Molly heard through Bart that he had returned. She expected to see him waiting for her in the little saddle in the ridge where formerly they had met of evenings but she watched the shadows fall on three successive nights and failed to see him skylined there. Her school opened with twenty pupils of assorted sizes, ages and degrees of intelligence and she threw herself into this new work. As she rode home on the second night after the opening she saw Carver in the field. He waved his hat but made no move to cross over. The next evening she motioned to him and he joined her in the road. “They tell me you’ve got a family of youngsters ranging all the way from Mexicans to Bostonese,” he greeted. “How’s the new school?” “Perfect,” she said. “I love it.” “Now me, I’d lose my mind after the first day,” he said. “Has Johnny begun to shed his milk teeth yet? It’s a downright shame the boy has to lose ’em again after all the trouble he had cutting his first ones.” The girl remained silent while he made inquiries concerning a number of her charges, recalling incidents from their past lives which she had heard from fond parents and passed on to him at various times. He had dropped into his old casual vein as easily as if nothing of an unusual nature had occurred since their last meeting. But Molly found it difficult to meet his mood and chat on trivial topics. She was conscious of a certain restraint. It was fully to be expected that he would mention the one thing which was uppermost in his mind and hers, attempting to explain it by the code of his kind, but it became increasingly evident that he did not intend to refer to it. She cast about for something to say but could discover no topic. Her mind was too exclusively occupied with that other. “That’s a good-looking new shirt you have on,” she stated at last, and was angrily conscious of the inanity of the observation in view of all that was left unsaid between them. But she forced herself to go on. “I like gray. You never affect red shirts like the most of the tumbleweeds wear.” She could have screamed at the idiocy of it all and found herself unable to proceed but Carver inspected the sleeve of the shirt in question and took the conversation away from her, dwelling upon the topic as if her observation had been the most natural one in the world. “Gray’s not a bad color for everyday wear,” he admitted. “I don’t run much to red. Reason is this: There’s eleven or twelve of us children at home; I forget without counting--but plenty--and the old man sometimes buys assorted job lots of clothing that has gone maybe a bit out of style. One day he turns up with an assortment of shoes. There’s gray, black, bay and buckskin shades in that lot--and one pair of red button shoes.” He paused to chuckle softly at some recollection.