FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82  
83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>   >|  
e shown me." I jerked away. "Sufficient! Sufficient! Let us be comfortable," I expostulated, and I turned my back, and gave myself to my pipe and silence. The birds sang softly as if wearied, and the earth was warm to the hand. I held the flowers in my fingers, and they smelled, somehow, like the roses on our terrace at home on moonlight evenings when I had been young and thought myself in love. I watched a drift of white butterflies hang over an opening red blossom. Such moments pay for hours of famine. It disturbed me to have the Englishman rise and go away. "Why do you go?" I demanded. He came back at once. "What can I do for you, monsieur?" His gentleness shamed my shortness of speech. "It was nothing," I replied. "The truth is, it was pleasant to have you here beside me." I laughed at my own folly. "Starling, I will put you in man's dress to-morrow!" I cried. He turned away. "As you like, monsieur. I think myself it would be best. Will you get out the clothes to-night?" But I stared at him. "Why blush about it, Starling?" I shrugged. I felt some disdain of his sensitiveness. "I did not mean to twit you. I understand that you have worn the squaw's dress to help us. But I think that the necessity for disguise is past. I see the skirts embarrass you." He turned to look at me fairly. "I am not blushing, monsieur," he explained, with a great air of candor. "It is the heat of the afternoon;" but even as he spoke the red flowed from chin to forehead, and when I looked at him with another laugh, his eyes fell before mine. I rose on my elbow. "Starling! Starling!" I cried. He made no sound. His head drooped, and I saw him clench his hand. I stared. He threw his head back, but when he tried to meet my look he failed. Yet I looked again. "My God!" I heard my voice say, and my teeth bit into my lip. I could smell the flowers in my hand, but they seemed a long distance away. "My God!" I cried again, and I rose and felt my way into the woods with the step of a blind man. CHAPTER XI MARY STARLING I do not know how long I walked, nor where, but the sun dropped some space. When I returned to the camp, I found the men before me. They had returned early, empty-handed, and were in an ill humor because the Englishman was away, and there was nothing done. I commanded Pierre to build a larger fire than usual, and keep it piled high till I returned. Then I began a search
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82  
83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Starling

 

monsieur

 

turned

 

returned

 

Englishman

 
looked
 

stared

 

Sufficient

 

flowers

 
failed

jerked

 
clench
 

drooped

 

forehead

 

flowed

 

afternoon

 

comfortable

 

expostulated

 

commanded

 

Pierre


handed

 

larger

 

search

 

STARLING

 

CHAPTER

 

walked

 

dropped

 

distance

 

silence

 

shortness


speech

 
replied
 

shamed

 

gentleness

 

terrace

 
laughed
 

pleasant

 

moments

 

blossom

 

butterflies


opening

 

famine

 

watched

 

evenings

 

demanded

 

moonlight

 
disturbed
 

thought

 

smelled

 

fingers