PART FOUR

Weary clattered up to the school-house door to find it erupting divers
specimens of young America--by adoption, some of them. He greeted each
one cheerfully by name and waited upon his horse in the shade.

Close behind the last sun-bonnet came Miss Satterly, key in hand.
Evidently she had no intention of lingering, that night; Weary smiled
down upon her tentatively and made a hasty guess as to her state of
mind--a very important factor in view of what he had come to say.

"It's awful hot, Schoolma'am; if I were you I'd wait a while--till the
sun lets up a little."

To his unbounded surprise, Miss Satterly calmly sat down upon the
doorstep. Weary promptly slid out of the saddle and sat down beside
her, thankful that the step was not a wide one. "You've been
unmercifully hard to locate since the dance," he complained. "I like
to lost my job, chasing over this way, when I was supposed to be headed
another direction. I came by here last night at five minutes after
four, and you weren't in sight anywhere; was yesterday a holiday?"

"You probably didn't look in the window," said the schoolma'am. "I was
writing letters here till after five."

"With the door shut and locked?"

"The wind blew so," explained Miss Satterly, lamely. "And that lock--"