and the young men and women of the Blue-grass, for tolerance and a better understanding, must never forget, in what darkness and for how long their sturdy kinspeople had lived, how they were just wakening from a sleep into which, not of their own fault, they had lapsed but little after the Revolution; how eagerly they had strained their eyes for the first glimmer from the outside world that had come to them, and how earnestly now they were fighting toward the light.  So isolated, so primitive were they only a short while ago that neighbor would go to neighbor asking ‘Lend us fire,’ and now they were but asking of the outer world, ‘Lend us fire.’  And he hoped that the young men and women from those dark fastnesses who had come there to light their torches would keep them burning, and take them back home still sacredly aflame, so that in the hills the old question with its new meaning could never again be asked in vain.”

Jason’s eyes had never wavered from the speaker’s face, nor had Gray’s, but, while John Burnham purposely avoided the eyes of both, he noted here and there the sudden squaring of shoulders, and the face of a mountain boy or girl lift quickly and with open-mouthed interest remain fixed; and far back he saw Mavis, wide-eyed and deep in some new-born dream, and he thought he saw Marjorie turn at the end to look at the mountain girl as though to smile understanding and sympathy.  A mental tumult still held Jason when the crowd about him rose to go, and he kept his seat.  John Burnham had been talking about Mavis and him, and maybe about Marjorie and Gray, and he had a vague desire to see the school-master again.  Moreover, a doubt, at once welcome and disturbing to him, had coursed through his brain.  If secret meetings in lanes and by-ways were going on between Mavis and Gray, Gray would hardly have been so frank in saying he had seen Mavis the previous afternoon for Gray must know that Jason knew there had been no meeting at Steve Hawn’s house.  Perhaps Gray had overtaken her in the lane quite by accident, and the boy was bothered and felt rather foolish and ashamed when, seeing John Burnham still busy on the platform, he rose to leave.

On the steps more confusion awaited him.  A group of girls was standing to one side of them, and he turned hurriedly the other way.  Light footsteps followed him, and a voice called: 

“Oh, Jason!”

His blood rushed, and he turned dizzily, for he knew it was Marjorie.  In her frank eyes was a merry smile instead of the tear that had fixed them in his memory, but the clasp of her hand was the same.

“Why, I didn’t know you yesterday—­did I?  No wonder.  Why, I wouldn’t have known you now if I hadn’t been looking for you.  Mavis told me you’d come.  Dear me, what a big man you are.  Professor Burnham told me all about you, and I’ve been so proud.  Why, I came near writing to you several times.  I’m expecting you to lead your class here, and”—­she took in with frank admiration his height and the breadth of his shoulders—­“Gray will want you, maybe, for the foot-ball team.”