walked close to her. She quivered like a leaf, but held her voice low and steady as she replied.

“No, Frale. I go there evenings when I’m not too tired. I’ve been going there ever since you left to — ”

“That doctah, he’s be’n castin’ a spell on you, Cass. I kin see hit — how you walkin’ off an’ nevah ‘low me to touch you. Ye hain’t said howd’y to me nor how you glad I come. You like a col’ white drift o’ snow blowin’ on ahead o’ me. You hain’t no human girl like you used to be. I got somethin’ to put a spell on him, too, ef he don’t watch out.”

He spoke in his mild, low-voiced drawl, but he kept close to her side, and