Part 14 (1/2)
”Tired of yourself?”
”Yes, I am.”
”Why don't you do something? Did you ever think of that?”
”What would be the use of thinking of it? There's nothing for me to do.”
”There is something for everyone to do. Why don't you take up some line of study?”
”I hate study. I can't put my mind on it.”
”But you could read good books.”
”I do, but I get tired. I must have been petted too much.”
”Ah! A girl is beginning to be strong when she feels that way. I suppose you have been flattered all your life.”
”Do I show it?”
”Yes. But not so much as you did.”
”And do you know the reason?”
”I don't know, unless it is that you have been sobered by a joke.”
”That has something to do with it. You have made me think. You don't regard me as a spoiled child; you seem to believe that I have a mind.
And that, even if you were a field hand, would cause me to be interested in you. I would like to talk with you seriously, but you joke with me.”
”To hear you in a serious mood would be as sweet as an anthem.”
”You must not talk that way. I want your friends.h.i.+p.”
”You shall have it.”
”I need your help.”
”You shall have it.”
”I don't want to be wicked,” she said, looking up at him, ”but I beg of you not to sign that pet.i.tion to the Court, until--”
”Until when?”
”Until Zeb Sawyer is--is--out of the way. People flatter me and praise me, but they don't know what I have suffered. And my father doesn't understand me. When you called Sawyer a coward I wanted to shout in the street.”
”Still you consented to marry him.”
”Yes, to live for a little longer in peace. But I know a tall rock over on the creek, and from the top of it is a long way to the cruel boulders below. They call it 'Lover's Leap,' and I have thought after awhile the name might be changed to 'Despair's Leap.' At night I have dreamed of that rock, and sometimes my dream would continue after I opened my eyes. Our engagement was for one year, and often I said to myself that I had but one year longer to live. At church I would pray, and I could hear the words, 'Children, obey your parents.' And then I would go home and pretend to be happy in that obedience.”
”But you signed the pet.i.tion.”