He stared at her in angry silence. “You appear a soft enough little thing,” he said at last, “but you’re as infernally obstinate as—— Here, give me the ring. I’ll not force it on you.” She slipped it from her finger in silence, and he took it, restored it to its velvet nest, and dropped the case in his pocket. “The next time I ask you to wear that ring,” he said, “you’ll either do it, or——” “David!” cried Barbara faintly. “Please—please don’t be angry. Try to—understand.” “Try to understand—eh? Well, I’m not so dull as some; but you’ve got me stumped all right. Maybe that’s what you’re trying to do.” She put out her hands to him pleadingly. But he did not choose to see them. “I’ll talk with Jarvis,” he said roughly. “And in the meantime you keep away from him. Just let me manage for a while. A woman isn’t up to business, anyway. Why, it makes me hot to think of his coming here and talking you to a finish the way he did. I wish I’d caught him at it, that’s all.” “David!” Barbara’s voice was low and urgent. “I wish you wouldn’t——” “Wouldn’t what?” She clung to his arm; but his look did not soften. “Please don’t—say anything to Mr. Jarvis. He—meant to be kind. He——” David turned suddenly and caught her by the shoulders. “See here,” he said. “I’m beginning to see a glimmer of light through this particular millstone. Is _Jarvis_ the man who tried to get you to marry him while I was away? Answer me!” “He asked—me—to marry him, and I——” David burst into a great laugh. “Well, well!” he cried, “that was a conquest. Old Jarvis, of all men! Why, Barb, you’re a wonder. Ha, ha!” She trembled before his loud laughter as she had not beneath the weight of his displeasure. David suddenly became grave, his brows drawn in thought. “That puts a different face on things,” he said. XVIII HEWETT’S general store, with its official annex, the post-office, occupied a prominent place in the social as well as the economic system of Barford. Not even the aisles, sheds, and steps of the Presbyterian church afforded so convenient and popular an arena for the interchange of items of general interest as did “Hewett’s.” There appeared to be something suggestively cheerful and enlivening in the sagging piles of fruit and vegetables, something friendly and hospitable in the boxes, barrels, and kegs open to public inspection and exploring fingers. Even the curious and all-pervasive odor compounded of prunes, pickles, yellow soap, and tobacco, with an occasional aromatic whiff of freshly ground coffee, seemed to lend itself to a pleasantly open frame of mind, conducive to an unreserved expression of opinion concerning the church, the state, and the social whirl, as evidenced in the varying currents and eddies of village life.