"There," cried triumphant Justice. "You see, I don't boast. I despise boasting." She took up her knitting, put on her glasses, closed her lips, and thus announced that court was also closed.
Poor Rita, meantime, was sobbing, upstairs at her window.
After a long, awkward silence, Billy Little addressed Dic. "I came up to spend the night with you, and if you are going home, I'll walk and lead my horse. I suppose you walked down?"
"Yes," answered Dic; "I'll go with you."
"I'm sorry to carry off your company, Mrs. Bays," said Billy, "but I want to—"
"Oh, Dic's no company; he's always here. I don't know where he finds time to work. I'd think he'd go to see the girls sometimes."
"Rita's a girl, isn't she?" asked Billy, glancing toward Dic.
"Rita's only a child, and a disobedient one at that," replied Mrs. Bays, but Billy's words put a new thought into her head that was almost sure to cause trouble for Rita.
When Billy and Dic went around the house to fetch Billy's horse, Rita was sitting at the window upstairs. She smiled through her tears and tossed a note to Dic, which he deciphered by the light of the moon. It was brief, "Please meet me to-morrow at the step-off—three o'clock."
The step-off was a deep hole in the river halfway between Bays's and Bright's.