Sarah's gaze, however, was not for her brother at that moment. Her eyes were fixed unswervingly upon the figure in the once-white drill trousers and bobbed swallow-tail coat and shuffling boots. She was staring from wide and, Caleb noted, rather horror-stricken eyes at the huge steel trap above the blanket pack. But the boy who must have received her glance full in his face had not faltered a step in his advance. He went forward until he stood at the foot of the low steps which mounted to the veranda; and there he stopped, looking up at her, and removed his battered hat. Caleb ranged awkwardly up alongside him and looked up at her in turn. He, searching desperately for a neat and cleverly casual opening speech, could not know that beneath her forbidding manner a peal of soft laughter was struggling for utterance; could not know that, at that moment, she was telling herself that, of the two, Caleb was far the younger. At last he cleared his throat, oratorically, and then she promptly interrupted him. "Supper is served, Cal," she drawled in her gentle, almost lisping voice. Caleb received the statement as if it were an astounding bit of hitherto undreamed-of news. "Comin', Sarah!" he chirped briskly. "Comin' this blessed minute!" And then, with an attempt at disingenuousness: "I--I've a friend here, Sarah, whom I'd like to--er--present to you! This is my sister, Miss Hunter," he announced to the silent boy, "and this young man, Sarah, this young man is--er--ah--Mr.----" "I'm Steve," said the boy, mildly. "I'm just Stephen O'Mara!" "Certainly!" gasped Caleb. "Quite so--quite so! Sarah, this is just Steve." The frail little woman with her quaint dignity of another decade failed to move; she did not unbend so much as the fraction of an inch. But hard upon the heels of Caleb's last words the boy went forward unhesitatingly. Hat in the hand that balanced his big steel trap, he stopped in front of her and offered one brown paw. "Haow dye do, Miss Hunter," he saluted her, gravely. And with a slow smile that discovered for her a row of white and even teeth: "Haow dye do? I--I reckon you're the first--dressed-up lady I ever did git to know!" The calm statement took what little breath there had been left in Caleb's lungs; it left Sarah breathless, too. But after an infinitesimal moment of waiting she held out her own delicate fingers and took the outstretched hand. "Haow dye do, Steve?" she answered, and Caleb was at a loss to interpret the suppressed quality of her voice. "And I--some day I am sure it will be a great pleasure to remember that I was the--first!" Then she faced her brother. "Will you--will your friend, Mr.--Steve--remain for supper, Cal?" she asked. And Caleb, quick to see an opening, made the most of this one. "Stay for supper," he repeated her question, and he laughed. "Stay--for--supper! Well, I should hope he would. Why--why, he's going to stop for the night!"