“I already know Miss Darrow,” said the young owner genially, “but I should enjoy shaking hands again, now that we are formally introduced.” He advanced toward her and held out his hand engagingly. The girl put both her hands behind her. “And I know _you_, Peter Parker,” she said whitely. “I know you--_now!_”--and with a long look of concentrated scorn and contempt at the fair face and the white clad figure of the amazed young man she turned and flung herself out of the room. “Well, now, Mr. Parker, it’s right sultry to-day,” said Luke Manders hastily, seeking to cover up his assistant’s rude exit, “and about dinner time, and I reckon you’d rather go on back to the hotel now and come here later in the afternoon when it’s cooler, wouldn’t you, sir?” He started toward the door, to lead the way. “I’ll fix it so I’m free, then, to go over things with you.” “That’s awfully nice of you, old top,” Peter Parker stopped looking at the door through which Glen Darrow had vanished and regarded his superintendent genially, “but I don’t want to bother you.” “No bother at all, sir,” he assured him, still moving toward the door as the whistle blew shrilly for the noon hour, “and anyhow, we’re quitting for dinner now----” “But I didn’t breakfast until ten, you see,” the youth explained, “so I can, without actual suffering, wait until one or one-thirty for my luncheon, and I shall enjoy just browsing about by myself.” “But I could explain----” “Of course you could,” his employer agreed gratefully, “and I’ll wager you’re one of our best explainers, but even at that, I probably wouldn’t get you. You can’t think what a fool I am about machinery ... and my friend, Gloriana-Virginia can tell me all I need to know for the present ... all that I can _assimilate_ on a day like this....” He screened a yawn and fanned himself with his exquisite panama. “And here comes my messenger!” M’liss’ Tolliver was crossing the room at her slouching gait and gave him a brief, incurious glance of recognition. She was followed by a very little boy, and a tall, stooped old man came after him, a large dinner bucket on his arm, and both hands engaged with the wheezing harmonica at his mouth which was producing, with gaps here and there which needed to be filled in with memory or imagination, a time-honored tune: “_There is a hap ... py land ... Far ... far ... a-way...._” It was not a very positive assertion, rather a tentative statement which was open to question. “Yo’ quit that, Pap!” his daughter snapped at him, snatching the bucket from his arm. “I ’low I’ll ‘happy land’ yo’, ef yo’ don’t leggo that dawg-gawn tune! Hyar, yo’ Glory, and Beany, pitch in and eat!” She sat down on the floor with her back against the wall and the two children squatted obediently beside her. “This is the quickest way out, sir,” said Luke Manders, pointing to the door which led into the lane.