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 than I do, Edith. Are you going to camp on your homestead?"

"Sure. I'm here to stay. And I suppose"—seriously, face averted—"I'll have to marry somebody now, or lose the sheep. No wedding, no present. That's the way Aunt Lila'll figure it."

"I wish there wasn't a sheep in the world!" he said, with such bitterness it seemed he must have taken a's udden dislike for the woolly genus.

"That's no kind of talk for a sheepman," she corrected him gently.

"I couldn't ask you to marry me just to save a band of dirty sheep," he said, ridiculously, as he realized when he saw her put her hand over her mouth to stifle a laugh. "I always intended to," he drove on, "I've planned toward it ever since I first saw you, Edith. And now—darn it, Edith, you'd think I wanted to marry you just to save the sheep!"

"Foolish!" said Edith, facing round with an encouraging grin. "It would be just the same with me if there wasn't any sheep. What do you suppose I took up that homestead for?"

"Why," pleadingly, hopefully, "you didn't take it up just because you wanted to be my neighbor always, did you, Edith?"

"I took it up because I had to do it while I was single, and I wanted that land in the family."

"Edith," earnestly, firmly, "when Elmer comes back I'll ask him to stay around here till we go over to town and—and"

"Get it over with?" she laughed. "No, there's not going to be any grand rush about this thing, Ned. I'm