At the end of the passage, facing the ravine, I stood and talked to Guinea, while Alf was hitching the mare to the buck-board. The sun was well over to the west, pouring upon us, and in the strong light I noted the clear, health-hue of her complexion. A guinea chicken, swift and graceful, ran round the corner of the house, and, nodding toward the fowl, I said: "I am talking to her namesake and she is jealous." I thought that the shadow of a pout crossed her lips, but she smiled and replied: "If my real name were not so ugly I'd insist upon people calling me by it. I hate nicknames." "But sometimes they are appropriate," I rejoined. "But when they are," she said, laughing, "they never stick. It's the disagreeable nickname that remains with us." "Is that the philosophy you learned at Raleigh?" I asked. She shrugged her shapely shoulders, laughed low in her throat and answered: "I haven't learned philosophy at all. It doesn't take much of a stock of learning for a girl who lives away out here." "But she might strive to learn in order to be fitted for a better life, believing that it will surely come." "How encouraging you are, Mr. Hawes. After a while you may persuade me that I am really glad that you came." "You have already made me glad," I replied. "Have I? Then mind that I don't make you sorry. Alf's waiting for you." As we drove toward Perdue's I wondered what could have caused old man Jucklin's change of manner at the time he had spoken of sending his daughter away to be educated. Surely, he could not deplore the grace and refinement which this schooling had given her. Would it be well to ask Alf? No; he could but regard such a question as a direct impertinence. The mare trotted briskly and the rush of cool air was delicious. The road was crooked, holding in its elbows bits of scenery unsuspected until we were upon them, moss growing under great rocks, weeping in eternal shade, a bit of water blazing in the sun, a hickory bottom, where squirrels were barking; and from everywhere came the thrilling incense of spring.