when the gales of peace shall scatter war's wild, red rubbish like chaff, when the mills shall renew their clatter then all the people will laugh.

—tunison's industrial hymns.

randall celebrated his release by retiring to lucindy's house, where he shut himself in and remained for more than an hour. he filled the little room with thanksgiving in the shape of song and prayer, all of which could be heard for a considerable distance. a great burden had been lifted from his simple mind, and he celebrated the fact in a simple and natural way. lucindy understood his feelings, for she shared them. while randall was praying and singing in her house, she was in the kitchen with adelaide. even while the tears of gratitude and thankfulness were running down her cheeks, and threatening to fall in the things she was cooking (as the child saw), she made light of the whole matter. "i dunner what he mean by gwine 'way off dat-a-way, an' holdin' a pray'r-meetin' by hisself. he'll have de whole town a-stan'in' 'roun' in de yard ef he keep on doin' like dat."

"well, mammy lucindy, you are crying yourself."

"my eyes weak, honey, an' dey feels like i done stuck a splinter in bofe un um. you des wait. when you git ol' ez what i is, i lay yo' eyes will run water, too."

the idea of adelaide growing old! nobody would have thought of such a thing but lucindy, and the thought only came to her as a means of hiding her own feelings. but it is a fact that the child was about to grow older. for shortly after randall's trouble, all of us took the road for eighteen-hundred-and-eighty-five. we thought it was a long road, too, and yet, somehow, it was neither long nor rough. but it was a very peculiar thoroughfare. for though all of us tried to walk side by side, it seemed that some of us were toiling up-hill, while others were walking down-hill. it was so peculiar that on several occasions, i was on the point of asking adelaide what she thought of a road that could be up-hill and down-hill in the same place, and at the same time; but the child had so many quaint and beautiful thoughts of her own that i hesitated to disturb her mind.

moreover, she was growing so fast, and getting along so well, that i had no real desire to put new ideas in her head. mr. sanders declared that she was running up like a weed. this attracted the attention of old jonas, who fixed his small glittering eyes on the old humourist.

"like a weed, sanders?" mr. whipple inquired.

"well," replied mr. sanders, "call the weed a sunflower, ef it suits you; but i dunner what's the matter with a weed—the lord made it."

old jonas, looking off into space, nodded his head, with "yes, i reckon maybe he did."

as we went along this road i have been telling you of, i thought that perhaps old jonas would stop to rest in a fence corner, but the further we went, we found that he was as lively as any of the rest, though perhaps not so nimble. as for adelaide, she simply grew; there was no other change in her. she carried her child nature along with her, and she carried cally-lou. not much was said of cally-lou, but all of us felt that she was in hiding in that wide, clear space that is just an inch or so beyond the short reach of our vision; and, somehow, we were all glad to have the company of the little dream-child who was "not quite white." i think she kept adelaide from taking on the airs and poses of growing girls. and this was just as well. adelaide took in knowledge, as though she had learned it somewhere before. when she began to study at school (as we went along) she declared that the books caused her to remember things that she had forgotten. mr. sanders said that there never was such a scholar, and mr. tidwell agreed with him. old jonas said nothing; his face simply wore a satisfied frown.

none of us forgot randall, or could afford to forget him, for we were journeying along together. his evolution was out of the usual order. adelaide merely fulfilled the promises of her childhood, and the expectations of those who were in love with her; whereas, randall outran prophecy itself. the boogerman developed into a full-fledged minister of the methodist church, and, in the course of that development, became a complete engine of modern industry. he went so far and so fast that he had an abundance of time to devote to the religious enthusiasm that kept him inwardly inflamed; and such was the power of his rude eloquence that he attracted the admiration of whites as well as blacks. he was ignorant, but he had a gift that education has never been able to produce in a human being—he had the gift of eloquence. when he was in the pulpit his rough words, his simple gestures, the play of his features, the poise of his body, his whole attitude, were as far beyond the compass of education as it is possible for the mind to conceive. this gift, or power, became so well known that he had a real taste of what is called reputation in this world. he was a pattern, a model, for the men of his race, and, indeed, for the men of any race, for there never was a moment when he was idle after he discovered that an honest and industrious man can make and save money. all that he made, he gave to old jonas whipple to keep for him. the more randall worked the more he learned how to work, so that in the course of a year or two, there was nothing in the way of work that he couldn't do well. his credit at the little bank was as good as that of most white men, and his simple word was as good as a bond.

the men of his race watched him with a curious kind of awe. when one of them asked him how he managed to accomplish the results that were plain to every one, his reply was: "good gracious, man! i jest goes ahead and does it, that's how." he had a great knack of meeting opportunity before she knocked at his door—of meeting her and hitching her to his shack of a buggy, where she served the purpose of a family horse. he had the confidence and sympathy of all the white people who knew him. he began to buy tracts of land, and one of his purchases included high falls, where the children and grown people had their picnic grounds. many thought this a wild investment, especially old jonas, who rated him soundly for throwing away his hard-earned money; but mr. sanders, who, with all his humour and nonsense, was by all odds the shrewdest business man in all that region, declared that the time would come when the money that randall had paid for it would be smothered by the money he could sell it for. randall explained to old jonas the reason why he had bought this remarkable water-power; it was because the water came so free and fell so far.

all this, by the way, as we were journeying along. we began to try to forget eighteen-hundred-and-sixty-eight; we knew right were it was, but, as we got farther and farther away from it, it seemed to lose some of its importance; and, sometimes, when we couldn't help but remember it, it came back to us as though it was the memory of a bad dream. people began to look up and stir about, progress, hand-in-hand with better conditions, crawled out of the woods, where they had been hiding, and began to pay visits to their old friends. mr. sanders said it gave him a kind of christmas feeling to see the hard times vanishing. old jonas felt better, too. at any rate, he seemed to take more interest in adelaide, who, by this time, had developed into a wonderfully charming young woman—just how charming, i leave you to imagine; for she was a young woman and still a child. it is given to few people in this world to have this combination and to be able to manage it as it should be managed. i don't know whether to call it the art of living, or the instinct that makes everybody feel as though he were somebody. i never could understand the secret of it, and, indeed, i never tried, until one day a scientist came along peddling his ideas and theories. he declared that there was an explanation somewhere in one of his books, but so far, i have been unable to find it. there was nothing in his dull books about adelaide and her individuality. it should be borne in mind that adelaide had, in the course of seventeen years, developed into something that was quite beyond art and education. her inimitable personality, which was hers from the first, and quite beyond the contingencies of chance or change, continued to be inimitable. she had received all the advantages that money could buy; but this fact only emphasised her native charm. she was a child as well as a young woman, with the sweet unconsciousness of the one and the dazzling loveliness of the other.

mean as he was said to be, it was a well-known fact that old jonas's money would go as far as that of any man; and when it came to a question of adelaide, it was as free as the money of some of our modern millionaires when they desire to advertise their benevolence. he was determined, he said, that his niece should have all the polish the schools could furnish. he called it polish for the reason that he had many a hot argument with mr. sanders and lawyer tidwell with respect to the benefits of education—the education furnished by our modern system of public schools. he didn't believe in it; there was always too much for some people, and not enough for others; there was no discrimination in the scheme. moreover, it put false ideas in some people's heads, and made them lazy and vicious. but he had never said a word in opposition to polish, and when he sent adelaide to one of the most expensive schools, it was not to educate her, he said, but to give her the "polish" that would elevate her above ordinary people.

adelaide received the polish, but refused to be elevated, and when she returned home, unchanged and unspoiled, old jonas whipple said to himself that his money had been spent in vain. he wanted to see her put on airs and hold herself above people, but this she never did; and she would have laughed heartily at old jonas's thoughts if she had known what they were. mr. whipple seemed to have an idea that culture and refinement are things that you can put your fingers on and feel of, and he was sure that dignity and personal pride are their accompaniments. yet he gave no outward sign of his disappointment if he really had any, and he swallowed such regrets as possessed him with a straight face; for he saw, with a secret pride and pleasure that no one suspected, that adelaide was the most charming young girl in all that neighbourhood. it filled him with pride for which he could not account when he observed that she could hold her own in any company, and that, wherever she went, she was the centre of admiration and interest.

now, it was not long before the promoters of a railway line from atlanta to malvern came knocking at the doors of shady dale. mr. sanders and a number of others were inclined to be more than hospitable to the enterprise, but old jonas whipple was opposed to it tooth-and-nail. his arguments in opposition to the enterprise will be thought amusing and ridiculous in this day and time, but it is notorious, the world over, that any man with money can have a substantial following without resorting to bribery, and there were many in shady dale, who, basing their admiration on the fact that he had been very successful as a money-maker, in the face of the most adverse conditions, were ready to endorse anything that old jonas said; he was an oracle because he knew how to make money, though it is well known that the making of money does not depend on a very high order of intelligence. old jonas's objections to a railway were not amenable to reason or argument; it was sufficient that they were satisfactory to him. he had them all catalogued and numbered. there were six of them, and they ran about as follows:

1. a railroad would add to the racket and riot of the neighbourhood, when, even as things were, it was a difficult matter for decent people to sleep in peace. 2. (this objection was impressive on account of its originality; no one had ever thought of it). the passing of railway trains would produce concussion, and this concussion, repeated at regular intervals, would cause the blossoms of the fruit trees to drop untimely off, and would no doubt have a disastrous effect on garden vegetables. 3. the railroad would not stop in shady dale, but would go on to atlanta, thus making the little town a way-station, and drain the whole county of its labour at a time when everybody was trying to adjust himself to the new conditions. 4. instead of patronising home industries and enterprises, people would scramble for seats on the cars, and go gadding about, spending anywhere but at home the little money they had. 5. every business and all forms of industry in the whole section adjacent to the line would be at the mercy of the road and its managers; and, 6. what did people want with railroads, when a majority of the loudest talkers had earned no more than three dollars apiece since the war?

mr. sanders tried hard to destroy these objections by means of timely and appropriate jokes. but jokes had no effect on mr. whipple. moreover, there was one fact that no jokes could change: a great body of land belonging to old jonas lay right across the face of the railway survey, and there was no way to avoid it except by making a detour so wide that shady dale would be left far to one side. you would think, of course, that it was an easy matter to condemn a right of way through old jonas's land, and so it would have been but for one fact that could not be ignored. there was a bitter controversy going on between the people and the roads, and the managers were trying to be as polite as they could be under the circumstances. the controversy referred to finally resulted in the passage of the railway laws that are now on the statute books of the state. the promoters of the line to shady dale had no desire to arouse the serious opposition of mr. whipple and his friends; they had no idea of making a serious contest in view of the state of public opinion, and they had made up their minds that if they failed to secure the right of way through old jonas's lands by fair words, they would leave shady dale out of their plans altogether. they had already surveyed another line that would run six or seven miles north of the town, and work on this would have begun promptly but for the representations of mr. sanders and other substantial citizens, who declared that only a short delay would be necessary to bring old jonas to terms. but that result, by the interposition of providence, as it were, was left for others to accomplish.

of the contest going on between the old-fashioned, unprogressive faction, headed by her uncle, and the spirited element of which mr. sanders was the leader, adelaide had no particular knowledge. she knew in a general way that some question in regard to the new railroad was in dispute. she had heard the matter discussed, and she had laughed at some of the comments of mr. sanders on the obstinacy of her uncle, but the whole matter was outside the circle of her serious thoughts and interests until, at last, it was brought home to her in a way that the novel writers would call romantic, though for some time it was decidedly embarrassing.

blushing and laughing, she told mr. sanders about it afterward. that genial citizen regarded it as a good joke, and, as such, he made the most of it. she was walking about in the garden one day, thinking of childish things, and remembering what fine times she and mr. sanders had had when she was a tiny bit of a girl. she was very old now—quite seventeen—but her childhood was still fresh in her remembrance, and she was quite a child in her freshness and innocence. the corn-patch was in a new place now, but to her it was still the whish-whish woods. in the days when she brought down the boogerman with her cornstalk gun, the corn was growing in the garden next to a side street on which there was very little passing to and fro; but now the corn-patch was next to a thoroughfare that was much frequented. remembering how delighted she had been when randall, the boogerman, responded so completely to her pretence of shooting him with her cornstalk gun, she was seized by a whim that gave her an almost uncontrollable desire to repeat the performance.

by a gesture which, whether magical or not, admirably served its purpose, adelaide became a child again. her beautiful hair, unloosed, fell below her waist, and her face had the same little pucker of earnestness that it wore when, as a child, she was intent on her business of make-believe. she found a cornstalk that suited her purpose, stripped off the blades, and concealed herself in the whish-whish woods, holding her gun in readiness to make a victim of the first person that passed along the street. as providence would have it, she was not kept waiting, for almost before she could conceal herself, she heard the sound of feet. whoever it was had no idea of the danger that awaited him, for he was walking along, whistling softly to himself, showing that he was either in high feather, or seriously uneasy with respect to certain plans he had in his head. as he came to the ambush, adelaide promptly thrust her cornstalk gun forward, with a loud cry of "bang!" the result was as surprising as, and far more embarrassing than, when she made-believe to shoot randall. this time the victim, instead of falling on the ground and writhing, as a man should do if he is seriously wounded, nearly jumped out of his skin, crying, "good gracious!"

the voice was strange to adelaide's ears, and when she was in a position to see her intended victim, she discovered that her innocent joke had been played at the expense of a young man whom she had never seen before; he was an utter stranger. the young man, glancing back to see who had waylaid him, caught a glimpse of adelaide, and politely raised his hat. adelaide, frightened at what seemed to be her boldness, could hardly articulate clearly, but she managed to say, in the midst of her confusion and embarrassment, "oh, excuse me! i thought—" but there she paused.

"so did i," said the young man, with a laugh, "and you are quite excusable." adelaide said to herself that he was making fun of her, but she did not fail to see, in the midst of her vexation and confusion, that he was very pleasant looking. in short he had a clear eye and a strong face. having seen this much, she gathered her skirts free of her feet, and went running to the house. she couldn't resist the temptation to stop in the kitchen and give lucindy the story of her exciting adventure, and in the midst of it, she paused to say how handsome the young man was. when the narrative was concluded, adelaide asked lucindy what she thought of it all. the old negro woman must have had very deep thoughts, judging from her silence. she asked no questions and merely nodded her head while adelaide was talking; and then, while the excited young woman was waiting for her to make some comment, the little-used knocker on the front door fell with a tremendous whack.

"whosomever it mought be," remarked lucindy, "it look like dey er bleedze ter git in, kaze dey er breakin' de door down!"

"oh, i believe it's the young man i tried to shoot!" cried adelaide in distress, "and i wouldn't meet him again for the world! i wonder where uncle jonas is—and why he don't have a bell placed on the door?" then the young woman asked with some indignation, "mammy lucindy, do you suppose that young man is knocking at the door because i made a goose of myself in the garden?"

"lawsy, honey," said lucindy, soothingly, "don't git ter frettin'; i'm gwine ter de door—yit i lay ef you had been up ter yo' neck in de flour-bairl, i wouldn't let you run ter de front door an' grin at whomsomever mought be dar! i lay dat much."

"but, mammy! i'm afraid the person at the door is the young man i was rude to when he was passing the garden. oh, i wish uncle jonas would hire a housemaid; i can't be running to the front door all the time."

"i ain't seed you run much, honey, kaze dat's de fust time dat door-knocker is bangded in many's de long day. you want a house-gal, does you? well, you better not fetch no gal in dis house fer ter make moufs at me right 'fo' my face. she sho' won't last long; i tell you dat right now!"

lucindy prepared to answer the summons, but before she could wipe the flour from her hands, adelaide changed her mind. she said she would answer the knock herself, and, as she went into the house, randall came around the corner and went into the kitchen. he was somewhat excited, and lucindy inquired if he was ill. "mammy," he said, "does you know who that is knockin' at the door? well, it aint nobody in the roun' worl' but ol' marster's grandson; it's miss betty's boy. of all people on top of the ground, that's who it is."

lucindy leaned on the kitchen table, and gazed at randall in speechless surprise. "de lord he'p my soul!" she exclaimed when she could find her voice. "what he been up ter dat he ain't never is been here befo'? he sholy can't be much mo' dan knee-high ter a puddle-duck." she persisted in thinking of her young mistress as she had known her a quarter of a century before. randall could tell her little beyond the fact that he had "know'd the favour," and had spoken to the young man on the street, asking if he were not kin to the bowdens.

this simple question developed into a long conversation, with the result that randall was as enthusiastic about miss betty's boy as he was about miss betty, who had saved his life. "he sho' have got the blood in 'im. he don't look strong, like all de balance of the bowdens, but he's got their ways. he walks an' holds his head jest like miss betty."

when adelaide opened the door, and saw standing there the young man at whom she had aimed her cornstalk gun, she was surprised to find that she was not at all embarrassed. she had no idea that this particular meeting had been arranged and provided for long ages ago. but she wondered why she should feel so cool and collected, when she should be confused and blushing. this is the way young women act in story books, and adelaide had often longed for the opportunity to stammer and blush when a strange but noble young man appeared before her; but now that the young man had come, she felt as if she had known him a long, long time. he was the embarrassed one, while she observed that he had nice brown eyes, to light up his handsome countenance, and these brown eyes seemed to be trying to apologise for something or other; and all the time the young man was thinking that he had never seen such beautiful blue eyes as those that were shyly glancing at him from under their long lashes. it was a desperate moment for all concerned, but providence was there, and laid its calm, cool hand on the situation. the young man asked for mr. whipple, but providence had been before him, and mr. whipple was not to be found in the house, though adelaide tried hard to find him, not knowing that if her uncle could have been found just at that particular time, a great many possibilities would have been destroyed. adelaide inquired if the brown eyes wouldn't come in and wait for uncle jonas, who was to be expected at any moment, and the brown eyes softly admitted that nothing would please them better if such an arrangement were perfectly agreeable to everybody, otherwise not for the world would they intrude—and then, as a matter of course, the blue eyes were compelled to see to it that the time of waiting would be made perfectly pleasant.

after awhile the sound of footsteps was heard on the veranda, and adelaide, with a secret regret, declared that uncle jonas must be coming. but providence was looking out for the interests of the young fellow with a keener eye, for the footsteps they heard were those of mr. sanders. he came in without knocking, as usual, and adelaide ran to meet him, just as she always did. "you look as flustrated as ef you had man company," mr. sanders remarked, as she greeted him. she slapped him lightly on the arm by way of warning and rebuke. "an' i'll lay i kin guess his name: it's winters." adelaide was very red in the face as she shook her head. "then it's somers," he declared; "i know'd it was one of the seasons that had dropped in on you out'n season. but it happens to be the very chap i'm arter." he stalked in to the sitting-room, and shook hands with young somers, calling him jonah, though his name was john.

then he casually inquired as to the whereabouts of mr. jonas whipple, in spite of the fact that he already knew. "you see how it is," he remarked to the young man; "you thought you wanted to see jonas, but it wasn't jonas you wanted to see at all." mr. sanders pursed his mouth, and stared at the ceiling. the remark he had made was interpreted by adelaide in a way he had not intended, but she was quite equal to the emergency.

"well, mr. sanders," she inquired with great dignity, "whom did mr. somers desire to see?"

he turned a bland and child-like smile upon her. "why, he wanted to see me, of course. who else could it 'a' been?" adelaide's dignity was not made of the strongest stuff, and she was compelled to laugh. "i understood him to inquire for uncle jonas," she said simply, "but i may have been mistaken."

"no; i really want to see mr. whipple," the young man insisted. "that is my business here."

mr. sanders beamed upon him with a smile that was as broad and sweet as a slice of pie. "i've allers took notice," he remarked, "that wimmen an' children, an' young folks in gener'l, will ax for the identical things they ought not to have. they're made that-a-way, i reckon."

in a little while the young man bowed himself out, followed by mr. sanders. "you young fellers worry me no little," remarked the sage of shady dale, as they went along the street together. "i happen to know about the business that fetched you here, an' i mighty nigh swallered my goozle when i seed you makin' for jonas's."

"well, i really thought mr. whipple was the proper person to see. i was told that he held the key to the situation," young somers replied.

mr. sanders smiled benignly. "old jonas has been seed an' he's been saw'd," said the elder man so drolly that somers laughed outright. "i reckon you've been to college, ain't you? i 'lowed as much. the trainin' is all right, but you'll have to fergit a heap you've l'arned ef you want travellin' for to be easy. old as i am, i wish i had some of your knowledge, but if you was to put it all in a hamper basket an' gi' me the right to paw it over, you'd be surprised at what i'd pick out. my experience is that when a feller gits through college, an' begins for to face the hard propositions that he ain't never thought about, he allers takes a notion that somethin's wrong somewhar.

"i reckon maybe you've got the idee that argyment, ef it's got all the facts behind it, is the thing that's bound for to win, an' you'll have to git bumped by a barnyard full of billy-goats before you find out that nineteen-hundred squar' miles on 'em ain't wuth one little inch of persuasion. it's all right in the books, whar they l'arn you how to think an' put up a nice article of argyment, but it don't work in reel life. you can't carry none of your p'ints wi'out doin' some mighty purty dancin' on t'other side of the line. now i've saved you from one of the wust bumpin's that a young feller ever had, and the beauty about it is you'll never have a suspicion of it ontel you're old enough for to have grandchildren. it'll not hurt you for to hit some of the rough places as you go slidin' through this vale of tears, but it'll never do you any reel good for to climb four flights of sta'rs an' then jump out'n the top window when you want to come down."

"i should think that even a fool would know that," the young man declared.

"well, some on 'em don't," responded mr. sanders. "thar's diffunt kinds of fools, an' diffunt kinds of houses, an' heap higher jumps, an' you'd 'a' had the experience of it ef you'd 'a' found old jonas at home. the next time you go thar don't ax for him. call for adelaide—call for lucindy the cook (she use' to belong to your gran'daddy bowden)—call for randall—call for any an' ever'body but old jonas."

"but what am i to do?" the young man inquired somewhat impatiently. "it seems that i may as well go back to malvern or atlanta; and when i do that, i'll have to hunt for another job."

mr. sanders hummed a tune, and apparently paid no attention to the young man's last remark. "old jonas is mighty quar'," he said after a pause. "when his sister died up thar in atlanta, you couldn't 'a' told from the motions he made that he'd hearn the mournful news; but sence he's had for to take keer of adelaide, her daughter, his gizzard has kinder softened up. why, that man thinks that the sun rises an' sets whar adelaide lives at."

"well," said the young fellow, "she certainly is charming; i don't think i ever met a young lady that so impressed me."

"forty years from now you'll be able for to say the same thing," remarked mr. sanders. "well, as i was a-tellin' you, old jonas ain't nigh as mean as he looks to be, but when i found out that he reely had a heart, you mought 'a' knocked me down wi' a feather. it was the time your gran'daddy died. why, jonas walked the floor all night long. that much i know bekaze i seed it wi' my own eyes. an' then thar's that nigger randall—thar ain't no tellin' how much jonas has done for him, nor how much he will do. but when it comes to makin' a fuss, jonas ain't in it. he's too hard-headed for to let people know him as he is. now, don't think i'm doin' any obiturary work, bekaze the fact is old jonas ain't a bit better than he ought to be. i reckon, he is too hard-headed for to let people know him as he is, but the fact is that old jonas is human; he ain't a bit better than the rest on us—an' he may be wuss in some spots. ef you've ever took notice, the people between the best man in the world an' the wust, make a purty fa'r average. i reckon," mr. sanders went on, regarding somers with a child-like smile, "i reckon you ain't never played poker as a habit?"

"not as a habit," replied the young man, laughing.

"well, the hand i've dealt to you is known as a royal straight flush, an' it sweeps ever'thing before it. look it over when you git time, an' ef anybody calls you, jes spread out the kyards on the table, an' ax 'em what they think of the lay-out."

"i don't think i know what you mean," said the young man, with some show of embarrassment.

"maybe not," replied mr. sanders, "but i leave it to you ef that's my fault; i've dealt you the hand, an' ef you dunno how to play it, you can't blame me. i see tidwell across yander, an' i want to have a talk wi' him; maybe he'll loan me his pocket-han'kcher. so-long!"

young somers went to his room in the tavern and pondered long over the problem that mr. sanders had presented with confident smiles. he tried to think it out, but, somehow, he could think of nothing but a laughing face, dimpled and sweet, blue eyes and golden hair, and lovely white hands lifted in eloquent gesture. he could concentrate all the powers of his mind on these, and he could think a little, just a little, of the wonderful personality of mr. sanders, who had persisted in remaining a boy, in spite of his years and large experience, but so far as puzzles and problems were concerned, his mind refused to work.

it was the same the next day, and the next. he walked about the little town by way of recreation, but by far the largest part of his time was spent in his room at the tavern. on the morning of the third day of his stay in shady dale, he concluded to visit the old place where his grandfather had lived, and where his mother was born. of the whereabouts of the place he had not the slightest idea, though he knew it was about a mile from the centre of the town. while he was debating whether or no he should wander about and try to find it for himself, or whether he should make inquiries as to the direction, he heard the rustle of skirts behind him. turning he beheld his vision of blue eyes and golden hair. this, however, was the reality. the young fellow had a queer notion, momentary but vivid, that somewhere or somehow, in some dim, mysterious region under the stars, he had come suddenly upon this same experience, under precisely the same conditions—and the thought gave him a thrill the like of which he had never felt before—the kind of thrill that, as mr. sanders once suggested, makes you think that you've clerked in a dry-goods store in some other world.

blue eyes and dimples were very gracious. "you left too soon the other day," they declared; "uncle jonas came in shortly after you went away, and you were hardly out of the house before one of your mother's old servants came in to see you. it was mammy lucindy, our cook, and she was very much disappointed to find you had gone."

"i'm sorry," the young fellow said, and he was so emphatic, and so serious, that adelaide laughed. "i have heard my mother speak of lucindy and her son randall."

"when uncle jonas came in," remarked adelaide, "i told him you had called. he frowned and said he supposed you wanted to see him on business; but i suggested that perhaps you had called because you were judge bowden's grandson. he declared you had never thought of such a thing; but the possibility that you might have had such a thought pleased him greatly. i don't know when i have seen him in such high good humour."

they were walking along as they talked, and the young man made a mental note of old jonas's pleasure. the sun was shining brightly, the air was fresh and cool, the jay-birds in the china trees were hilarious, and, somehow or other, the two young people felt very happy as they walked along. they had no particular reason for their happiness, but they seemed to be in the atmosphere in which happiness arises like the sparkling dew of early morning. a deaf old lady sitting on her piazza, on the opposite side of the street, smiled sweetly at adelaide, and held her trumpet to her ear, as if, by means of its echoing depths, she could hear what the laughing young woman was saying. adelaide did have something to say, evidently—something that an ear-trumpet could not interpret across the wide street, for she made a little gesture with her head, which her companion failed to see, and she sent some signal whirling through the air by means of a fluttering white hand. this signal he did see, but he was unfamiliar with the code that prevails among women-kind the world over: yet he had no difficulty in taking it to be an ordinary salutation, especially as the smiling old lady waved the trumpet around her head with an air of triumph. still there was something in it all that seemed to be a trifle beyond him—and from the feminine point of view it was a neat and pretty piece of work.

he had small opportunity to give the matter any thought, for adelaide, laughing, turned toward him, and began to speak of the affection her uncle jonas had felt for judge bowden, and the high esteem in which he held the judge's memory. she acknowledged that it was very queer that a man long dead should play a living part in her uncle's thoughts, but she explained that people had wrong ideas about her uncle. "they seem to think," she declared, "that uncle jonas is very mean and stingy, and hard-hearted; but if they knew him as well as i do, they would think differently."

the young fellow would have protested, but adelaide stopped him with a dignified wave of her versatile white hand. "i know what people say," she insisted. "mr. sanders tells me, and so does randall, whose life was saved by your mother; they tell me everything that is said about uncle jonas. and i always tell him about it, but he doesn't seem to care; he laughs as if it were a good joke, and declares that people have more sense than he has been willing to credit them with. really, i believe he likes it, but it is not at all agreeable to me."

young somers hardly knew what to say; he had heard old jonas described as the meanest man in twenty states, and the promoters of the railway enterprise who had sent him to shady dale were not at all backward in expressing their opinion of the man who was causing them so much unnecessary trouble and delay. so he walked on in silence for awhile. then: "speaking of my grandfather, i was just on the point of inquiring about the old place, but when you made your appearance just now, dropping out of the sky, i forgot all about it. i should like very much to see the home where my mother was born, and where my grandfather was born and died. i have heard my mother talk about shady dale and about the old home-place ever since i could understand what she said. i remember, when i was a child, that i had a queer idea that the town was shaped like a bowl or saucer; all the good people that chanced to come by stumbled and fell in, there to remain, and all the bad people crawled over the rim and fell out; and i couldn't help having a feeling of disappointment when i found that shady dale is very much like other towns."

"now, don't say that!" protested adelaide. "i have seen a great many towns, but never one like this—not one as pretty."

"why, in north carolina——" the young fellow began, but adelaide interrupted him with a laugh so genuine and unaffected that it was delightful to hear. yet, in spite of the fact that he enjoyed the rippling sound, he felt his face turning red. "you think north carolina is a joke," he went on, "but you would be surprised to know what a great state it is."

"i was laughing at one of mr. sanders's jokes," said adelaide, still smiling. "once there was a tobacco peddler came here driving a big covered waggon. mr. sanders discovered he was from north carolina, and shook hands with him very cordially, and asked about a great many people he never heard of. the tobacco man said they must have moved away, but mr. sanders said he thought not, for the reason that the only three north carolinians he ever saw that were able to settle at the toll-gates and ferries, made their way straight to alabama, and formed a business firm. he said the name of this firm was 'tar, pitch, and turkentime'—that's the way he pronounced the names. the tobacco man didn't get angry; he laughed as loudly as anybody, and uncle jonas says that was because he wasn't conceited."

here adelaide paused; she had come to the house of the friend she proposed to visit, and from the gate she pointed out the trees that grew so abundantly on the bowden place, and her attitude seemed to say to the young man that should he get lost, he would be safe so long as she was within calling distance. he had been used to more dignity and less charm on the part of most of the young women he knew, and he rather preferred the variety which he had now come in contact with for the first time. and yet, when he came to the old homestead, where his grandfather lived and died, and where his mother was born, he was attacked by none of the emotions that would have seized upon the soul of his mother. he had been educated in a different environment, and he was essentially modern in his sense of the importance of business affairs. as he read the friendly inscription on the tomb of his grandfather—the family burying-ground being not far from the picturesquely simple old house—he was conscious of a strong desire to know whether failure or success would crown his negotiations with mr. jonas whipple.

the vagrant winds blew through the tops of trees more than two centuries old, the house frowned grimly over the reminiscences of past hospitality, and the whole scene appealed strongly to sentiments that are now said not to be strictly scientific. but it must not be supposed that the young man had no poetry in his soul, or that his nature was free from emotions of a sentimental character. he lived entirely in the present, and the past had no meaning for him save that which was coldly historical. he found his inspiration in the rhythmical clatter and cackle of intricate machinery; he was stirred by the interweaving and interlacing business problems, and the whole movement, shape, and pattern of huge commercial enterprises.

nor was this a misfortune. being modern and practical, he was wholly free from the entanglements and misconceptions of prejudices that had outlived the issues that gave rise to them; and he went about his business with a mind at once clear, clean, and cheerful, bearing the signal of hope on his forehead. as he walked about the old place, it was characteristic of him, that he should be seeking the solution of the puzzle which mr. sanders had placed before him in the shape of a "royal straight flush," but in a matter of this kind, his mathematics availing him nothing: nor did it occur to him that the solution was to be found somewhere in the region from which the nations of the world draw their not over-abundant supplies of poetical metaphor. after an interval which he deemed seemly and proper, he turned his steps in the direction whence he had come. the street being straight as well as wide, afforded a fine perspective of sun and shade, to say nothing of the sand. as he went on, he walked more and more rapidly, so that he could have been accused of fleeing from the ghosts of his ancestors; but the propelling influence was the sight of adelaide, who, having completed her morning call, was emerging from the gate-way that led to the house of her friend. she was for moving on, but seemed suddenly to remember about the young man. turning, she saw him coming, and waited, sauntering slowly, her mind full of a swarm of thoughts that had been fighting for its possession since she first saw him.

"the sight of your mother's old home doesn't seem to have saddened you," she remarked, as he came up.

"no," he replied, "but that is because i have no refreshing memory of the old place. all my ideas about it are second hand; and besides, it seems to be a very cheerful place. i imagine that the soil round about is still fertile."

"i never thought of that," she answered; "but men are always more practical than women. in your place, i should have searched over the old homestead for the favourite walks of my grandfather; and i should have known, before i came away, where my mother ran, and hid herself when her feelings were hurt; and where she played with her dolls, and just how she did when she was a little bit of a girl."

the young man had an uneasy idea that adelaide was poking fun at him, but her face was so grave that he dismissed the idea, and it was then that he felt himself stirred by a dim conception of the region in which the thoughts of this beautiful young woman wandered and ranged.

"what i was really thinking of all the time," he said, with a laugh that somehow conveyed a regret that his thoughts were on a plane so much lower than hers, "was how i shall prevail on your uncle to convey to the railway company a right of way through his land. it means a great deal to me."

"oh, that is why you are here!" exclaimed adelaide. "well, i was wondering." she regarded him very seriously for a moment and he felt that he had fallen a notch in her estimation. "if you'll take my advice," she said, "you will leave the whole affair to randall."

"but how can i? randall is a negro. i'm sure i don't understand what you mean!" his pride, his self-esteem, had been wounded to the very core, and his face was very red.

"yes, leave it to randall and mr. sanders," adelaide replied, "and you'd not lose anything if you could manage to introduce the ghost of your grandfather." this was said airily, but it had far more meaning that young somers was able to read into it.

"i never saw just such a place as this is," he remarked somewhat petulantly, "where the people can only help you along by means of riddles and parables and jokes. mr. sanders tells me to say nothing to your uncle about the business on which i have been sent. and then he says that i already have a royal straight flush in my hand. what am i to infer from that?"

young somers, without intending it, revealed the essential boyishness of his nature, and adelaide relished it immensely. "you are to infer just what he intended you should," she declared. "the jokes of mr. sanders mean a great deal more than another man's wisdom. you'll discover that for yourself when you come to know him well."

"but you can't do business by means of jokes," the young fellow protested.

"that's the way mr. sanders transacts his business," adelaide responded, "and he's a very prosperous man. as for your grandfather's ghost, uncle jonas will raise it if you give him half an opportunity. you'll learn a great deal from mr. sanders and uncle jonas if you stay here long enough." the expression of her face was demureness itself, but the blue eyes sparkled with humour.

now, young somers was neither slow nor dull, but the peculiar atmosphere he found at shady dale was something new in his experience, and he was compelled to tunnel through it before he could clearly understand it. his business training, as far as it had gone, and all his business associations, had accustomed him to methods of procedure that were not only direct, but blunt. he never went around obstacles but through or over them. but he knew, after giving the matter some consideration, and after discovering that the ordinary commercial and cold-blooded methods would be useless here, that he would have to enter into the spirit of the place. he was a very attractive young man when at his best, and he made himself more attractive than ever by acquiring a quick sympathy for the things that interested the sincere and simple people about him.

he had several long talks with mr. sanders, during which he never once mentioned business nor anything relating thereto. instead, he seemed to be very much interested in adelaide and her personality, her nature and individuality. on this subject mr. sanders was eloquent. he could discourse on it for hours, and was only humorous when he wanted to make people believe he was in earnest. he told somers all about cally-lou, and asked the young man what he thought about the child that was a little more than make-believe, and yet remained on the very verge of visibility. now, the young man was very practical; circumstances had made him so. his spirit had had so little exercise, his dreams remained so persistently on the hither side of concrete things, he was so completely invested with the cold and critical views that were the result of his education, that his mind never ventured much beyond his material interests, and he never tried to peep around the many corners that life presents to a curious and sincere observer. consequently, he was all at sea, as the saying is, when mr. sanders told him about cally-lou. he thought it was some form of a new joke, and he would have had a hearty laugh had the old philosopher given him the wink.

but the wink was not forthcoming. on the contrary, much to the young man's surprise, mr. sanders appeared to be very serious. but the young man was as frank as it is possible for a youngster to be. "i'll be honest with you, mr. sanders," he said. "i don't know a thing about such matters. if i were not in shady dale, where everything seems to be so different, i would say at once that you are talking nonsense—that you are trying to play some kind of a practical joke—but, as it is, i don't know what to think."

when the young man said that everything is different in shady dale, he meant that adelaide was different, and mr. sanders knew it; so he said, "when you git so that you kin mighty nigh see cally-lou, you'll be wuth lookin' at twice."

somers took this more seriously than he would have taken it twenty-four hours previously—and he carried it to the tavern with him, and thought it over a long time; and then, as if that were not sufficient, he carried it to the bowden place in the dusk of the evening, and worried with it until he had no difficulty in discovering where his grandfather had walked, and where his mother had hid herself when her feelings were hurt, and where she had played with her dolls.

the experience helped him in many ways, so much that when adelaide saw him only a few hours later she exclaimed, "why, how well you are looking! our climate must be fine to make such a change in you." and mr. sanders—"well, well! ef you stay here long, you'll turn out to be a purty nice lookin' chap. the home air is mighty good for folks, so i've been told." and, somehow or other, without further explanation, the young fellow knew what mr. sanders had meant by his talk about the "royal straight flush." when he called on old jonas, he went as the grandson of judge bowden, and not as the agent of the promoter of the new railway, and endeavoured to learn everything that the old man knew about his grandfather.

mr. sanders joined the two before they had been conversing very long, and he was surprised, as well as pleased, to find how completely old jonas had thawed out. there was not a frown on his face, and, on occasion, he laughed heartily over some incident that his memory drew from the past. and, presently, adelaide glided in from the innermost recesses of the house, and sat near her uncle. she was a charming addition, and a most interesting one, for she was able to remind old jonas of many things he had told her about the dead judge. mr. sanders, not to be outdone, contributed some of his own reminiscences, so that the evening became a sort of memorial of a good man who had long passed away.

when the visitors were going away, adelaide accompanied them to the door, and went with them on the veranda. before mr. sanders could say good-bye, she caught him by his sleeve—"do you remember what i told you the other day? well, she has returned."

"what did she say?" he inquired, his finger on his chin. adelaide blushed, but no one could see her embarrassment. "why, she says that everything looks a great deal better by lamplight."

young somers heard the conversation, but kept on moving away. "did you hear that?" inquired mr. sanders, as he overtook the other. "she was talking about cally-lou. it seems she run away the day you showed your face here, and now she's come back." and further than that, the sage of shady dale said not a word. but the next day, he met the young fellow on the street, and gave him a congratulatory slap on the back. "you showed up purty strong, sonny; an' now that you've diskiver'd for yourself that thar's a whole lot of ingineerin' that's nuther civil nor mechanical, an' that aint got a thing in the world to do wi' figgers, you'll manage to git along ruther better than you thought—in fact, mighty nigh fustrate.

"but don't fergit cally-lou!"

and the young fellow did get along first-rate in more ways than one. the railroad was allowed to run right through old jonas's land, and when it was completed there was nothing to do but to celebrate the event by a marriage, in which the young man was aided and abetted by adelaide. then when everything had settled down, he took hold of randall's water-power and furnished lights for the town, and power for two or three mills in which mr. sanders was interested. i think this is all, but if you are in doubt about it, and want to find out something more, just enclose a stamp to william h. sanders, esq., shady dale, georgia.