All that afternoon Henry revolved this proposition in his mind, and he even did what he had never done before in his life--he lay awake at night. The next day, after the midday dinner, he said to himself: "I might as well resk it. Albaugh's got an all-fired good place, and all out of debt. And that's a tre-mendous nice eighty father's offered to give me." So he went up stairs and put on a new suit of blue jeans fresh from his mother's loom. Then he walked over to Albaugh's, to find Rachel sewing on the front porch. Rachel had been "kindah dauncey like," as her mother expressed it, ever since her visit to Barbara. She had received as many attentions as usual, but they seemed flat and unrelishable to her now. She began seriously to reflect that a girl past twenty-three was growing old in the estimation of the country, and yet she was further than ever from being able to make a choice between the lovers that paid her court, more or less seriously. When she looked up and saw Henry Miller coming in at the gate she felt a strange surprise. She had never before seen him in Sunday clothes or visiting on a week-day. "Hello, Henry! Looking for Ike?" she asked, with neighborly friendliness. "No, not as I know of. I've come to talk to you, Rache." "To me? Well, you're the last one I'd look for to come to talk to me; and in day-time, and corn-shucking not begun yet." There was an air of excited curiosity in her manner. It was plain to be seen that she was inwardly asking, "What _can_ Henry Miller be up to, anyhow?" but to him she said, "Come in, Henry, an' take a cheer." "No, I'll sed down here," he answered, taking a seat on the edge of the porch, like the outdoor man that he was, approaching a house with half reluctance. The relations between Henry and Rachel were unconstrained. They had played "hide and whoop" together in childhood, and times innumerable they had gone on black-berrying and other excursions together; he had swung her on long grape-vine swings on the hill-side; they had trudged to and from school in each other's company, exchanging sweet-cakes from their lunch-baskets, and yet they had never been lovers. "Rache," he said, locking his broad, brown hands over his knee, "father says he'll give me that east-eighty whenever I get married, if I won't go off West." "You'll be a good while getting married, Henry. You never was a hand to go after the girls." "No, but I might chance to get married shortly, for all that. The boys that do a good deal of sparking and the girls that have a lot of beaux don't always get married first. You'd ought to know that, Rache, by your own experience." Rachel laughed good-naturedly, and waited with curiosity to discover what all this was leading up to. "What I 'm thinking," said Henry, with the air of a man approaching a horse-trade cautiously, lest he should make a false step, "is this: that eighty of our'n jines onto your medder and west corn-field."