He began picking over an assortment of small hardware, varying his musical accompaniment by whistling instead of singing. His visitor looked at him rather oddly.
"Jed," she observed, "you're changed."
Changed? I ain't changed my clothes, if that's what you mean. Course if I'd know I was goin' to have bankers' daughters with gold—er—muskrats 'round their necks come to see me I'd have dressed up."
"Oh, I don't mean your clothes. I mean you—yourself—you've changed."
"I've changed! How, for mercy sakes?"
"Oh, lots of ways. You pay the ladies compliments now. You wouldn't have done that a year ago."
"Eh? Pay compliments? I'm afraid you're mistaken. Your pa says I'm so absent-minded and forgetful that I don't pay some of my bills till the folks I owe 'em to make proclamations they're goin' to sue me; and other bills I pay two or three times over."
"Don't try to escape by dodging the subject. You HAVE changed in the last few months. I think," holding the tail of the silver fox before her face and regarding him over it, "I think you must be in love."
"Eh?" Jed looked positively frightened. "In love!"
"Yes. You're blushing now."