"My fellow-guest confided to me a little while ago that she too had been a hired girl, Mr. Striker, so I don't see—"
"Did she tell you that?" demanded Phineas sharply.
"She did," replied Gwynne, enjoying his host's consternation.
"Well, I'll be tee-totally danged," exploded the settler. He got up suddenly and turning his back to his guest, knocked the burnt tobacco from his pipe against the stone arch of the fireplace. "I guess I better rake the ashes over these here coals," said he, "'cause if I don't an' the cabin took fire an' burnt us all alive Eliza'd never git done jawin' me about it." Presently he stood off and critically surveyed his work. "I guess that'll fix her so's she won't spit any sparks out here an' set fire to the carpet. As I was sayin', I reckon I'll have to make up a bed here in front of the fireplace fer myself, an' let you go up to the attic. We got a—"
"I was afraid of this, Mr. Striker. You are putting yourselves out terribly on my account. I can't allow it, sir. It is too much to ask—"
"Now, don't you worry about us. You ain't puttin' us out at all. One night last winter,—the coldest night we had,—Eliza an' me slep' on the kitchen floor with nary a blanket er quilt, an' I had to git up every half hour to put wood on the fire so's we wouldn't freeze to death, all because Joe Wadley an' his wife an' her father an' mother an' his sister with her three children dropped in sort of unexpected on account of havin' their two wagons git stuck in a snow drift a mile er so from here. No, sirree, don't you worry. There's a spare tick up in the attic what we use fer strangers when they happen along, an' Zachariah has put your blankets right here by the door,—an' your pistols, too, I see,—so whenever you're ready, I'll lead the way up the ladder an' show you where you're to roost. There's a little winder at one end, so's you c'n have all the air you want,—an', my stars, there's a lot of it to-night, ain't there? Jist listen to her whistle. Sounds like winter. She's changed, though, an' I wouldn't be surprised if we'd find the moon is shinin'."
CHAPTER IV — VIOLA GWYN
They stepped outside the cabin, into the fresh, brisk gale that was blowing. A gibbous moon hung in the eastern star-specked sky. Scurrying moonlit clouds off in the west sped northward on the sweep of the inconstant wind, which had shifted within the hour. A light shone dimly through the square little window of the bedroom. Kenneth's imagination penetrated to sacred precincts beyond the solid logs: he pictured her in the other frock, moving gracefully before the fascinated eyes of the settler's wife, proud as a peacock and yet as gay as the lark.