Sternly, however, though the
Falins did not know the fact, Devil Judd continued to hold aloof
in spite of the pleadings of young Dave, and so confident was the
old man in the balance of power that lay with him that he sent
June word that he was coming to take her home. And, in truth, with
Hale going away again on a business trip and Bob, too, gone back
home to the Bluegrass, and school closed, the little girl was glad
to go, and she waited for her father's coming eagerly. Miss Anne
was still there, to be sure, and if she, too, had gone, June would
have been more content. The quiet smile of that astute young woman
had told Hale plainly, and somewhat to his embarrassment, that she
knew something had happened between the two, but that smile she
never gave to June. Indeed, she never encountered aught else than
the same silent searching gaze from the strangely mature little
creature's eyes, and when those eyes met the teacher's, always
June's hand would wander unconsciously to the little cross at her
throat as though to invoke its aid against anything that could
come between her and its giver.
The purple rhododendrons on Bee Rock had come and gone and the
pink-flecked laurels were in bloom when June fared forth one sunny
morning of her own birth-month behind old Judd Tolliver--home.
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