"This girth was cut, not worn," she said, in an astonished voice. Fult laughed, "Are you just finding hit out?" he said. "What do you mean?" she demanded. "You seed me get off and fix hit back there?" "Yes," said Isabel, puzzled. "Well, I cut hit then," he said, "nigh in two, not quite." "You cut it--why?" With anger gathering in his eyes, he dropped knife and string and slowly faced her. "Because," he said, "I've stood being treated this way as long as I aim to. For four days you hain't hardly looked at me or spoke to me; and when I try to talk to you, or sing to you, you all the time drag somebody else in,--Lethie or somebody,--so I don't never get a chance to be with you like I want to. And I'm tired of hit. I aim to talk to you, whether or no." His eyes blazed, his chest heaved. "I don't think I just understand you," Isabel replied. "Yes, you do," he exclaimed, angrily. "You seed, from the minute I laid eyes on you in that wagon down Troublesome, how things was with me--how I was plumb crazy about you, couldn't stay away from you a minute hardly, or get you off my mind day or night. You knowed hit as well as I did." "I did not," replied Isabel, slowly. "I knew, or hoped, that you liked me, because I liked you immensely; but I didn't imagine that it was--the other thing." "You was bound to," cried Fult. "Hit was there plain in my heart and my eyes for you to see. Hit wouldn't be possible for me to feel so much and you not know hit." "I wasn't thinking of such matters. I came up here to work, not to have love-affairs. And, another thing, I didn't know anything about you and Lethie being sweethearts, or maybe I would have been more careful not to let you be with me so much." "I thought that was hit," exulted Fult; "I allowed somebody had been telling you tales." "No," said Isabel; "I simply overheard someone say how you had changed to Lethie; and then, of course, I was distressed to death over being a possible cause of suffering to her. It is really best, perhaps, that you and I should have this talk, and understand each other plainly. I want you to know that I won't permit this feeling you say you have for me to go on, or be spoken about, or even thought of. You must put it instantly out of your mind, unless you want me to leave for home to-morrow; for I'll never stay here and be the cause of suffering to that beautiful child, who already carries so many burdens. Of course she is the one you truly love, deep down in your heart; you have loved her truly, haven't you?" "I loved her all right, or thought I did, till you come in; then she seemed to me just like you said,--a child,--and I knowed you was the woman for me, the one I had allus heared tell of in song-ballats, and had drempt about all my life. I knowed hit the minute I seed you setting there in the wagon in the middle of Troublesome, with the sunlight sifting down on your hair."