excerpt from the book..As soon as the Elder left the supper-table his daughter and the newschoolmaster went out on the stoop or verandah which ran round theframe-house. The day had been warm, but the chilliness of the eveningair betokened the near approach of the Indian summer. The house stoodupon the crest of what had been a roll in the prairie, and as the twoleant together on the railing of the stoop, they looked out over a smallorchard of peach-trees to where, a couple of hundred yards away, at thefoot of the bluff, Cottonwood Creek ran, fringed on either bank by thetrees which had suggested its name. On the horizon to their right, awaybeyond the spears of yellow maize, the sun was sinking, a ball of orangefire against the rose mist of the sky. When the girl turned towards him,perhaps to avoid the level rays, Bancroft expressed the hope that shewould go with him to the house-warming. A little stiffly Miss Conklinreplied that she'd be pleased, but--