Washburn flushed. "I'm mighty much obliged, Mr. Westerfelt. I wusn't complainin' as it wus." "I know it, but you are a good fellow; I'm going to trust the whole business to you. Your judgment's as good as mine; do the best you can. I'm going down to Atlanta for a few days--I don't know for how long, but I will write you from there." "I'll do the best I can, Mr. Westerfelt, you kin be shore of that." Chapter XXIV After breakfast, at Bradley's, Westerfelt went into his room and hastily packed his valise and told Alf to take it to the stable and put it into the hack going that morning to the station. Mrs. Bradley came to him in the entry. "John Westerfelt, what's got into you?" she asked, looking at him with concern. "Shorely you are not goin' off." "To Atlanta for a few days on business, that's all," he said; "I'll write back from there." She looked at him curiously, as if not quite satisfied with his explanation. "Well, hurry back," she said. "Me 'n' Luke'll miss you mightily." "Tell Luke good-bye for me," he called back from the gate, and she nodded to him from the hall, but he could not hear what she said. As he approached the stable, he saw the hack waiting for him at the door. Budd Ridly sat on the driver's seat. "Time we wus off," he remarked to Westerfelt. "It takes peert drivin' to catch the two-forty, south-bound." "That's a fact," said Washburn, coming from the stable, "but I'll bet you'll have to wait a few minutes, anyway." He was looking back in the direction from whence Westerfelt had come. "I saw Miss Harriet come out o' the hotel jest after you passed; it looks to me like she's trying to overtake you." Westerfelt turned and saw Harriet about a hundred yards away. "Maybe she is," he said. "I'll go meet her." She paused when she saw him approaching, and he noticed that she looked greatly troubled and was quite pale. "I must see you, Mr. Westerfelt," she said, a catch in her voice. "I came right at once so you wouldn't get left. Oh, Mr. Westerfelt, mother has just told me what she said to you last night. I don't know what she did it for--I reckon she thought she was acting right--but I cannot help her in deception of any kind. I was not sick last night." "I knew you were not," he said, and then he could think of nothing else to say. "But mother said she told you I was, and that she left the impression on your mind that it was because you were going off. That is not true, Mr. Westerfelt. I cannot presume to dictate to you about what you ought to do. Besides, it really seems a sensible thing for you to go. She said you promised not to leave, but I can't have it that way." Something in the very firmness of her renunciation of him added weights to his sinking spirits. "You think it would be best for me to go?" he managed to articulate. "Oh, do you, Harriet?"