Now Dave Titus well knew that this was no bluff of Wapiti’s. He was amused and embarrassed. He could not fight this unexpected foe, for victory or defeat would be equally fatal to his hope of pleasing Miranda. As a consequence, here he was, Dave Titus, the noted hunter, the Nimrod, held up by a rutting buck! Well, the trouble was of Miranda’s making. She’d have to get him out of it. Facing the defiant Wapiti at a distance of five or six paces, he rested the butt of his rifle on his toe and sent a mellow, resonant heigh-lo, heigh-lo! echoing over the still air. The forest edges took it up, answering again and again. Kirstie and Miranda came to the door to see who gave the summons, and they understood the situation at a glance.

“Call off yer dawg, Mirandy,” cried Young Dave, “an’ I’ll come an’ pay ye a visit.”

“He thinks you’re going to hurt us,” explained Kirstie; and Miranda, with a gay laugh, ran to the rescue.

“You mustn’t frighten the good little boy, Wapiti,” she cried, pushing the big deer out of her path and running to Dave’s side. As soon as Wapiti saw Miranda with Dave, he comprehended that the stranger was not a foe. With a flourish of his horns he stepped aside and led his herd off through the barnyard.

Arriving at the door, where Kirstie, gracious, but impassive, awaited him, Dave exclaimed: “She’s saved my life ag’in, Kirstie, that girl o’ yourn. First it’s a painter, an’ now it’s a rutting buck. Wonder what it’ll be next time!”

“A rabbit, like as not, or a squir’l, maybe,” suggested Miranda, unkindly.

“Whatever it be,” persisted Dave, “third time’s luck for me, anyways. If you save my life agin, Mirandy, you’ll hev’ to take care o’ me altogether. I’ll git to kind of depend on ye.”

“Then I reckon, Dave, you’ll get out of your next scrape by yourself,” answered Miranda, with discouraging decision.

“That’s one on you, Dave,” remarked Kirstie, with a strictly neutral air. But behind Miranda’s back she shot him a look which said, “Don’t you mind what she says, she’s all right in her heart!” which, indeed, was far from being the case. Had Dave been so injudicious as to woo openly at this stage of Miranda’s feelings, he would have been dismissed with speedy emphasis.

Dave was in time to help with the milking,—a process which he boyishly enjoyed. The cows, five of them, were by now lowing at the bars. Kirstie brought out three tin pails. “You can help us, if you like, Dave,” she cried, while Miranda looked her doubt of such a clumsy creature’s capacity for the gentle art of milking. “Can you milk?” she asked.

“’Course I can, though I haven’t had much chance, o’ late years, to practise,” said Dave.

“Can you milk without hurting the cow? Are you sure? And can you draw off the strippings clean?” she persisted, manifestly sceptical.

“Try me,” said Dave.

“Let him take old Whitey, Miranda. He’ll get through with her, maybe, while we’re milking the others,” suggested Kirstie.

“Oh, well, any one could milk Whitey,” assented Miranda; and Dave, on his mettle, vowed within himself that he’d have old Whitey milked, and milked dry, and milked to her satisfaction, before either Kirstie or Miranda was through with her first milker. He stroked the cow on the flank, and scratched her belly gently, and established friendly relations with her before starting; and the elastic firmness of his strong hands chanced to suit Whitey’s large teats. The animal eyed him with favour and gave down her milk affluently. As the full streams sounded more and more liquidly in his pail, Dave knew that he had the game in his hands, and took time to glance at his rivals. To his astonishment there was Kroof standing up on her haunches close beside Miranda, her narrow red tongue lolling from her lazily open jaws, while she watched the milky fountains with interest.

While Kirstie’s scarlet kerchiefed head was still pressed upon her milker’s flank, and while Miranda was just beginning to draw off the rich “strippings” into a tin cup, Dave completed his task. His pail—he had milked the strippings in along with the rest—was foaming creamily to the brim. He arose and vaunted himself. “Some day, when I’ve got lots of time,” he drawled, “I’ll l’arn you two how to milk.”

“You needn’t think you’re done already,” retorted Miranda, without looking up. “I’ll get a quart more out of old Whitey, soon as I’m through here.”

But Kirstie came over and looked at the pail. “No, you won’t, Miranda, not this time,” she exclaimed. “Dave’s beaten us, sure. Old Whitey never gave us a fuller pail in her life. Dave, you can milk. You go and milk Michael over there, the black-an’-white one, for me. I’ll leave you and Miranda, if you won’t fall out, to finish up here, while I go and get an extra good supper for you, so’s you’ll come again soon. I know you men keep your hearts in your stomachs, just where we women know how to reach them easy. Where’d we have been if the Lord hadn’t made us cooks!”

Such unwonted pleasantry on the part of her sombre mother proved to Miranda that Dave was much in her graces, and she felt moved to a greater austerity in order that she might keep the balance true. Throughout the rest of the milking, she answered all Dave’s attempts at conversation with briefest yes or no, and presently reduced him to a discouraged silence. During supper,—which consisted of fresh trout fried in corn meal, and golden hot johnny-cake with red molasses, and eggs fried with tomatoes, and sweet curds with clotted cream, all in a perfection to justify Kirstie’s promise,—Miranda relented a little, and talked freely. But Dave had been too much subdued to readily regain his cheer. It was his tongue now that knew but yes and no. Confronted by this result of her unkindness, Miranda’s sympathetic heart softened. Turning in her seat to slip a piece of johnny-cake, drenched in molasses, into the expectant mouth of Kroof who sat up beside her, she spoke to Dave in a tone whose sweetness thrilled him to the finger-tips. The instinct of coquetry, native and not unknown to the furtive folk themselves, was beginning to stir within Miranda’s untaught heart.

“I’m going down to the lake to-night, Dave,” she said, “to set a night line and see if I can catch a togue.[1] There’s a full moon, and the lake’ll be worth looking at. Won’t you come along with us?”

“Won’t I, Miranda? Couldn’t think of nothin’ I’d like better!” was the eager response.

“We’ll start soon as ever we get the dishes washed up,” explained the girl. “And you can help us at that—what say, mother?”

“Certainly, Dave can help us,” answered Kirstie, “if you have the nerve to set the likes of him at woman’s work. But I reckon I won’t go with you to-night to the lake. Kroof and Dave’ll be enough to look after you.”