Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 1, 2025
"Now you see why I didn't join the army, don't you, Krane?" Bill Banney said, aside. "I wanted to work under a real general." Then turning to my uncle, he added: "I'm already contracted for the round trip, Clarenden." "You are going to start back just as if there were no dangers to be met?" Rex Krane inquired. "As if there were dangers to be met, not run from," Esmond Clarenden replied.
Eloise and Father Josef and Santan and Little Blue Flower were all there that day; and Jondo, although we did not know it then. Rex Krane had told Beverly, going out, that an Indian never forgets. In all the years Santan had not forgotten. To-day we covered the miles rapidly. Jondo and Father Josef rode ahead, with Esmond Clarenden and Felix Narveo following them; then came Eloise St.
"There's a new Clarenden store at a place called Burlingame out in Kansas now, somewhere on the old trail. Maybe it will be far enough away to let you get tamed gradually to civil life there, if Uncle Esmond thinks you are worth it," I suggested. "Rex Krane is to take charge of that as soon as we get home. Yonder are the spires and minarets and domes of Kansas City.
"I tell you, Krane, it's men like Clarenden that's going to make these prairies worth something one of these days. The men who build up business, not them that shoot and run to or from. That's what the West's got to have. I'm through going crazy about army folks. One man that buys and sells, if he gives good weight and measure, is, himself, a whole regiment for civilization."
Uncle Esmond smiled, but the stern lines in his face hardly broke as he said, earnestly, "Keep your eyes open and, whatever you do, stay close to Krane while Bill helps me here, and don't forget to watch for that little girl when you are sight-seeing." "There's not much to see, as Bev says, but the outside of 'dobe walls five feet thick," Rex Krane observed.
In the bridal party Beverly and I walked in front, followed by the two girls in the white Greek robes which they had worn at the school frolic at St. Ann's, and wearing their headbands, the one of silver and turquoise, the other of silver and coral. Then came Rex Krane and Bill Banney. Poor Bill! Nobody guessed that night that the bridal blossoms were flowers on the coffin of his dead hope.
Here she paused, and as the evening shadows lengthened the dress and wall blended their dull tones together. Beverly Clarenden, who had gone with Rex Krane up to Fort Marcy that evening, had left his companion to watch the sunset and dream of Mat back on the Missouri bluff, while he wandered down La Garita.
I rode beside her, glad to catch the faint smile in her eyes when she looked at me. And last of all, Rex Krane, with the same old Yankee spirit, quick to help a fellow-man and oblivious to personal danger. So we all came to the chapel, but at the door Rex wheeled and rode away, muttering, as he passed me: "I've got business to look after, and not a darned thing to confess." And Beverly!
I'd have plucked you out of the cranny right then, if old Rex Krane hadn't given us our 'forward march! orders, and an Indian boy, ten feet high and sneaky as a cat, hadn't been lurking in the middle distance to pluck me as a brand for the burning. And now you are a St. Ann's girl, a good little Catholic. How did you ever get away up into Kansas Territory, anyhow?"
The day had been very hot for the season and the night was warm and balmy, with the moonlight flooding the open space, edging the shadows of the inner portal with silver. There was much noise and boisterous laughter in the billiard-room where the heads of affairs played together. Rex Krane had gone to bed early.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking