JEFFRY MAULBOY took an unusually large chew of tobacco, and thought it all over.

“I won’t do it,” he finally said.

“All right, then,” she replied; “I’ll write to Mrs. CUPID and tell her the whole story, and I’ll stay here besides.  It’ll be hard enough on me for a while if I go, and harder still if I stay; but I’ll do it to spite you.  I’ll break off your match with Mrs. CUPID if I do stay, now mark my words.”

JEFFRY MAULBOY walked back and forth, and emitted the choicest string of curses that his extensive and valuable collection enabled him to cull.  At last he stopped in front of her, and said savagely: 

“I’ll do it.  But if you ever lisp a word to any living soul till I’m safely married to CUPID, I’ll kill you, dead sure.  Do you hear that?”

“When and how is the thing to be done?” he growled again.

“The sooner the better,” was ANN’S reply.  “If you don’t hear from me by to-morrow noon, go to the Half-way House at Forney’s Crag.  That’s all you’ve got to do.  I’ll have the lawyer and minister both there. You’d better be there too.  That’s all I say.”

Alone in his room, JEFFRY admitted that ANN had been too smart for him.

“And I’m mighty afraid that, somehow or other, the old she-dragon will get the best of me yet in this infernal business,” he soliloquized.  “Anyhow, I’ll sleep on it,” and he went to bed.

He got up in the morning, firmly resolved to break his engagement with ANN.

“She was only bluffing me last night,” he said.  “She daren’t tell CUPID.”  But he didn’t feel easy for all that.

After breakfast he took his hat and started out.

“Where are you bound, JEFF?” inquired ARCHIBALD.

“Anywhere,” was the reply.  “Come along.”

JEFFRY was awful dull company, so Archibald thought.  He took very large chews of tobacco, and expectorated freely into the eyes of the small boys whom they chanced to meet, and if he didn’t make a good shot, he swore awfully.  Once he went away across a field on purpose to kick a very small dog, and ARCHIBALD waited for him.

“Why, JEFFRY,” said ARCHIBALD, “what ails you?  You’re awfully down in the mouth this morning.”

“And so you’d be if you was in my boots,” was the reply.

And then he up and told ARCHIBALD the whole story.

The latter was so thoroughly dumbfounded that a decently-smart boy could have blown him over without any apparent effort.

“Why, JEFF,” said he, “only to think of it.  Ain’t it awful?  And ANN BRUMMET, too; ain’t I glad it ain’t me, though.”

“That’s no way to console a fellow, you fool,” said JEFFRY.  “You’d better offer to help me out of the scrape.”

“Why, so I will, of course,” said ARCHIBALD.  “If I hadn’t saved your life, of course you wouldn’t have got into it; and so I feel bound, you know, to see you out of it.  What shall I do?”