When the morning came these two met, each intently resolved to render to the other the supreme service of sacrifice, and neither dreaming of the other's thought. But in all human affairs circumstance has its part to play, and while it cannot alter purposes it often plays havoc with results. It was so in this case. Things happened, and the happening was more decisive than the moonlight meditations of a pair of maidens could possibly be. XXVII THE PHILOSOPHY OF JACK TOWNS Boyd Westover had the excellent mental habit of attending carefully to more than one thing at a time. Just now he had the election on his hands, and with it some problems of personal dignity and repute that required his closest attention. But he also had Wanalah plantation to look after, and in view of his long absence he felt that home affairs were pressing. Accordingly he was up before the dawn, on the morning after his arrival, and for half an hour after dawn he waited, not at all patiently, for the coming of his overseer, to whom he had sent a summons over night to be with him "at the crack of day." Then instead of waiting longer, he mounted his horse and rode away on a tour of inspection. It was well after sunrise when he returned to find the overseer hitching his horse to the rack. "Good afternoon, Mr. Wilkinson," he said; "I had hoped to see you this morning." "I'm sorry, sir, but Î was very tired last night." "So was I. I had walked all through the night before. Never mind that now. I wanted to see you at dawn. The sun is now half an hour high. That means that you have wasted an hour and a half of my time, and my time is just now precious." "I'm very sorry, sir--" "Don't bother to apologize. I can't waste any further time listening to excuses. Why are you seeding the Gaston field in wheat? I directed otherwise, you know." "Well, sir, the fall has given us good weather, and we can get in that two hundred acres as well as not." "But how about harvesting it?" "Oh, I'll manage that." "Yes, by making the negroes work by moonlight, as you did last summer to the everlasting shame of Wanalah plantation, and just as you made too many hogsheads of tobacco and too many barrels of corn to the hand. I have told you before and I tell you now that I will not have the hands over-worked. Is the Gaston field seeded?" "No, sir. We begin on that to-day." "Don't seed it. Let it lie fallow." "But my gracious, Mr. Westover,--"