"Yes, sir--in the mornin'." He caught hold of the girl's arm
awkwardly and swung her around to the opposite side of the
pump-handle, and put her hands on it and began to pump. She pumped
with him as he puffed between the strokes, "Um' huh--we're going to
hide in the provision wagons, under some saddles they is there and
go--to--war!" The water was pouring into the bucket by the time he
had got this out. Their hands touched on the pump-handle. It was the
boy who drew his hand away. The girl gasped:--

"Why, John Barclay,--it ain't no such thing--does your ma know it?"

He told her that no one knew it but her, and they pumped in silence
until the bucket was full, and walking back carrying the bucket
between them, he told her another secret: that Watts McHurdie had
asked John to get his guitar after midnight, and play an accompaniment
to the accordion, and that Watts and Ward and Jake Dolan and Gabriel
Carnine were going out serenading. Further he told her that Watts was
going to serenade Nellie Logan at the Thayer House, and that Gabriel
Carnine was going to serenade Mary Murphy, and that Philemon Ward was
going to serenade Miss Lucy, and that he, John Barclay, had suggested
that it would be fine to serenade Mrs. Culpepper, because she was such
a nice woman, and they agreed that if he would bring his guitar, they
would!

When the boy and girl returned to the store, Ward and Miss Lucy went
to the Barclay home for the guitar. When they came back, Mrs. Barclay
noted a pink welt on one of Ward's fingers where his cameo ring had
been, and she observed that from time to time Miss Lucy kept feeling
of her hair as if to smooth it. It was long after midnight before the
girls from the hotel went home, and Miss Lucy and Mrs. Barclay lay on