except at table, when he was usually grimly
laconic, though now and then she would hear him
joking heavily with Sam Warden in the yard, or,
with evidently humorous intent, groaning at Mamie
over Eugene's health; but it had not escaped Ariel
that he was, on his part, watchful of herself, and
upon his guard with a wariness in which she was
sometimes surprised to believe that she saw an
almost haggard apprehension.

He did not answer her question, and it seemed
to her, as she continued steadily to meet his hot
eyes, that he was trying to hold himself under some
measure of control; and a vain effort it proved.

"You go back to my house!" he burst out,
shouting hoarsely. "You get back there! You
stay there!"

"No," she said, moving between him and the
door. "Mamie and I are going for a drive."

"You go back to my house!" He followed her,
waving an arm fiercely at her. "Don't you come
around here trying to run over me! You talk
about your `affairs'! All you've got on earth
is this two-for-a-nickel old shack over your head
and a bushel-basket of distillery stock that you
can sell by the pound for old paper!" He threw
the words in her face, the bull-bass voice seamed