Gray's face was pale, his brow looked anxious; but he rode head
up and alert, and glanced with surprise at the two at the Sessions gate.
He had no hat to raise, but he saluted Lydia Sessions with a sweeping
gesture of the hand and passed on. A blithe, gallant figure cantering
along the suburban road, out toward the Gap, and the mountains beyond,
Gray Stoddard rode into the dip of the ridge and--so far as Cottonville
was concerned--vanished utterly.
Buckheath drew a long breath and straightened up.
"I'm but a poor man," he began truculently, "yit there ain't nobody can
marry the gal I set out to wed and me stand by and say nothing."
"Oh, Mr. Buckheath!" cried Miss Lydia. "Mr. Stoddard had no idea of
_marrying_ John--a mill girl! There is no possibility of any such thing
as that. I want you to understand that there isn't--to feel assured,
once for all. I have reason to know, and I urge you to put that out of
your mind."
Shade looked at her narrowly. Up to the time Pap gave him definite
information from headquarters, he had never for an instant supposed that
there was a possibility of Stoddard desiring to marry Johnnie; but the
flurried eagerness of Miss Sessions convinced him that such a
possibility was a very present dread with her, and he sent a venomous
glance after the disappearing horseman.
"You go and talk to him right now, Mr.
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