At the end of the passage, facing the ravine, I stood and talked to Guinea, while Alf was hitching the mare to the buck-board. The sun was well over to the west, pouring upon us, and in the strong light I noted the clear, health-hue of her complexion. A guinea chicken, swift and graceful, ran round the corner of the house, and, nodding toward the fowl, I said: "I am talking to her namesake and she is jealous."
I thought that the shadow of a pout crossed her lips, but she smiled and replied: "If my real name were not so ugly I'd insist upon people calling me by it. I hate nicknames."
"But sometimes they are appropriate," I rejoined.
"But when they are," she said, laughing, "they never stick. It's the disagreeable nickname that remains with us."
"Is that the philosophy you learned at Raleigh?" I asked.
She shrugged her shapely shoulders, laughed low in her throat and answered: "I haven't learned philosophy at all. It doesn't take much of a stock of learning for a girl who lives away out here."
"But she might strive to learn in order to be fitted for a better life, believing that it will surely come."
"How encouraging you are, Mr. Hawes. After a while you may persuade me that I am really glad that you came."
"You have already made me glad," I replied.
"Have I? Then mind that I don't make you sorry. Alf's waiting for you."