"Do you think she favors him?" asked Dudley, anxiously, a momentary fierce pang of dislike or distrust or envy shivering through him as he looked at the debonair young lawyer.
"At any rate," laughed Abby, "there can be no doubt of his intentions. As for her," she continued, looking earnestly at Abner, "I have in mind a far more suitable lover, who will, I hope, some day win that heart of gold."
"Who is this fortunate one destined to 'win that heart of gold'?" Dudley carelessly inquired, feeling but little interest just then in any topic save that which concerned himself and the girl at his side. "Do I know him?"
"Only slightly, I believe," Miss Patterson replied, looking down with a demure smile; "not nearly so well as I hope you will some day."
Abner flushed warmly, and his pulse leaped high with hope; for he interpreted the words to refer to a closer relationship between Abby and himself. "Of course," he thought jubilantly, "I shall become well acquainted with Betsy's prospective husband, when Abby shall have accepted me."
"Whoever he may be," said Abner, heartily, "since he has your approval, I wish him Godspeed with Betty; for," he added in a lower key, and frowning slightly, as he looked at Mr. Drane, "I can not, for the life of me, cordially like or trust yonder fine gentleman. But what about this other lover for Betty?"
"At present," Abby answered with a meaning which Abner was far from construing correctly, "he thinks his affections are centered in a far less worthy object; and he is blind to his heart's best interests."
"Let us hope that this blind Romeo may soon be restored to sight," laughed Abner; "or else, that dear little Juliet yonder will be carried off by some clearer-visioned wooer. But see, Mr. Rogers has at last restrung that fiddle and tuned it to his notion; so now for our dance!"
No stately minuet or mincing cotillion was the order of the evening. Instead, the "countre dance," the "gauntlet," the "four-handed reel"—old-time, energetic country dancing—shook the rafters overhead, and made the puncheon floor vibrate. Such jigging, such "cutting the pigeon wing," such swinging corners! No languid, lazy gliding, but hearty motion—up and down, round and round, faster and faster, as the twinkling bow sawed across the strings to the tune of "Coon Dog," "Roxy Ann," "Billy Batters," or "Niggah in the Cawnfield."
Rousing music it was—"enough," as Rube and Tom declared, "to mek even a one-legged fellah git up an' hump hisse'f."