flashed once under long lashes at Johnny Trumbull and gave him encouragement to go on.

“Well,” said Trumbull, “I don’t like Sunday-school picnics very much, but anything would be nice with Doris. They’re going to have an indoor picnic in the Grange. Hall, and maybe I can take her to that.”

“She don’t like picnics, neither,” Wilkins told him, with the crease in his forehead growing deeper. “Nor coasting parties. Nor any doings that take her out anywhere, any time. She’s a home body.”

“That’s nice,” said Trumbull, with a glance at Doris, “even if it is hard on me. I take it you’re a home body, too, Wilkins.”

“I be!” replied Wilkins firmly. “And I calculate to be!”

Wilkins was trying to wear him out, of course, as he had worn out other young men callers. The difference was that Trumbull sometimes wore rough instead of ragged. He decided to force the situation to a break; and the eyes of Doris did not seem to forbid him.

 II 

II

I’ve always thought I’d like to marry a home body,” remarked Trumbull, giving a hitch to his belt. “And I don’t mean you, Wilkins.”

What followed was a little startling. Orla Wilkins rose from his chair with a quickness surprising in a man who looked so clumsy. He took down the shotgun that Trumbull had observed and heard about and sat down again with the barrels of the gun resting across his knees in the general direction of Trumbull. The silent menace which that old muzzle-loader had seemed to give off had not been imaginary.

“Doris don’t want to get married,” said Wilkins grimly. “Not to-night, nor any time.”

Trumbull looked at the black muzzles, the big thumb of Wilkins as it pulled back the hammers, and up into the man’s eyes. They were flat and impenetrable, dulled by much eating. They might mean business, and they might not. It is an uncomfortable feeling to have a double-barreled shotgun, said to be loaded with buckshot, pointed at one’s middle.

“Let’s get down to brass tacks,” said Trumbull, with a slight growl in his voice. “Just what for are you pointing that shooting iron at me?”

“Because I can set down to shoot,” Wilkins told him, 

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