: At the Crossroads by Comstock Harriet T Harriet Theresa De Maris Walter Illustrator - Fiction

@FreeBooks

Posted in: #FreeBooks #FreeBooksIndia #FreeBooksApp #gg

Vote Up Vote Down   0 Reactions

Login to give Reaction!

is pipe. "Lord! I wonder if any one ever called Mary-Clare Mrs. Rivers before, Polly?" Heathcote paused, then went on:

"Yes; Mary-Clare holds her own and her boy-togs help the idea. Mary-Clare ain't properly grown up, anyway. Some parts of her are terrible strong and thrifty; parts as has caught the sunlight, so to speak, and been sheltered from blasts. The other parts of her ain't what you might say shrivelled, but they've kept hid and they ain't ever on exhibition."

"Oh! it's just a blamed amusing fancy of mine," Heathcote chuckled, "to calculate 'bout Mary-Clare. You see, being a magistrate, I married Mary-Clare to Larry, and I've never been at ease about the thing, though I had to put it through. There lay ole Doc looking volumes and not being able to speak a word--nothing to do for him but keep him company and try to find out what he wanted. He kept on wanting something like all possessed. Larry and Mary-Clare hung over him asking, was it this or that? and his big, burning eyes sorter flickering, never steady. I recall old Peneluna Todd was there and she said the young uns were pestering the ole Doc. Then, it was 'long about midnight, Larry rose up from asking some question, and there was a new look on his face, a white, frozen kind of look. Mary-Clare kinder sprang at him. 'What is it?' she whispered, and I ain't never forgot her face. At first Larry didn't answer and he began shaking, like he had the chills.

"'You must tell me, Larry!' Mary-Clare went up close and took Larry by the shoulders as if she was going to tear his secret from him. Then she went on to say how he had no right to keep anything from her--her, as would give her soul for the ole Doc. She meant it, too. Well, Larry sort of dragged it out of himself. Ole Doc wanted him and Mary-Clare to marry! That was what was wanted! There wasn't much time to consider things, but Mary-Clare went close to the bed and knelt down and said slowly and real tender:

"'You can hear me, can't you, Daddy?' The flicker in ole Doc's eyes steadied. I reckon any call of Mary-Clare's could halt him, short of the other side of Jordan. 'Then, dearie Dad, listen.' Just like that she said it. I remember every word. 'You want me to marry Larry--now? It would make you--happy?' The steady look seemed to kinder freeze. I called it a listening look more than an understanding one. I'll allas hold to that, but God knows there warn't much time to calculate. Peneluna began acting up but Mary-Clare set her aside.

"'All right, Daddy darling!' she whispered, and with that she stood up and said to me, 'You marry us at once! Come close so that he can see and know!'

"Things go here in the Forest that don't go elsewhere; I married them two because I couldn't help it--something drew me on. And then just when I got to the end, ole Doc rose up like he was lifted--he stared at what was passing; tried to say something, and sank back smiling--dead!"

Northrup wiped his forehead. There were drops of perspiration on it, and his breath came roughly through his throat; he seemed part of the dramatic scene.

"Maybe!" sighed Peter. "Maybe. But he took big chances even for a dying man. I couldn't get rid of the notion that when he cottoned to what had been done, he sorter threw up his hands! But what happened to Mary-Clare just took my breath. 'Pon my soul, as I looked at her it was like I saw her going away after ole Doc and leaving, in her place, a new, different woman that really didn't count so long as she looked after things while the real Mary-Clare went about her business. It was disturbing and I felt downright giddy."

"You're downright silly, Peter Heathcote"--Polly tossed her knitting aside and shifted the pillows of the couch--"making Mary-Clare out the way you do when she's ordinary enough and doing her life tasks same as other folks."

"How has it worked out?" Northrup heard the words as if another spoke them.

"I guess, friend, that's what no one actually knows." Peter pulled on his pipe. "Larry is on and off. Maclin, over to the mines, seems to do the ordering of Larry's coming and going. Darned funny business, I say. However, there you are. When Larry is home I guess the way Mary-Clare holds her head and laughs gets on his nerves. No man likes to feel that he can't clutch hold of his wife, but it comes to that, say what you will, Mary-Clare keeps free of things in a mighty odd fashion; I mean the real part of her; the other part goes regular enough.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

(0)

Login to post a comment!