"What know we," he declaimed, getting into his stride, while Donahue, comforted and reassured by the well known sound of the harangue, steadied himself down to a walk, "of the restless nights and the heavy days that yonder virtuous woman has suffered from the meanderings of Jethniah? He is a personable, plausible man with a roving eye. He has a gift for conversation and an eye for beauty. Even his references to a post in the mud show a discontented, restless disposition. You heard him mention the post in the mud? It is proof patent that his thoughts are wanderers.
"Then, too, he is a man of consequence and of travel. I saw the stage back of the house. It proves that he himself journeys daily down to the railroad to get the mail, to carry the passengers, if any there be—You notice that I stick to the bare facts, there may not be any passengers, but if any there be—and to mingle with the gay world that whirls by.
"Fifthly and sixthly; he is the postmaster. We can only vaguely appreciate what that means. He has the first read at every postal card that comes into these hills. He knows everybody's secrets. Do you realize the hold that gives him on the imaginations of the female portion of this high and wide community?
"He knows the ins and the outs. The devious ways of the female mind are to him an open book. He pats the shoulder of widowed sorrow. He consoles the lovelorn maiden and invents all too welcome excuses for the letter that does not come. He is even capable of writing letters himself to take the place of the missing ones. Given the man, the temptation, and the immunity of his position, and there are no heights of rascality that he might not scale."
"I don't care," said Augusta hotly. "I'm sure he is a good kind man."
And that's all right! thought Jimmie, pleased and proud to have drawn Augusta out to argue, and flushed for further triumphs.
"There you have it! He is kind," he echoed. "You have touched the very key spring of his villainy. What man was ever kind but to beguile? From our ancient friend Leander at the swimming bee down to young John W. Lothario himself they all had kind hearts and were willing to share them with any and every lady within the horizon line. And here is our Jethniah the very prize dandler of them all. For forty years he has gone up and down these hills and has ranged far and wide, even as far as the railroad, interesting himself in the trials of beauty in distress, while his own lawful wife and spouse languished behind the vines.
"Think of the tale of these doings that she could tell! And she would tell them, too. In fact I'd wager that she has told them, numerously, circumstantially, and in detail, for a good many hours out of the forty years," he concluded with a grin.
Augusta was quiet now. She had nestled in close under Jimmie's shoulder and seemed to have forgotten Jethniah and his wife.
"Jimmie."