She had unburdened her mind. She had spent her quiver,—not a barbed shaft remained. She was glancing about the room, meditating upon certain arrangements to be providently made over night for the early breakfast; now and again her gaze rested on Bob, still serenely awake in his nightgown, and holding up before eyes that squinted in the eager intensity of their interest the spur which he had taken from the boot. She was altogether unprepared for aught of moment when Jepson said slowly, “Ye hed better lay off ter milk the cow-critters sooner ’n common, ter-morrer, M’ria, kase I be goin’ ter drive my stock off from hyar by daylight. I hev hed in an’ about enough o’ this place.” Her small eyes dilated; she changed color; her jaw dropped. Her lethargic husband was suddenly tense and alert, looking at Jepson with a dismayed deprecation, aghast at the prospect of this collapse of their partnership. Mild as he was and weak, he was man enough in this emergency to upbraid his wife. “Thar now, M’ria!” he said, temperately, however. It was the first rebuke he had ever given her, and he quailed as the words passed his lips. But she took no heed of them; her sense of loss was so poignant as to dull all resentment. “Why, Teck!” she exclaimed, her voice cordial with persuasive intonations, “ye goin’ ter leave us—jes’ kase I tole ye what that thar black-hearted Jake Baintree say ’bout our bein’ well rid o’ ye? I didn’t go ter hurt yer feelin’s. Ye ain’t goin’ ter leave us fur sech ez that!” She smiled at him, her eyes and her teeth glittering in the glow of the fire. “’Tain’t fur nuthin’ Jake Baintree say,” he disclaimed, still placidly gazing at the blaze, with none of the excitement and instability of an unconsidered resolution in his face. “I jes’ be a-goin’ fur good.” He seemed unpliable enough to daunt persuasion or appeal. “Laws-a-massy, Teck!” Ben Bowles exclaimed, lantern-jawed, and pallid, and disconsolate. The inflections of his voice had such dreary suggestions that Jepson glanced at him, as he sat pulling at his hay-colored beard, the deeply indented grooves and wrinkles in his face growing more definite and multiplying, his weak blue eyes appealing and forlorn. He might have seemed in terror of being left at the mercy of his wife, who sat beside him, the picture of discomfiture, and swift repentance, and anxious forecast. The survey evidently suggested to Jepson some modification of his plans. “I’ll leave old Spot an’ her calf, bein’ ez yer cow air dry, so ez the chill’n kin hev buttermilk an’ M’ria kin churn; an’,” after a moment’s pause, “I’ll leave one o’ my horses, so ye kin git along better puttin’ in craps nex’ spring. Ye kin keep ’em ez long ez ye’ll feed ’em.”