"It ain't much, but it was the best in the crate and I shined it up on my towel." Mr. Slater handed Eliza a fine red apple of prodigious size, at sight of which the girl turned pale. "I--don't like apples," she cried, faintly. "Never mind; they're good for your complexion." "I'd die before I'd eat one." "Then I'll eat it for you; my complexion ain't what it was before I had the smallpox." When he had carried out this intention and subjected his teeth to a process of vacuum-cleaning, he asked: "Say, what happened to your friend who chewed gum?" "Well, he was hardly a friend," Miss Appleton said, "If he had been a real friend he would have listened to my warning." "Gum never hurt anybody," Slater averred, argumentatively. "Not ordinary gum. But you see, he chewed nothing except wintergreen--" "That's what I chew." Eliza's tone was one of shocked amazement. "Not REALLY? Oh, well, some people would thrive on it, I dare say, but he had indigestion." "Me too! That's why I chew it." The girl eyed him during an uncomfortable pause. Finally she inquired: "Do you ever feel a queer, gnawing feeling, like hunger, if you go without your breakfast?" "Unh-hunh! Don't you?" "I wouldn't alarm you for the world, Uncle Tom--" "I ain't your uncle!" "You might chew the stuff for years and not feel any bad effects, but if you wake up some morning feeling tired and listless--" "I've done that, too." Slater's gloomy eyes were fixed upon her with a look of vague apprehension. "Is it a symptom?" "Certainly! Pepsin-poisoning, it's called. This fellow I told you about was a charming man, and since we had all tried so hard to save him, we felt terribly at the end." "Then he died?" "Um-m! Yes and no. Remind me to tell you the story sometime--Here comes Dan, in a great hurry." Young Appleton came panting up the hill. "Good-by, Sis," he said. "I'm off for the front in ten minutes." "Anybody hurt?" Slater asked quickly. "Not yet, but somebody's liable to be. Gordon is trying to steal the canon, and Murray has ordered me out with a car of dynamite to hold it." "Dynamite! Why, Dan!" his sister exclaimed in consternation. "We have poling-boats at the lower crossing and we'll be at the canon in two days. I'm going to load the hillside with shots, and if they try to come through I'll set 'em off. They'll never dare tackle it." Dan's eyes were dancing; his face was alive with excitement. "But suppose they should?" Eliza insisted, quietly. "Then send Doc Gray with some stretchers. I owe one to Gordon, and this is my chance." Drawing her aside, he said in an undertone. "You've got to hold my ground with Natalie while I'm gone. Don't let her see too much of Murray." "I'll do the best I can," she answered him, "but if he seems to be in earnest I'll renig, no matter what happens to you, Danny." He kissed her affectionately and fled. XII HOW GORDON FAILED IN HIS CUNNING