BOY AND GIRL
From the moment Dick Welford had seen Socola bowing and smiling before
Jennie Barton he had hated the man. He hated foreigners on general
principles, anyhow. This kind of foreigner he particularly loathed--the
slender, nervous type which suggested over-refinement to the point of
effeminacy. He had always hated slender, effeminate-looking men of the
native breed. This one was doubly offensive because he was an Italian.
How any woman with true womanly instincts could tolerate such a spider
was more than he could understand.
Jennie Barton had always frankly said that she admired men of his own
type. He was six feet one, fair-haired, blue-eyed, and weighed a hundred
and ninety-six pounds at twenty-one years of age. He had always felt
instinctively that he was exactly the man for Jennie's mate. She was
nineteen, dark and slender, a bundle of quick, sensitive, nervous
intelligence. Her brown eyes were almost black and her luxuriant hair
seemed raven-hued beside his. He had always imagined it nestling beside
his big blond head in perfect contentment since the first summer he had
spent with Tom Barton at their cottage at the White Sulphur Springs.
He had taken it for granted that she would say yes when he could screw
up his courage to speak. She had treated him as if he were already in
the family.
"Confound it," he muttered, clenching his big fist, "that's what worries
me! Maybe she just thinks of me as one of her brothers!"
It hadn't occurred to him until he saw the light kindle in her eyes at
the sight of that smooth-tongued reptilian foreigner. He was on his way
now to her house, to put the thing to the test before she could leave
Washington. Thank God, the spider was tied down here at the Sardinian
Ministry. He hoped Victor Emmanuel would send him as Consul to Shanghai.
Mrs. Barton met him at the door with a motherly smile.
"Walk right in the parlor, Dick. It's sweet of you to come so early
to-day. We're all in tears, packing to go. Jennie'll be delighted to see
you. Poor child--she's sick over it all."
Mrs. Barton pressed Dick's hand with the softest touch that reassured
his fears. The only trouble about Mrs. Barton was she was gentle and
friendly to everybody, black and white, old and young, Yankee or
Southerner. She was even sorry for old John Brown when they hung him.
"Poor thing, he was crazy," she said tenderly. "They ought to have sent
him to the asylum."
Try as he might, he couldn't fling off the impression of tragedy the
meeting of Socola with Jennie had produced. He was in a nervous fit to
see and tell her of his love. Why the devil hadn't he done so before
anyhow? They might have been engaged and ready to be married by this
time. They had met when she was sixteen.
Why on earth couldn't he throw off the fool idea that he was going to
lose her? His big fist suddenly closed with resolution.
"I'll not lose her! I'll wring that viper's neck--I'll wade through
blood and death and the fires of h--"
Just as he was plunging waist deep through the flames of the Pit, she
appeared in the door, the picture of wistful, tender beauty.
He rose awkwardly and extended his hand.
"Good morning, Dick!"
"Good morning, Jennie--"
Her hand was hot, her eyes heavy with tears.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
"As if you didn't know--I've been saying good-by to some of the dearest
friends I've ever known. It's terrible. I just feel it's the end of the
world--"
He started to say: "Don't worry, Jennie darling, you have me. I love
you!" The thought of it made the cold beads of perspiration suddenly
stand out on his forehead. It was one thing to think such
things--another to say it aloud to a girl with Jennie's serious brown
eyes.
She seemed terribly serious this morning and far away somehow. Never had
he seen her so utterly lovely. The mood of tender seriousness made her
more beautiful than ever. If he only dared to crush her in his arms and
laugh the smiles back into her eyes.
When he spoke it was only a commonplace he managed to blurt out:
"So you're really going to-morrow?"
"Yes--we've telegraphed the boys to come home from school at once and
join us in Montgomery."
He tried to say it again, but the speech turned out to be political, not
personal.
"Of course Virginia'll stand by her Southern sisters, Jennie--"
"Yes--"
"It's just a few old moss-backs holding her. No army will ever march
across her soil to fight a Southern State--"
"I hope not."
"Of course not. I'll meet them on the border with one musket anyhow--"
The girl was looking out the window at the slowly drizzling rain and
made no answer. He flushed at her apparent indifference to his heroic
stand.
"Don't you believe I would?"
"Would what, Dick?" she smiled, recovering herself from her reverie.
It was no use beating about the bush, trying to talk politics. He had to
make the plunge.
He suddenly took her hand in his.
She threw him a startled look, sat bolt upright, made the faintest
effort to draw her hand away, and blushed furiously.
He was in for it now. There was no retreat. He gripped with desperate
earnestness, tried to speak, and choked.
He drew a deep breath, tried again and only squeezed her hand harder.
The girl began to smile in a sweet, triumphant way. It was nice, this
conscious power over a big, stunning six-footer who grasped her hand as
a drowning man a straw. The sense of her strength was thrilling.
She looked at him with demure reproach.
"Dick!"
He grinned sheepishly and clung to her hand.
"Yes--Jennie--"
"Do you know what you are doing?"
"No--but--I
know--what--I'm--trying--to--do--and--I'm--going--to--do--it--"
Again his big hand crushed hers.
"You're trying to break every bone in my hand as near as I can make
out--I'd like it back when you're through with it--"
He found his tongue at last:
"I--I--can't let you have it back, Jennie, I'm going to keep it
forever--"
"Really?"
"Yes--I am. I--I love you--Jennie--don't you love me--just--a--little
bit?"
The girl laughed.
"No!"
"Not the least--little--tiny--bit?"
"I don't think so--"
The hand slipped through his limp fingers and he stared at her in a
hopeless, pitiful way.
Her heart went out in a wave of tender sympathy. She put her hand back
in his in a wistful touch.
"I'm sorry, Dick dear, I didn't think you loved me in that way--"
"What did you think I was hanging round you so much for?"
"I knew you liked me, of course. And I like you--but I've never thought
seriously about love."
"There's no other fellow?"
"Of course, not--"
"You liked that Socola, didn't you?"
"I liked him--yes--"
"I thought so."
"He's cultured, handsome, interesting--"
"He's a sissy!"
"Dick!"
"A little wizened-faced rat--the spider-snake! I could break his long
neck. Yes--you do like him! I saw it when you met him. You're throwing
me down because you met him!"
"Dick!"
"But he shan't have you, I tell you--I'll show him I could lick a
thousand such sissies with one hand tied behind me."
The girl rose with dignity.
"Don't you dare to speak to me like that, sir--"
"You're going to see that fellow again--I'll bet you've got an
engagement with him now--to-night--to-day!"
The slender figure rose.
"I'll see him if I please--when I please and where I please and I'll not
consult you about it, Dick Welford--Good day!"
Trembling with anger the big, awkward boy turned and stumbled out of the
house.