“I won’t go back!” he repeated exultantly, “I won’t go back!”

“You’re talkin’ to yo’self, mister,” said a voice at his side, and looking down he saw a small barefooted boy, in overalls, with a bag of striped purple calico hanging from one shoulder.

“You’ve been talkin’ to yo’self all along the road,” the boy repeated with zest.

“Have I?  What are you up to?”

“I’ve been chinquapinin’.  Ma, she thinks I’m at school, but I ain’t.”  He looked up wickedly, bubbling over with the shameless joys of truancy.  “Thar’s a lot of chinquapin bushes over yonder in Cobblestone’s wood an’ they’re chock full of nuts.”

“And they’re in your bag now, I suppose?”

“I’ve got a peck of ’em, an’ I’m goin’ to make me a chain as long as—­that.  It’ll be a watch chain, an’ I’ve made a watch out of a walnut.  It can’t keep time, of course,” he added, “’cep’n for that it’s really a sho’ nough watch.”  His small freckled face, overhung by a mat of carroty hair, was wreathed in a contagious, an intoxicating smile—­the smile of one who has bought happiness at the price of duty, and whose enjoyment is sweetened by the secret knowledge that he has successfully eluded the Stern Daughter of the Voice of God.  Instinctively, Abel was aware that the savour was not in the chinquapins, but in the disobedience, and his heart warmed to the boy with the freckled face.

“Are you going home now?” he asked.

“You bet I ain’t.  I’ve got my snack ma fixed for me.”  He unrolled a brown paper package and revealed two thin slices of bread with a fishing hook stuck in one corner.  “Thar’s apple-butter between ’em,” he added, rolling his tongue, and a minute later, “Ma’d whip me jest the same, an’ I’d ruther be whipped for a whole day than for a half.  Besides,” he burst out as though the mental image convulsed him with delight, “if I went home I’d have to help her tote the water for the washin’.”

“But what are you going to do with yourself?”

“I’m goin’ huntin’ with a gravel shooter, an’ I’m goin’ fishin’ with a willow pole, an’ I’m goin’ to find all the old hare traps, an’ I’m goin’ to see ’em make hog’s meat over at Bryarly’s an’ I’m goin’ to the cider pressin’ down here at Cobblestone’s.  She ain’t goin’ to ketch me till I’ve had my day!” he concluded with a whoop of ecstasy.  Startled by the sound, a rabbit sprang from a clump of sassafras, and the boy was over the fence, on a rush of happy bare feet, in pursuit of it.

The road curved abruptly into a short wood, filled with dwarfed holly trees, which were sown thickly with a shower of scarlet berries—­and while Abel walked through it, his visions thronged beside him like the painted and artificial troupe of a carnival.  He saw Molly coming to him, separating him from Judy, surrendering her warm flesh and blood to his arms.  “I won’t go back!” he said, still defiantly, “I’ll love Molly if I pay for it to the last day I live.”  With a terrible exultation he felt that he was willing to pay for it—­to pay any price, even the price of his honour.  His passion rushed like flame through his blood, scorching, blackening, devouring.