up here.' She ain't no fool, with all her faintin's and dyin's away! No,
Jeff Briggs. And if she wants to show ye off agin them city fellows ez
she knows, and ye ain't got spunk enough to stand up and show off with
her--why"--she turned her head impatiently, but he was gone.

If Jeff had ever wavered in his resolution he would have been steady
enough NOW. But he had never wavered; the convictions and resolutions of
suddenly awakened character are seldom moved by expediency. He was
eager to taste the bitter dregs of his cup at once. He began to pack his
trunk, and make his preparations for departure. Without avoiding Miss
Mayfield in this new excitement, he no longer felt the need of her
presence. He had satisfied his feverish anxieties by placing his trunk
in the hall beside his open door, and was sitting on his bed, wrestling
with a faded and overtasked carpet-bag that would not close and accept
his hard conditions, when a small voice from the staircase thrilled
him. He walked to the corridor, and, looking down, beheld Miss Mayfield
midway on the steps of the staircase.

She had never looked so beautiful before! Jeff had only seen her in
those soft enwrappings and half-deshabille that belong to invalid
femininity. Always refined and modest thus, in her present
walking-costume there was added a slight touch of coquettish adornment.
There was a brightness of color in her cheek and eye, partly the result
of climbing the staircase, partly the result of that audacious impulse
that had led her--a modest virgin--to seek a gentleman in this personal
fashion. Modesty in a young girl has a comfortable satisfying charm,
recognized easily by all humanity; but he must be a sorry knave or
a worse prig who is not deliciously thrilled when Modesty puts her
charming little foot just over the threshold of Propriety.