THE HEROIC DAY
"Where the roots strike deepest, the fruitage is best."--_The Murmuring
Pine_.
Little Patience had forgotten the red balloon, overnight. Lydia had
known that she would. Nevertheless, with the feeling that something
was owing to the baby, she decided to turn this Saturday into an extra
season of delight for her little charge.
"Do you care, Dad," asked Lydia, at breakfast, "if baby and I have
lunch over at the lake shore?"
"Not if you're careful," answered Amos. "By the way," he added, "that
cottage of John Levine's is right on the shore." He spoke with studied
carelessness. Lydia had a passion for the water.
She stared at him now, with the curiously pellucid gaze that belongs to
some blue eyed children and Amos had a vague sense of discomfort, as if
somehow, he were not playing the game quite fairly. He dug into his
coat pocket and brought up a handful of tobacco from which he
disinterred two pennies.
"Here," he said, "one for each of you. Don't be late for supper,
chickens."
He kissed the two children, picked up his dinner pail and was off.
Lydia, her red cheeks redder than usual, smiled at Lizzie, as she
dropped the pennies into the pocket of her blouse and stuffed a gray
and frowsy little handkerchief on top of them.
"Isn't he the best old Daddy!" she exclaimed.
"Sure," said Lizzie absentmindedly, as she poured out her third cup of
coffee. "Lydia, that dress of yours is real dirty. You get into
something else and I'll wash it out to-day."
"I haven't got much of anything else to get into, have I,
Lizzie?--except my Sunday dress."
"You are dreadful short of clothes, child, what with the way you grow
and the way you climb trees. I'm trying to save enough out of the
grocery money to get you a couple more of them galatea dresses for when
school opens, but land--your poor mother was such a hand with the
needle, you used to look a perfect picture. There," warned by the
sudden droop of Lydia's mouth, "I tell you, you'll be in and out of the
water all day, anyhow. Both of you get into the bathing suits your
Aunt Emily sent you. They're wool and it's going to be a dreadful hot
day."
"Jefful hot day," said little Patience, gulping the last of her oatmeal.
"All right," answered Lydia, soberly. "Wouldn't you think Aunt Emily
would have had more sense than to send all those grown up clothes? Who
did she think's going to make 'em over, now?"
"I don't know, child. The poor thing is dead now, anyhow. Folks is
always thoughtless about charity. Why I wasn't taught to sew, I don't
know. Anyhow, the bathing suits she got special for you two."
"You bet your life, I'm going to learn how to sew," said Lydia, rising
to untie the baby's bib. "I'm practising on Florence Dombey. Mother
had taught me straight seams and had just begun me on over and over,
when--"
"Over and over," repeated the baby, softly.
Lizzie put out a plump, toil-scarred hand and drew Lydia to her.
"There, dearie! Think about other things. What shall poor old Liz fix
you for lunch?"
The child rubbed her bright cheek against the old woman's faded one.
"You are a solid comfort to me, Lizzie," she said with a sigh. Then
after a moment she exclaimed, eagerly, "Oh! Lizzie, do you think we
could have a deviled egg? Is it too expensive?"
"You shall have a deviled egg if I have to steal it. But maybe you
might dust up the parlor a bit while I get things ready."
Lydia established little Patience on the dining-room floor with a linen
picture book, brought in a broom and dustpan from the kitchen and began
furiously to sweep the parlor. When the dust cleared somewhat she
emerged with the dustpan heaped with sweepings and the corners of the
room still untouched. She hung the coats and hats in the entry and
rubbed off the top of the table with her winter Tam o' Shanter, from
which the moths flew as she worked. She gazed thoughtfully at the
litter on the desk and decided against touching it. Then with a sense
of duty well done, she lifted little Patience and carried her up into
the little bedroom.
The bathing suits were pretty blue woolen things, and when the two
presented themselves to Lizzie in the kitchen the old woman exclaimed,
"Well, if ever I seen two fairies!"
"A thin one and a fat one," chuckled Lydia. "Push the baby carriage
down over the steps for me, Lizzie, and I'll prepare for our long, hard
voyage."
Patience was established in her perambulator with her linen picture
book. Florence Dombey was settled at her feet, with "Men of Iron."
The bits of cigar box and the knife packed in a pasteboard box were
tied to one edge of the carriage. Patience's milk, packed in a tin
pail of ice, was laid on top of "Men of Iron." The paper bag of lunch
dangled from the handle-bar and Lydia announced the preparations
complete.
The way to the lake shore led under the maple trees for several blocks.
Then the board walk turned abruptly to cross a marsh, high-grown now
with ripening cat-tails. Having safely crossed the marsh, the walk
ended in a grass-grown path. Lydia trundled the heavy perambulator
with some difficulty along the path. The August sun was hot.
"'A life on the ocean wave--'"
she panted. "You are getting fat, baby!
'A home on the rolling deep.
Where the scattered waters rave
And the winds their revels keep.'
Darn it, I wish I had a bicycle!"
"Ahoy there! Hard aport with your helm, mate!" came a shout from
behind her. A boy in a bright red bathing suit jumped off a bicycle.
"Hello, Kent!" said Lydia.
"Hello, yourself!" returned Kent. "Wait and I'll hitch to the front
axle."
He untied a stout cord from his handle-bars and proceeded to fasten it
from his saddle post to the perambulator. Lydia watched him with a
glowing face. She was devoted to Kent, although they quarreled a great
deal. He was a handsome boy, two years Lydia's senior; not tall for
his years, but already broad and sturdy, with crinkly black hair and
clear, black-lashed brown eyes. His face was round and ruddy under its
summer tan. His lips were full and strong--an aggressive, jolly boy,
with a quick temper and a generous heart. He and Lydia had been
friends since kindergarten days.
"I'm going to stay in the Willows all day," said Lydia. "Don't go too
fast, Kent."
"Dit-up! Dit-up, horsy!" screamed little Patience.
"Toot! Toot! Express for the Willows!" shouted Kent, mounting his
wheel, and the procession was off, the perambulator bounding madly
after the bicycle, while Patience shouted with delight and Lydia clung
desperately to the handle-bars.
The path, after a few moments, shifted to the lake shore. The water
there lapped quietly on a sandy beach, deep shaded by willows. Kent
dismounted.
"Discharge your cargo!" he cried.
"Don't be so bossy," said Lydia. "This is my party."
"All right, then I won't play with you."
"Nobody asked you to, smarty. I was going to give you my deviled egg
for lunch."
"Gosh," said Kent, "did you bring your lunch? Say, I guess I'll go
home and get mother to give me some. But let's play pirates, first."
"All right! I choose to be chief first," agreed Lydia.
"And I'm the cannibal and baby's the stolen princess," said Kent.
The three children plunged into the game which is the common property
of childhood. For a time, bloody captures, savage orgies, escape,
pursuit, looting of great ships and burial of treasure, transformed the
quiet shore to a theater of high crime. At last, as the August noon
waxed high, and the hostage princess fell fast asleep in her
perambulator cave, the cannibal, who had shifted to captured duke,
bowed before the pirate.
"Sir," he said in a deep voice, "I have bethought myself of still
further treasure which if you will allow me to go after in my trusty
boat, I will get and bring to you--if you will allow me to say farewell
at that time to my wife and babes."
"Ha!" returned the pirate. "How do I know you'll come back?"
The duke folded his arms. "You have my word of honor which never has,
and never will, be broken."
"Go, duke--but return ere sundown." The pirate made a magnificent
gesture toward the bicycle, "and, say Kent, bring plenty to fill
yourself up, for I'm awful hungry and I'll need all we've got."
As Kent shot out of sight, Lydia turned to arrange the mosquito bar
over little Patience, then she stood looking out over the lake. The
morning wind had died and the water lay as motionless and perfect a
blue as the sky above. Faint and far down the curving shore the white
dome of the Capitol building rose above soft billows of green tree
tops. Up the shore, woods crowned the gentle slopes of the hills.
Across the lake lay a dim green shore-line of fields. Lydia gave a
deep sigh. The beauty of the lake shore always stirred in her a
wordless ecstasy. She waded slowly to her waist into the water, then
turned gently on her back and floated with her eyes on the sky. Its
depth of color was no deeper nor more crystal clear than the depths of
her own blue gaze. The tender brooding wonder of the lake was a part
and parcel of her own little face, so tiny in the wide expanse of water.
After some moments of drifting, she turned on her side and began to
swim along the shore. She swam with a power and a precision of stroke
that a man twice her size would have envied. But it must be noted that
she did not get out of eye and ear shot of the perambulator beneath the
willows; and she had not been swimming long before a curious agitation
of the mosquito netting brought her ashore.
She wrung the water from her short skirt and was giving little Patience
her bread and milk, when Kent returned with a paper bag.
"Ma was cross at me for pestering her, but I managed to get some
sandwiches and doughnuts. Come on, let's begin. Gee, there's a squaw!"
Coming toward the three children seated in the sand by the perambulator
was a thin bent old woman, leaning on a stick.
"Dirty old beggar," said Kent, beginning to devour his sandwiches.
"Isn't she awful!" exclaimed Lydia. Begging Indians were no novelty to
Lake City children, but this one was so old and thin that Lydia was
horrified. Toothless, her black hair streaked with gray, her calico
dress unspeakably dirty, her hands like birds' claws clasping her
stick, the squaw stopped in front of the children.
"Eat!" she said, pointing to her mouth, while her sunken black eyes
were fixed on Kent's sandwiches.
Little Patience looked up and began to whimper with fear.
"Get out, you old rip!" said Kent.
"Eat! Eat!" insisted the squaw, a certain ferocity in her manner.
"Did you walk clear in from the reservation?" asked Lydia.
The squaw nodded, and held out her scrawny hand for the children's
inspection. "No eats, all time no eats! You give eats--poor old
woman."
"Oh, Kent, she's half starved! Let's give her some of our lunch,"
exclaimed Lydia.
"Not on your life," returned Kent. "Dirty, lazy lot! Why don't they
work?"
"If we'd go halves, we'd have enough," insisted Lydia.
"You told me you'd only enough for yourself. Get out of here, you old
she-devil."
The squaw did not so much as glance at Kent. Her eyes were fastened on
Lydia, with the look of a hungry, expectant dog. Lydia ran her fingers
through her damp curls, and sighed. Then she gave little Patience her
share of the bread and butter and a cooky. She laid the precious
deviled egg in its twist of paper on top of the remainder of the bread
and cookies and handed them to the Indian.
"You can't have any of mine, if you give yours up!" warned Kent.
"I don't want any, pig!" returned Lydia.
The old squaw received the food with trembling fingers and broke into
sobs, that tore at her old throat painfully. She said something to
Lydia in Indian, and then to the children's surprise, she bundled the
food up in her skirt and started as rapidly as possible back in the
direction whence she had come.
"She's taking it back to some one," said Kent.
"Poor thing," said Lydia.
"Poor thing!" sniffed Kent. "It would be a good thing if they were all
dead. My father says so."
"Well, I guess your father don't know everything," snapped Lydia.
"Evyfing," said Patience, who had finished her lunch and was digging in
the sand.
Kent paused in the beginning of his attack on his last sandwich to look
Lydia over. She was as thin as a half-grown chicken in her wet bathing
suit. Her damp curls, clinging to her head and her eyes a little heavy
with heat and weariness after her morning of play, made her look
scarcely older than Patience. Kent wouldn't confess, even to himself,
how fond he was of Lydia.
"Here," he said gruffly. "I can't eat this sandwich. Mother made me
too many. And here's a doughnut."
"Thanks, Kent," said Lydia meekly. "What do you want to play, after
lunch?"
"Robinson Crusoe," replied Kent promptly. "You'll have to be
Friday."
As recipient of his bounty, Lydia recognized Kent's advantage and
conceded the point without protest.
She held Patience's abbreviated bathing suit skirt with one hand.
"Where are you heading for, baby?" she asked.
"Mardy! Mardy!" screamed Patience, tugging at her leash.
"Oh, rats, it's Margery Marshall. Look at the duds on her. She makes
me sick," groaned Kent.
"She's crazy about little Patience," answered Lydia, "so I put up with
a lot from her."
She loosed her hold on Patience. The baby trundled along the sand to
meet the little girl in an immaculate white sailor suit, who approached
pushing a doll buggy large enough to hold Patience. She ran to meet
the baby and kissed her, then allowed her to help push the doll
carriage.
"Mardy tum! Mardy tum!" chanted Patience.
Margery's black hair was in a long braid, tied with a wide white
ribbon. Margery's hands were clean and so were her white stockings and
shoes. She brought the doll's carriage to pause before Lydia and Kent
and gazed at them appraisingly out of bright black eyes--beautiful
eyes, large and heavily lashed. Kent's face was dirty and sweat
streaked. His red bathing suit was gray with sand and green with grass
stain. On his head he wore his favorite headgear, a disreputable white
cotton cap with the words "Goldenrod Flour Mills" across the front.
"Well," he said belligerently, to Margery, "do you see anything green?"
Margery shrugged her shoulders. "Watcha playing?"
"Nothing! Want to play it?" replied Lydia.
"Thanks," answered Margery. "I'll watch you two while I sit with the
baby. Isn't she just ducky in that bathing suit?"
Lydia melted visibly and showed a flash of white teeth. "You bet!
How's Gwendolyn?" nodding toward the great bisque doll seated in the
wonderful doll carriage. "I wish I had a doll like that."
"She isn't in it with Florence Dombey," said Kent. "Florence is some
old sport, she is. Guess I'd better cut her down."
It was remarkable that while on most occasions Lydia was the tenderest
of mothers to Florence Dombey, she was, when the fever of "play and
pretend" was on her, capable of the most astonishing cruelties. During
the game of pirates, Florence Dombey had been hung from a willow
branch, in lieu of a yardarm, and had remained dangling there in the
wind, forgotten by her mother.
Kent placed her in Patience's carriage. "I'll tell you what I'll do,"
he said. "I'll go up the shore and get Smith's flat boat. We'll
anchor it out from the shore, and that'll be the wreck. We'll swim out
to her and bring stuff in. And up under the bank there we'll build the
cave and the barricade."
"Gee," exclaimed Lydia, "that's the best we've thought of yet. I'll be
collecting stuff to put in the wreck."
All during the golden August afternoon the game waxed joyfully. For a
long time, Margery sat aloof, playing with the baby. But when the
excavating of the cave began, she succumbed, and began to grovel in the
sand with the other two. She was allowed to come in as Friday's
father, and baby Patience, panting at her work of scratching the sand
with a crooked stick, was entered as the Parrot. Constant small
avalanches of sand and soil from the bank powdered the children's hair
and clothes with gray-black dust.
"Gosh, this is too much like work," groaned Kent, at last. "I'll tell
you, let's play the finding of Friday's father."
"I don't want to be tied up in a boat," protested, Margery, at once.
"Mardy not in boat," chorused little Patience, toddling to the water's
edge and throwing in a handful of sand.
"Isn't she a love!" sighed Margery.
"Huh, you girls make me sick," snorted Kent. "We won't tie you in the
boat. We'll bring the boat in and get you, then we'll anchor it out
where it is now, and--and--I'll go get Smith's rowboat, and Friday and
I'll come out and rescue you."
Margery hesitated. "Aw, come on!" urged Kent. "Don't be such a 'fraid
cat. That's why us kids don't like you, you're such a silly,
dressed-up doll."
The banker's daughter flushed. Though she loved the pretty clothes and
though the sense of superiority to other children, carefully cultivated
by her mother, was the very breath of her nostrils, she had never been
quite so happy as this afternoon when grubbing on an equality with
these three inferior children.
"I'm not afraid at all and I'm just as dirty as Lydia is. Go ahead
with your old boat."
They tethered Patience with Kent's cord to one of the willow trees and
Margery was paddled out several boat lengths from the shore and the
great stone that served for anchor was dropped over. Kent took a clean
dive overboard, swam ashore and disappeared along the willow path.
Little Patience set up a wail.
"Baby turn too. Baby turn, too," she wept.
"I'll go stay with her till Kent comes," said Lydia, diving into the
water as casually as if she were rising from a chair.
"I won't stay in this awful boat alone!" shrieked Margery.
Lydia swam steadily to the shore, then turned. Margery was standing up
in the boat.
"Sit down! Sit down!" cried Lydia.
Margery, beside herself with fear, tossed her arms, "I won't stay in
this old--"
There was a great splash and a choking cry as Margery's black braid
disappeared beneath the water.
"And she can't swim," gasped Lydia. "Kent!" she screamed, and made a
flying leap into the water. Her slender, childish arms seemed suddenly
steel. Her thin little legs took a racing stroke like tiny propellers.
Margery came up on the far side of the boat and uttered another choking
cry before she went down again. Lydia dived, caught the long black
braid and brought the frenzied little face to the surface. Margery
immediately threw an arm around Lydia's neck, and Lydia hit her in the
face with a clenched small fist and all the strength she could muster.
"Let go, or I'll let you drown. Turn over on your back. There isn't a
thing to be afraid of."
Margery, with a sob, obeyed and Lydia towed her the short distance to
the boat. "There, catch hold," she said.
Both the children clung to the gunwale, Margery choking and sobbing.
"I can't lift you into the boat," panted Lydia. "But quit your crying.
You're safe. There's Kent."
The whole episode had taken but a few minutes. Kent had heard the call
and some note of need in it registered, after a moment, in his mind.
He ran back and leaped into the water.
He clambered into the flat boat and reaching over pulled Margery bodily
over the gunwale. The child, sick and hysterical, huddled into the
bottom of the boat.
"Are you all right, Lyd?" he asked.
"Sure," replied Lydia, who was beginning to recover her breath.
It was the work of a minute to ground the boat. Then unheeding little
Patience's lamentations, the two children looked at each other and at
Margery.
"I'll run for her mother," said Kent.
"And scare her to death! She isn't hurt a bit," insisted Lydia.
"Margery, stop crying. You're all right, I tell you."
"I'll tell you," said Kent, "let's put her in Patience's carriage, and
carry her home. The water she swallowed makes her awful sick at her
stomach, I guess."
The fright over, the old spirit of adventure, with an added sense of
heroism, animated Kent and Lydia.
Margery was teased out of the boat and assisted into the perambulator,
with her dripping white legs dangling helplessly over the end. Little
Patience's tears were assuaged when she was placed in the doll buggy,
with Margery's doll in her arms. Florence Dombey was tied papoose
fashion to Lydia's back. The bicycle was hidden in the cave and with
Kent wheeling Margery and Lydia, Patience, the procession started
wildly for home.
By the time they had turned into the home street, Margery was beginning
to recover, but she was still shivering and inclined to sob. Other
children followed them and it was quite an imposing group that turned
in at the Marshall gate, just as Mrs. Marshall came to the door to bid
a guest good-by.
The scene that followed was difficult for either Lydia or Kent to
describe afterward. There was a hullabaloo that brought half the
mothers of the neighborhood into the yard. The doctor was sent for.
Margery was put to bed and Kent and Lydia were mentioned as murderers,
low-down brats and coarse little brutes by Mrs. Marshall, who ended by
threatening them with the police.
Old Lizzie appeared on the scene in time to take Lydia's part and Kent
disappeared after Mrs. Marshall had told him that Margery's father
would be around to see his father that evening.
"Is the child dead?" demanded old Lizzie, holding Patience on one arm
while Lydia clung to the other.
"She was able to walk upstairs," said a neighbor. "It's just Mrs.
Marshall's way, you know."
"I'll way her," snorted Lizzie. "Fine thanks to Lydia for saving the
child. Come home with your old Liz, dearie, and get into the nice
clean dress I've got for you."
Lydia told the story to Amos at suppertime. He was much disturbed.
"I've told you often and often, Lydia, never to endanger a child that
can't swim. You and Kent should have had more sense."
The quick tears sprang to the child's eyes. She was still much shaken.
"Is this lesson enough for you, or must I forbid your playing in the
water? I thought I could trust you absolutely."
"Stop your scolding her, Amos Dudley," exclaimed old Lizzie. "I won't
have it. She's too nervous a child."
Amos was saved a reply by a ring at the doorbell. Lizzie let Margery's
father in. He was a short, red-faced man with black hair and eyes. He
was too much excited now to stand on ceremony, and he followed Lizzie
into the dining-room.
"This won't do, Dudley. These wild young ones of yours--"
"Wait a minute, Marshall," interrupted Amos, with a dignity that he had
brought with him from New England. "Margery is all right, so we can go
over this thing calmly. Sit down and listen to Lydia's story. Tell
him, Lydia."
Lydia left her place and crowded up against her father's side. Old
Lizzie was holding the baby.
"It was like this," Lydia began. "Baby and me were going to play by
ourselves under the willows. Then Kent, he came and he played pirates
with us."
"Why wasn't Kent out playing with the boys?" interrupted Marshall.
Lydia's eyes widened. "Why, I'm as good as a boy to play with, any
day! Mostly he does play with other boys, but when they aren't round,
he and I play pirates. And then, right after we'd had our lunch,
Margery she came along and Kent and I were mad--"
The child paused uncomfortably and rubbed her curly yellow head with
her thin little hand in an embarrassed way.
"Why were you mad, Lydia?" In spite of himself, Marshall's voice was
softening, as Amos had known it would. Lydia made a deep appeal
somehow to the tenderness of men.
"Tell Mr. Marshall all you told me, Lydia," said Amos.
"Well--well, you see, it's like this. Margery's always so _clean_ and
she has lovely clothes and--and she--she looks down on us other kids so
we won't generally let her play with us--and she's an awful 'fraid cat
and--and a tattle-tale. But when we got to playing Robinson Crusoe,
and were digging the cave she helped and got terrible dirty, just like
us, and then she wanted to be Friday's father, and then--well--now--I
guess the rest of it was Kent's and my fault. We forgot she couldn't
swim and we forgot what a cry-baby she was. 'Cause you see, water's
almost like land to Kent and me and we'd been swimming 'most all day,
and Margery's the only kid around here that can't swim."
"Why can't she swim?" demanded Marshall. "How'd all the rest of you
learn? Don't you think you were mean not to let her learn?"
Again Lydia's pellucid eyes widened. "Why her mother won't let her
play with common kids like us! And us kids never learned. We've just
played in the water ever since we was as big as baby. She'll be
swimming by the time she's five," added Lydia, looking at the sleeping
Patience and speaking with the curious note of richness in her voice.
David Marshall scowled and stirred uncomfortably. He did not look at
Amos, who sat with his arm about Lydia, his thin face a lesser replica
of the old engraving of Daniel Webster hanging on the wall above.
"Well, go on! How'd she come to fall overboard?"
"She and I was sitting in the boat, and baby, she was tied to a tree by
a long string and she began to cry to come too, and I jumped over to go
quiet her. Kent he'd gone to get another boat. And Margery she jumped
up and began to yell and wave her arms and fell overboard. Then I
remembered she couldn't swim and I went back and got her and Kent came
and pulled us in shore. It wasn't anything, but Margery's such a
cry-baby. Lizzie, she's terrible uncomfortable."
Lydia's attention had returned to little Patience. "I'll take her up
to bed," she said, "it won't take but a few minutes."
"I'll carry her," said Lizzie.
The baby opened her eyes. "No, no one cally but Lyd."
"Let Daddy carry you," begged Amos.
Patience's little voice rose to a wail. "No one cally but Lyd."
"You don't have to be so polite," sniffed Lydia, "I carry her all the
time."
She lifted the sleepy baby easily and Patience dropped her soft cheek
against Lydia's and closed her eyes again. Lydia turned to Marshall.
Her face was very serious.
"I know I was awful bad, Mr. Marshall, and maybe you feel as if you
ought to lick me."
"Put your little sister to bed," said Marshall gravely, "and then we'll
see."
There was silence in the room for a moment after Lydia left it, then
Amos said, "I'll be glad to do anything I can, Marshall."
"Neither of you'll lay a finger on Lydia," interrupted Lizzie. "If you
want to lick any one, go lick Elviry Marshall, the fool! Why, I knew
her when she was my niece's hired girl and you, Dave Marshall, was
selling cans of tomatoes over a counter. And she's bringing that young
one up to be a silly little fool. Mark my words, she'll be the prey of
the first fortune-hunter that comes along."
To Amos's surprise, Marshall only scowled at Lizzie, who now began to
remove the supper dishes, talking in a whisper to herself. She paused
once in front of Marshall with the teapot in one hand and the milk
pitcher in the other.
"Coming and going with your nose in the air, Dave, I suppose you never
notice Lydia, but you've had a good look at her to-night, and mind well
what I mean when I say you know as well as I that children like Lydia
are rare and that your young one ought to consider it a privilege to be
pulled out of the water by her."
Old Lizzie pounded out of the room and there was a clatter of dishes
that ably expressed her frame of mind. Above the clatter and down from
the children's bedroom floated Lydia's little contralto lilt:
"Wreathe me no gaudy chaplet;
Make it from simple flowers
Plucked from the lowly valley
After the summer showers."
Neither Amos nor his caller spoke. In a few minutes Lydia's step
sounded on the stairs. The last of the sunset glow caught her hair,
and the fine set of her head on her square little shoulders was never
more pronounced than as she walked slowly toward Dave Marshall.
"I never had a licking," she said, "but I guess I deserve one and so
you'd better do it and get it done, Mr. Marshall."