Unrelentingly little Eve Edgarton’s horse kept right on forcing him back—­back—­back.

“But if you’re not one of Father’s clever friends—­who are you?” she demanded perplexedly.  “And why did you insist so on riding with me this afternoon?” she cried accusingly.

“I didn’t exactly—­insist,” grinned Barton with a flush of guilt.  The flush of guilt added to the flush of heat made him look suddenly very confused.

Across Eve Edgarton’s thin little face the flash of temper faded instantly into mere sulky ennui again.

“Oh, dear—­oh, dear,” she droned.  “You—­you didn’t want to marry me, did you?”

Just for one mad, panic-stricken second the whole world seemed to turn black before Barton’s eyes.  His heart stopped beating.  His ear-drums cracked.  Then suddenly, astonishingly, he found himself grinning into that honest little face, and answering comfortably: 

“Why, no, Miss Edgarton, I hadn’t the slightest idea in the world of wanting to marry you.”

“Thank God for that!” gasped little Eve Edgarton.  “So many of Father’s friends do want to marry me,” she confided plaintively, still driving Barton back through that horrid scratchy thicket.  “I’m so rich, you see,” she confided with equal simplicity, “and I know so much—­there’s almost always somebody in Petrozavodsk or Broken Hill or Bashukulumbwe who wants to marry me.”

“In—­where?” stammered Barton.

“Why—­in Russia!” said little Eve Edgarton with some surprise.  “And Australia!  And Africa!  Were you never there?”

“I’ve been in Jersey City,” babbled Barton with a desperate attempt at facetiousness.

“I was never there!” admitted little Eve Edgarton regretfully.

Vehemently with one hand she lunged forward and tried with her tiny open palm to push Barton’s horse a trifle faster back through the intricate thicket.  Then once in the open again she drew herself up with an absurd air of dignity and finality and bowed him from her presence.

“Good-by, Mr. Barton,” she said.  “Good-by, Mr. Barton.”

“But Miss Edgarton—­” stammered Barton perplexedly.  Whatever his own personal joy and relief might be, the surrounding country nevertheless was exceedingly wild, and the girl an extravagantly long distance from home.  “But Miss Edgarton—­” he began all over again.

“Good-by, Mr. Barton!  And thank you for going home!” she added conscientiously.

“But what will I tell your father?” worried Barton.

“Oh—­hang Father,” drawled the indifferent little voice.

“But the extra horse?” argued Barton with increasing perplexity.  “The gray?  If you’ve got some date up your sleeve, don’t you want me to take the gray home with me, and get him out of your way?”

With sluggish resentment little Eve Edgarton lifted her eyes to his.  “What would the gray go home with you for?” she asked tersely.  “Why, how silly!  Why, it’s my—­mother’s horse!  That is, we call it my mother’s horse,” she hastened to explain.  “My mother’s dead, you know.  She’s almost always been dead, I mean.  So Father always makes me buy an extra place for my mother.  It’s just a trick of ours, a sort of a custom.  I play around alone so much you know.  And we live in such wild places!”