Free Phoebe Deane by Grace Livingston Hill Page B

brow of the hill, a mere speck against the autumn sky when they came out of the woods. The young man's face kindled as he answered:
     
    " Thank you for telling me. Yes, now I will understand. My mother has been gone a long time, too. I wish she had written me a letter to read to-day."
     
    Then, as if he knew he must not stay longer, he lifted his hat, smiled, and walked quickly up the hill, while Phoebe sped swiftly down the road, not noticing the glories of the day, nor thinking so much of her own troubles, but marveling at what had happened and living it all over once more in imagination. She knew without thinking that a wagon was rumbling nearer and nearer, but she gave it no heed.
     
    Nathaniel Graham, when he reached the edge of the wood, turned and looked back down the road; saw the girl in her yellow draperies moving in the autumn sunshine, and watched her intently. The driver of the farm wagon, now almost opposite to him, watched glumly from behind his bags of wheat, high piled, sneered under his breath at the fine attire, half guessed who he was; then wondered who the girl was who kept tryst so far from any houses, and with a last glance at the man just vanishing into the woods he whipped up his team, resolved to find out.
     
    CHAPTER VI
     
    Nathaniel Graham went to pick up the letter he had left behind the log, but as he did so his eye caught something brown, lying on the ground among the laurel near the letter. He reached out and took it. It was a bit of a bow of brown velvet, and seemed strangely a part of the girl who had been there but a few moments before. What part had this bit of velvet played in her make-up? Had it been worn at her throat, or in her wonderful hair? He never doubted that it was hers. As he raised it wonderingly in his hand to look at it more closely he fancied he caught the same subtle fragrance that had been in her hair. His fingers closed pleasantly about the soft little thing. For a moment he pondered whether he ought to go after her and give it to her. Then farther up the hill he heard the voices calling him, and with a pleasant smile he tucked it into his inner pocket beside the letter that had played so important a part in the little affair. He rather liked to think he had that bit of velvet himself, and perhaps it was not of much value to the owner. It might at least make another opportunity of seeing her. And so he passed on up the hill with something besides the freedom of Texas to think upon.
     
    Meantime, the load of wheat went down the road after Phoebe at a lively pace, and its driver, in no pleasant mood because he had been all the way to Albany with his wheat and had been unable to sell it, studied the graceful sunlit figure ahead of him, and wondered what there was about it so strangely familiar.
     
    Phoebe had just reached the highroad and paused to think which way she would go, when the wagon overtook her, and turning with her face bright with pleasure, and momentary forgetfulness, she faced the lowering astonishment of Hiram Green! Her face grew deadly white with the revulsion, and she caught at the fence to steady herself. She felt as if the earth were reeling under her unprotected feet. One hand flew to her heart and her frightened eyes, with a wild thought of her late protector, sought the way by which she had come; but the hill-side lay unresponsive in the late sunshine, and not a soul was to be seen. Nathaniel Graham had just picked up his cousin Janet's basket.
     
    " Well, I swear!" said Hiram Green, pulling his horses up sharply. " It ain't you tricked out that way, away off here! " Then slowly his little pig eyes traveled to the lonely hill-side, gathered up an idea, came back to the girl's guilty face, and narrowed to a hateful slit through which shone a gleam of something that might be likely to illumine outer darkness. He brought his thin, cruel lips together with satisfaction. He felt that at last he had a hold upon the girl, but he could wait and use it