He paused a little way beyond the window, which stood open with the sun falling through it, listening for the sound of their voices. It was strangely silent for a time when the book-agent was around. Joe went on, his shadow breaking the sunbeam which whitened the kitchen floor. There was a little quick start as he came suddenly to the kitchen door; a hurried stir of feet. As he stepped upon the porch he saw Morgan in the door, Ollie not a yard behind him, their hands just breaking their clasp. Joe knew in his heart that Morgan had been holding her in his arms. Ollie's face was flushed, her hair was disturbed. Her bosom rose and fell like troubled water, her eyes were brighter than Joe ever had seen them. Even Morgan was different, sophisticated and brazen that he was. A flash of red showed on his cheekbones and under his eyes; his thin nostrils were panting like gills. Joe stood there, one foot on the porch, the other on the ground, as blunt as honesty, as severe as honor. There was nothing in his face that either of them could read to indicate what was surging in his breast. He had caught them, and they wondered if he had sense enough to know. Joe pushed his hat back from his sweating forehead and looked inquiringly at Morgan. "Your horse sick, or something?" he asked. "No," said Morgan, turning his back on Joe with a little jerk of contempt in his shoulders. "Well, I think he must be down, or something," said Joe, "for I heard a racket in the barn." "Why didn't you go and see what was the matter?" demanded Morgan crossly, snatching his hat from the table. Ollie was drowned in a confusion of blushes. She stood hanging her head, but Joe saw the quick turn of her eyes to follow Morgan as he went away in long strides toward the barn. Joe went to the tool-chest which stood in a corner of the kitchen and busied himself clattering over its contents. Presently he looked at Ollie, his hand on the open lid of the box. "Did you see that long whetstone lying around anywhere, Ollie?" he asked. She lifted her head with a little start. Joe never had called her familiarly by her name before. It always had been "Missis Chase," distant and respectful. "No, I haven't seen it, Joe," she answered, the color leaving her cheeks. "All right, Ollie," said he, holding her eyes with steady gaze, until she shifted hers under the pain of it, and the questioning reproach. Joe slammed down the lid of the tool-chest, as if with the intention of making as much noise as possible. There was something in the way he had spoken her name that was stranger than the circumstance itself. Perhaps she felt the authority and the protection which Joe meant that his voice should assume; perhaps she understood that it was the word of a man. She was afraid of him at that moment, as she never had been afraid of Isom in all their married life. "I suppose Isom put it away somewhere around the barn," said Joe. "Maybe he did, Joe."