"No, I can't—I never leave the house after dark. They need me at home."
"Blast them, what have they got to do with you? You are already a slave to them. Well, good-bye. You'll change your mind some day."
He held out his hand with a smile, but she refused to take it.
"You won't even shake hands. Why, what is the matter with you? I can see that you are mad at me by the twitching of—Do you know, Dixie, you have the most maddening mouth and lips that a woman ever owned? Say, shake just once to show that we are friends."
"I won't. I did it once and you held me and tried to kiss me. I'll tell you now in dead earnest, Hank, you must never try that sort of a thing again. I mean it, as God is my judge, I do."
"I never will while you hold a hoe in your grip," he jested, with a thwarted smile, as she turned from him.
He stepped back to his gun and stood watching her as she plodded homeward. "I can't help it," he said, a dark, desperate look on his face. "I simply can't quit thinking about her. I've got staying qualities, and no man ever gained his point that paid the slightest attention to a woman's moods. Right now she may be wishing she'd gone to the picnic."
CHAPTER IV
