In his impatience to secure this four-wheeled compendium of happiness he had mortgaged his future, and had promised his father to plant and cultivate larger areas. The shrewd farmer therefore had no prospect of being out of pocket, for the young man was keeping his word. The acres of the cornfield were nearly double those of the previous year, and on them Roger spent the long hot day in vigorous labor in preference to the easy task of going to the river for the luggage. Dusty and weary, but in excellent spirits over the large space that he and the hired man had "hilled up," he went whistling home through the long shadows of the June evening. The farm wagon stood in the door-yard piled with trunks. The front entrance of the house--rarely used by the family--was open, and as he came up the lane a young girl emerged from it, and leaned for a few moments against the outer pillar of the little porch, unconscious of the picture she made. A climbing rose was in bloom just over her head, and her cheeks, flushed with heat and fatigue, vied with them in color. She had exchanged her travelling-dress for one of light muslin, and entwined in her hair a few buds from the bush that covered the porch. If Roger was not gifted with a vivid imagination he nevertheless saw things very accurately, and before he reached the head of the lane admitted to himself that the old "front steps" had never been so graced before. He had seen many a rustic beauty standing there when his sister had company, but the city girl impressed him with a difference which he then could not understand. He was inclined to resent this undefined superiority, and he muttered, "Father's right. They are birds of too fine a feather for our nest." He had to pass near her in order to reach the kitchen door, or else make a detour which his pride would not permit. Indeed, the youth plodded leisurely along with his hoe on his shoulder, and scrupled not to scrutinize the vision on the porch with the most matter-of-fact minuteness. "What makes her so 'down in the mouth'?" he queried. "She doesn't fancy us barbarians, I suppose, and Forestville to her is a howling wilderness. Like enough she'll take me for an Indian." Mildred's eyes were fixed on a great shaggy mountain in the west, that was all the more dark and forbidding in its own deep shadow. She did not see it, however, for her mind was dwelling on gloomier shadows than the mountain cast. As he passed he caught her attention, and stepping toward him a little impatiently, she said, "I suppose you belong to the premises?" He made an awkward attempt at a bow, and said stiffly, "I'm one of the Atwood chattels."