“Do you suppose they’ll tell her to-night?” asked Meeks.

Henry regarded him with an expression of actual terror.  “Seems as if they might wait, and let Sylvia have her night’s sleep,” he muttered.

“I guess I won’t stay to supper,” said Meeks.

“Stay, for the Lord’s sake.”

Meeks laughed.  “I believe you are afraid, Henry.”

“I hate to see a woman upset over anything.”

“So do I, for that matter.  Do you think my staying might make it any better?”

“Yes, it might.  Here we are in sight of the house.  You ain’t going to back out?”

Meeks laughed again, although rather uneasily.  “All right,” he said.

When he and Henry entered they found Sylvia moving nervously about the sitting-room.  She was scowling, and her starched apron-strings were rampant at her slim back.

“Well,” she said, with a snap, “I’m glad somebody has come.  Supper’s been ready for the last quarter of an hour, and I don’t know but the corn is spoiled.  How do you do, Mr. Meeks?  I’ll be glad to have you stay to supper, but I don’t know as there’s a thing fit to eat.”

“Oh, I’ll risk it,” Sidney said.  “You can’t have anything worse than I’ve got at home.  I had to go to Alford about that confounded Ames case.  I had a dinner there that wasn’t fit for a dog to eat, and I’m down to baker’s bread and cheese.”

“Where have you been?” demanded Sylvia of Henry.  He cast an appealing glance at Meeks.  The two men stood shoulder to shoulder, as if confronted by a common foe of nervous and exasperated feminity.

“I’m to blame for that,” said Meeks.  “I wanted to see if you had any wild grapes to spare, and I asked Henry to go down to the orchard with me.  I suppose you can spare me some of those wild grapes?”

“Take all you want, and welcome,” said Sylvia.  “Now, I’ll put supper on the table, and we’ll eat it.  I ain’t going to wait any longer for anybody.”

After Sylvia had gone, with a jerk, out of the room, the two men looked at each other.  “Couldn’t you give Allen a hint to lay low to-night, anyhow?” whispered Meeks.

Henry shook his head.  “They’ll be sure to show it some way,” he replied.  “I don’t know what’s got into Sylvia.”

“It seems a pretty good sort of match, to me.”

“So it does to me.  Of course Rose has got more money, and I know as well as I want to that Horace has felt a little awkward about that; but lately he’s been earning extra writing for papers and magazines, and it was only last Monday he told me he’d got a steady job for a New York paper that wouldn’t interfere with his teaching.  He seemed mighty tickled about it, and I guess he made up his mind then to go ahead and get married.”

“Come to supper,” cried Sylvia, in a harsh voice, from the next room, and the two men went out at once and took their seats at the table.  Rose’s and Horace’s places were vacant.  “I’d like to know what they think,” said Sylvia, dishing up the baked beans.  “They can eat the corn cold.  It’s just as good cold as it is all dried up.  Here it is six o’clock and they ain’t come yet.”