"Why--how could you help me?" she said at last; "even if--"

--"You'd let me," he finished for her. "Well, I'm not particularly

clever, but I've got sense enough to count sheep and drive cows; and I

can break in colts, train dogs, and, if I'm obliged, I daresay I could

drive a plough."

Her eyes wandered thoughtfully, abstractedly down the dale; but she was

listening and thinking.

"Of course I should have a lot to learn, but I'm rather quick at

picking up things, and--"

"Are you joking, Mr. Orme?" she broke in.

"Joking? I was never more serious in my life," he said, eagerly, and

yet with an attempt to conceal his earnestness. "I am asking it as a

favour, I am indeed! I shall be here for weeks, months, perhaps, and I

should be bored to death--"

"With your father's house full of visitors?" she put in, softly, and

with a smile breaking through her gravity.

"Oh, they'll amuse themselves," he said. "At any rate, I sha'n't be

with them all day; and I'd ever so much rather help you than dance

attendance on them."

She pushed the short silky curls from her temples, and shook her head.

"Of course it's ridiculous," she said, with a girlish laugh; "and it's

impossible, too."

"Oh, is it?" he retorted. "I've never yet found anything I wanted to do

impossible."

"You always have your own way?" she asked.

"By hook or by crook," he replied.

"But why do you want to--help me?" she asked. "Do you think you would

find it amusing? You wouldn't." The laughter shone in her eyes again.

"You would soon grow tired of it. It is not like hunting or fishing or

golfing; it's work that tries the temper--I never knew what a fiendish

temper I had got about me until the first time I had to drive a cow and

calf."

"My temper couldn't be worse," he remarked, calmly. "Howard says that

sometimes I could give points to the man possessed with seven devils."

"Who is Mr. Howard?" she asked.

"My own particular chum," he said. "He came down with me and is up at

the house now. But never mind Howard; are you going to let me help you

as if I were an old friend or a--brother? Or are you going to be unkind

enough to refuse?"




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