverty.