"Conover! Why, I never even heard the man's name till now!"
"Conover?" Marian screwed up her forehead. A vague recollection flickered in her mind.
"Yes, sir, Conover. He has a good-sized farm back here a piece. Likely you've forgotten. There's him and his wife and his little girl. Crippled she is, the poor child. Mamie, they call her."
"Mamie Conover—Oh! The poor little soul who was so delighted with your red pencils, Rod! That visitors' Sunday, don't you remember?"
"Oh, to be sure. You're better at remembering than I am, Sis. Well, I'm going up to thank him, this minute. Then we'll ship the dredge into trim and begin digging out the channel again. Think it will take us all night?"
"Now that Conover's gang has stopped the slide so good and square for us, we ought to be able to cut out and tamp down, too, by daybreak, sir. Maybe sooner. Here comes Conover this minute."
Coated with mud, squashing heavily into the sodden crest of the bank with every step, Conover tramped down the ditch. In that shambling figure, Marian instantly recognized little Mamie's father. Vividly she remembered his deep, weary look at her, the infinite tenderness with which he had lifted the little frail body from her arms.
In the white glare of the search-light, his gaunt face was radiant with friendly concern.
"We've done what little we could, Mr. Hallowell," he said, in reply to Rod's eager thanks. "Little enough at that. But now if you'll put in a few hours' dredging to get out that slide, your ditch will be all right again. Mr. Locke there, whose land borders on this lateral, is a little—well, a little fussy, you know. That's why we fellows kinder butted in and set to work without waitin' to hear from you. Land, it wasn't nothing to thank us for. Just a little troke between neighbors. You here, Miss Hallowell? My buckboard is right up-shore. Can't I drive you to Mr. Gates's? It's right on my way home—only a mile or so off my road, that is."
"Run along, Sis. Please. It's late and damp, and chilly besides. Scoot, now."