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"Well, if he does, he'll regret it a lot," prophesied Pink. "And anyway, something sure got wrong with Weary; do yuh suppose he'd give up Glory deliberately? Not on your life! Glory comes next to the Schoolma'am in his affections." "Wonder where he got that dirt-colored cayuse, anyhow," mused Cal. "I was studying out the brand, a while ago," Pink answered.
Yes; they would see it all UPSTAIRS! The same old bunk dished out night after night at so much a head and the nervous little schoolma'am of uncertain age, who fidgeted now beside him, would go back somewhere down in Maine and shiver while she related her "wider experiences" in tremulous whispers into the shocked ears of envious other maiden ladies of equally uncertain age.
Weary was standing pensively by the door, debating with himself the advisability of going boldly over and claiming the first waltz with the schoolma'am and taking a chance on being refused when Cal Emmett gave him a vicious poke in the ribs by way of securing his attention. "Do yuh see that bunch uh red loco over there by the organ?" he wanted to know. "That's Bert Rogers' cousin from Iowa."
Skinner on speaking terms with romance and failed. "Oh?" she said again. "Yes. Y'see, there was another man after me. Jog along, black mare. I'd been a widder so long folks had given up expecting me to marry again. But when my darter she's a schoolma'am like you went out West to teach I felt real lonesome and wasn't nowise sot against the idea.
I thought some, last year, of sending him away to Frisco to school, but when they talked of bringing a schoolma'am here, I waited till I saw you, and then I knew it was all right, and I could keep my boy a little longer. And, oh! miss, he loves you so much; and if you could hear him talk about you in his pretty way, and if he could ask you what I ask you now, you couldn't refuse him.
Altogether a cool-headed and practical young lady, this midget schoolma'am, with her uncompromising directness of speech and her clear eyes a merry, mirthful, frank, dainty, altogether delightful small person.
"If it's to his discredit," said the schoolma'am, looking straight at her, "I certainly don't know. It must have been something awful, judging from your tone. Did he" she spoke solemnly "did he mur-rder ten people, old men and children, and throw their bodies into a well?" It is saying much for Miss Forsyth that she did not look as disconcerted as she felt.
The rest of the Happy Family stayed late at the school-house, and Weary and Chip discussed something enthusiastically in a corner with the Little Doctor and the schoolma'am. The Little Doctor said that something was a shame, and that it was mean, to tease a fellow as bashful as Happy Jack.
Nothing but 'Kindly remit' for me, and one letter for you looks like the fist of a Yankee schoolma'am." He handed her the letter, holding it with a big thumb over the right-hand corner, so that she recognized Miss Mason's hand before she saw the French stamp. "Mind if I hang round on the stoop and smoke a pipe?" queried McEwan, pulling a newspaper from his pocket.
"But for the Lord's sake don't take up that talking in italics like Myrt does. I can't stand this bearing down hard on every other word. It sets my teeth all on edge." The schoolma'am opened her eyes wider. Was it possible Weary was acquiring an irritable temper? "Second," she went on deliberately, "I do not consider that I have been mean to you; and if I have it is because I choose to be so."
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