Aunt Minervy Ann’s picturesque reminiscences were sufficiently amusing to whet my appetite for more. The county fair, which was the occasion of my visit to Halcyondale, was still dragging its slow length along, but it had lost its interest for me. The displays in the various departments were as attractive as ever to those who saw them for the first time, but it seemed to me that all my old acquaintances, or their wives and daughters, had something on exhibition, and nothing must do but I must go around and admire it. A little of this goes far, and, as I had been through the various departments a dozen times over, I concluded that it would be more comfortable to remain away from the grounds altogether, making more room for those who desired to see the judges deliver the prizes, or who were anxious to witness the trotting matches and running races. Therefore, when Major Tumlin Perdue (whose guest I was) and his daughter, Mrs. Conant, made an early start for the fair grounds, on the fourth day, I excused myself, on the plea of having some letters to write. The excuse was readily accepted, especially by Major Perdue, who expressed a very strong hope that I would do the fair justice in the Atlanta newspapers. “If you can put in a word about Paul Conant, I’d be glad if you’d do it,” the Major added. “He’s come mighty near working himself down to get the blamed thing a-going. If it wasn’t on account of Paul, me and Valentine wouldn’t go any closer to the fair grounds than we are right now. But we think maybe we can help Paul, and if we can’t do that, we hope to keep him from running his legs off. He ain’t well a bit. Vallie says he didn’t sleep more than two hours last night for the pains in his shoulder.” “It seems to be an old trouble,” I suggested. “Yes, it’s an old trouble,” replied the Major. Then he looked over the tree-tops and sighed. Here was the same air of mystery that I had observed when I first came, and I remembered that Aunt Minervy Ann had begun to tell me about it when she became entangled in her reminiscences. Therefore, when they were all gone, and Aunt Minervy Ann had cleaned up the house and coaxed the Conant baby to sleep (which was no hard thing to do, he was such a fat and good-humored little rascal), I ventured to remind the old negress that she had neglected to tell me why the Major and his daughter were so mysteriously solicitous about Paul Conant’s shoulder. “Well, de goodness knows!” Aunt Minervy Ann exclaimed, with well-affected surprise; “ain’t I done tell you ’bout dat? I sho’ wuz dreamin’, den, bekaze I had it right on de tip-eend er my tongue. I dunno what got de matter wid me deze days, less’n I’m gettin’ ol’ an’ light-headed. Well, suh! an’ I ain’t tol’ you ’bout dat!”