Ethelyn had a good view of it as the train approached it and even caught a passing glimpse of the white house in the distance which Richard pointed out as home, his face lighting up with all the pleasure of a schoolboy as he saw the old familiar waymarks and felt that he was home at last.

Dropping her veil over her face Ethelyn arose to follow her husband, who in his eagerness to grasp the hand of the tall, burly young man he had seen from the window, forgot to carry her shawl and her satchel, which last being upon the car-rack, she tugged at it with all her strength, and was about crying with vexation at Richard’s thoughtlessness, when Tim Jones, who while rolling his quid of tobacco in his great mouth, had watched her furtively, wondering how she and Melind would get along, gallantly came to her aid, and taking the satchel down kept it upon his arm.

“Take care of that air step.  Better let me help you out.  Dick is so tickled to see Jim that he even forgets his wife, I swan!” Tim said, offering to assist her from the train; but with a feeling of disgust too deep to be expressed, Ethelyn declined the offer and turned away from him to meet the curious gaze of the young man whom Richard presented as brother James.

He was younger than his brother by half a dozen years, but he looked quite as old, if not older.  His face and hands were sunburnt and brown, his clothes were coarse, his pants were tucked into his tall, muddy boots, and he held in his hands the whip with which he had driven the shining bays, pricking up their ears behind the depot and eyeing askance the train just beginning to move away.  The Markhams were all good-looking, and James was not an exception.  The Olney girls called him very handsome, when on Sunday he came to church in his best clothes and led the Methodist choir; but Ethelyn only thought him rough, and coarse, and vulgar, and when he bent down to kiss her she drew back haughtily.

“Ethelyn!” Richard said, in the low, peculiar tone, which she had almost unconsciously learned to fear, just as she did the dark expression which his hazel eyes assumed as he said the single word “Ethelyn!”

She was afraid of Richard when he looked and spoke that way, and putting up her lip, she permitted the kiss which the warm-hearted James gave to her.  He was naturally more demonstrative than his brother, and more susceptible, too; a pretty face would always set his heart to beating and call out all the gallantry of his nature.  Wholly unsophisticated, he never dreamed of the gulf there was between him and the new sister, whom he thought so beautiful—­loving her at once, because she was so pretty, and because she was the wife of Dick, their household idol.  He was more of a ladies’ man than Richard, and when on their way to the democratic-wagon they came to a patch of mud, through which Ethelyn’s skirts were trailing, he playfully lifted her in his strong arms, and set her down upon the wagon-box, saying, as he adjusted her skirts:  “We can’t have that pretty dress spoiled, the very first day, with Iowa mud.”