“A month ago,” she continued reflectively, “my mother would never have thought it possible to leave me here alone. Perhaps she may be getting worried now.”
Miss Mayfield had calculated over much on Jeff's recumbent position. To her surprise and slight mortification, he rose instantly to his feet, and said anxiously,
“Ef you think so, miss, p'raps I'm keeping you here.”
“Not at all, Mr. Jeff. Your being here is a sufficient excuse for my staying,” she replied, with the large dignity of a small body.
Jeff, mentally and physically crushed again, came down a little heavier than before, and reclined humbly at her feet. Second knock-down blow for Miss Mayfield.
“Come, Mr. Jeff,” said the triumphant goddess, in her first voice, “tell me something about yourself. How do you live here—I mean; what do you do? You ride, of course—and very well too, I can tell you! But you know that. And of course that scarf and the silver spurs and the whole dashing equipage are not intended entirely for yourself. No! Some young woman is made happy by that exhibition, of course. Well, then, there's the riding down to see her, and perhaps the riding out with her, and—what else?”
“Miss Mayfield,” said Jeff, suddenly rising above his elbow and his grammar, “thar isn't no young woman! Thar isn't another soul except yourself that I've laid eyes on, or cared to see since I've been yer. Ef my aunt hez been telling ye that—she's—she—she—she—she—lies.”
Absolute, undiluted truth, even of a complimentary nature, is confounding to most women. Miss Mayfield was no exception to her sex. She first laughed, as she felt she ought to, and properly might with any other man than Jeff; then she got frightened, and said hurriedly, “No, no! you misunderstand me. Your aunt has said nothing.” And then she stopped with a pink spot on her cheek-bones. First blood for Jeff!
Now this would never do; it was worse than the butterflies! She rose to her full height—four feet eleven and a half—and drew her cloak over her shoulders. “I think I will return to the house,” she said quietly; “I suppose I ought not to overtask my strength.”
“You'd better let me go with you, miss,” said Jeff submissively.