the cañon for "orders," Flip did not deem it necessary to reply. "Then
I allowed how ez you might have company," he continued; "I reckon
there's some city folks up at the summit. I saw a mighty smart,
fash'n'ble gal cavorting round. Hed no end o' style and fancy fixin's.
That's my kind, I tell you. I just weaken on that sort o' gal," he
continued, in the firm belief that he had awakened Flip's jealousy, as
he glanced at her well-worn homespun frock, and found her eyes suddenly
fixed on his own.

"Strange I ain't got to see her yet," she replied coolly, shouldering
her parcel, and quite ignoring any sense of obligation to him for his
extra-official act.

"But you might get to see her at the edge of the Gin and Ginger Woods,"
he persisted feebly, in a last effort to detain her; "if you'll take a
_pasear_ there with me."

Flip's only response was to walk on toward the cabin, whence, with a
vague complimentary suggestion of "drop-in' in to pass the time o' day"
with her father, the Postmaster meekly followed.

The paternal Fairley, once convinced that his daughter's new companion
required no pecuniary or material assistance from his hands, relaxed to
the extent of entering into a querulous confidence with him, during
which Flip took the opportunity of slipping away. As Fairley had that
infelicitous tendency of most weak natures, to unconsciously exaggerate
unimportant details in their talk, the Postmaster presently became
convinced that the butcher was a constant and assiduous suitor of
Flip's. The absurdity of his sending parcels and letters by post when
he might bring them himself did not strike the official. On the