’And still the wonder grew,
 That one small head could carry all she knew.’

Now I shall have to run for it, which will be most undignified.  Good-by, mother!” He kissed her.  “Good-by, Miss Sally!  We’ll be there to-night.”

He swung away down the road at a brisk pace, turning once to wave his hat at the figure on the porch.

“Such a boy!” breathed the mother.  “Yet such a man, Miss Sally, though his mother says it.  And he’ll go off with all that nonsense on his lips, and a head full of talk for those men in the church at noon—­talk that will go straight to their hearts—­and, better, to their judgments.”

“I haven’t yet been able to realize that he’s a minister,” Sally ventured.  “Somehow, seeing him out-doors here—­”

Mrs. Ferry nodded.  “I know.  Nobody takes him for what he is, because he will not do what he calls ‘dress the part every day.’  And he is such a believer in making the physical life offset the mental and spiritual—­if I may put it so—­that I tell him he may be in danger of becoming so athletic—­and so agricultural”—­she smiled—­“that he will crowd out the spiritual.  Yet he knows I don’t mean that.  He turns up many a rich nugget of thought, when he is hoeing the ground—­and chops down many an error when he fells a tree, perhaps!”

“I don’t doubt it,” agreed Sally, regarding the proud little mother with real envy of her fortunate son.  “Please come over early,” she begged, as she took her leave, after lingering a little to tell Mrs. Ferry more about her plans for the evening.

“Sally Lunn!” Josephine exclaimed, a few hours later.  “What have you been doing to yourself?  You never looked so well.  Behold her, Jarvis!  But don’t dare take off your blue goggles.  Her radiance is fairly dazzling, and is liable to blind you.”

“It’s partly sunburn,” confessed Sally.  “I go deliberately out and let the sun smite me, first on the right cheek and then on the left.  For awhile I burned my nose at the same time, which was not picturesque.  But now I put a thick coating of talcum powder on my nose, and burn myself only where it is artistic.”

“There’s an honest confession for you,” and Jarvis shook hands so heartily that Sally’s fingers ached for a minute afterward.  “I can see some of the rouge through my glasses.”

“I must look purple to you, then.  Red and blue make purple, on cheeks as well as palettes, don’t they?  Joey, what made you put on a white dress?  I planned to take you all blackberrying over in the pasture.”

“Lovely!  Lend me an apron, and I’ll risk the dress.  This is a beautiful time of day to pick blackberries.”

The three set off.  As they passed the garden on the farther side of the hedge they were hailed by Donald Ferry.  “May I go, too?” called the young man, and he leaped lightly over the hedge.

Jarvis Burnside went forward and held out his hand.  “I heard you speak, this noon,” he said, in a low tone.