United States or Bermuda ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
If you would, if you only would, why, at last, you couldn't help liking her!" Again he smiled at her, shaking his head. "I love you, not Marylyn." "You're a good man," she said. "You wouldn't like to see me do anything that wasn't right square. You wouldn't think much of me if I did. I'll do wrong if if I take you from her." "I wouldn't have you do anything wrong," he declared stoutly.
The most western station-house in Texas, standing amid thorny mesquite, was her birthplace and that of her sister Marylyn; the grey plateau across which the embankment led was their playground; there they grew to womanhood under the careful guidance of their frail, Northern-born mother. And then two casualties, coming close upon each other, had suddenly changed their life.
The sash was pushed open. Dallas and Marylyn, the younger girl still clinging to the elder, looked out. "It's all right," said the storekeeper, not taking his eyes from the enemy. "I'm here." Dallas could not answer. But Marylyn, though exhausted, was fully alive to their rescue. Her eyes, wide and tearful, were fixed upon Lounsbury.
No, no," as their guest would have accompanied her, "we won't need help. The mules are used to Charley, now, and Simon's pretty ugly to strangers." She started out. "Marylyn," she said, from the door, "you take Mr. Bond's coat." Then, to the evangelist, "I'm glad it's you, and not somebody else." A rare smile crossed her face.
Lounsbury!" repeated Marylyn. "Was he here?" "On this side, by the grove. I saw him start for the Fort." And so their going was delayed.
A second, and a weight was hurled against the outer battens. Then came four raps. "Don't open! don't!" cried Marylyn. "Maybe it ain't Charley!" But Dallas, undoubting, swung the door back, and into the room leaped a stooping figure. It was The Squaw. He crouched, and moved his head from side to side, as if expecting a blow or a bullet from behind.
Marylyn glanced over a shoulder. "Does there?" she questioned, half whispering. He took a forward step. "There does," he answered solemnly. "It's Goldenhair, as well as I can make out. But where on earth are the bears?" Instantly, she had her bonnet. "My! my!" she said. "Bears! Indians is bad enough." She peered into the long heaps of tangled grapevine. "Oh, now!" he exclaimed self-accusingly.
But he can't do anything. And Marylyn Oh, I wish there was someone with us, now someone that'd help us if anything went wrong." Of a sudden, looking down at her hands, her eyes fell upon the crimson stripes left across her palms by the plow. And, in fancy, a horseman was riding swiftly toward her from the east, again, while she leaned on the cross-brace and waited.
"But it'll be easier just to go straight to the Captain; not I, but you " "Yes, do pa," urged Marylyn. "Oh, Dallas, what's happened?" The elder girl told of the pole and the bootmarks, treating them lightly. Then she came back to her father. To find that her argument of a moment before, for all its short-cut logic, had set him utterly against the plan he had himself proposed.
"Miss Marylyn," he said, "before another winter you'll be the belle of the town of Lancaster." She put her hand in his bashfully. "And, Miss Dallas?" His voice entreated a little. "I hope you'll be the biggest storekeeper," she said. To Lounsbury's surprise, he saw a trace of fun lurking in her eye. "Ah! you've forgiven me!" he declared triumphantly. But she made no answer as she turned away.
Word Of The Day