Part 23 (2/2)
”You think a lot of David, don't you?”
Susan felt her color rising. This time she not only sat squarer in her saddle, but raised her shoulders and chin a trifle.
”Yes. I am engaged to be married to him.”
”When will you be married?” said the uncrushable man.
She inclined her head from its haughty pose just so far that she could command his face from an austere eye. Words were ready to go with the quelling glance, but they died unspoken. The man was regarding her with grave, respectful attention. It is difficult to suddenly smite a proud crest when the owner of the crest shows no consciousness of its elevation.
”When we get to California,” she said shortly.
”Not till then? Oh, I supposed you were going to marry him at Bridger or along the road if we happened to meet a missionary.”
The suggestion amazed, almost appalled her. It pierced through her foolish little play of pride like a stab, jabbing down to her secret, sentient core. Her anger grew stronger, but she told herself she was talking to one of an inferior, untutored order, and it was her part to hold herself in hand.
”We will be married when we get to California,” she said, seeing to it that her profile was calm and carried high. ”Sometime after we get there and have a home and are settled.”
”That's a long time off.”
”I suppose so--a year or two.”
”A year or two!” he laughed with a careless jovial note. ”Oh, you belong to the old towns back there,” with a jerk of his head toward the rear. ”In the wilderness we don't have such long courts.h.i.+ps.”
”We? Who are we?”
”The mountain men, the trappers, the voyageurs.”
”Yes,” she said, her tone flas.h.i.+ng into sudden scorn, ”they marry squaws.”
At this the man threw back his head and burst into a laugh, so deep, so rich, so exuberantly joyous, that it fell upon the plain's grim silence with the incongruous contrast of suns.h.i.+ne on the dust of a dungeon.
She sat upright with her anger boiling toward expression. Before she realized it he had leaned forward and laid his hand on the pommel of her saddle, his face still red and wrinkled with laughter.
”That's all right, little lady, but you don't know quite all about us.”
”I know enough,” she answered.
”Before you get to California you'll know more. There's a mountain man and a voyageur now in the train. Do you think Zavier and I have squaw wives?”
With the knowledge that Zavier was just then so far from contemplating union with a squaw, she could not say the contemptuous ”yes” that was on her tongue. As for the strange man--she shot a glance at him and met the gray eyes still twinkling with amus.e.m.e.nt. ”Savage!” she thought, ”I've no doubt he has”--and she secretly felt a great desire to know. What she said was, ”I've never thought of it, and I haven't the least curiosity about it.”
They rode on in silence, then he said,
”What's made you mad?”
”Mad? I'm not mad.”
”Not at all?”
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