FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35  
36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   >>   >|  
g-on lonely." A very little of the ridge road sufficed to make Bruce sick for comradeship, and his voice showed it. The boy turned an impressionable, sympathetic face. "Come rat along," he said. He looked at Bruce a moment questioningly before adding, "Reckin's haow you aint usen to the quiet yit. Taint so lonely, the woods an' the hills whend you know um." He twisted his head like a bird and looked out across the extensive sweep of the land and the long slow curve of the river, a deep inspiration swelling his chest. "Simlike they up an' talk to you, the woods an' the hills an' the quiet, whend you know um," he said. All on the instant Steering knew that, as in the case of Old Bernique, here again was character. "Character" seemed distinctly the richest and the pleasantest thing in Missouri. He rode in a little closer to his companion, drawn to him irresistibly, recognising in him the sweet, untutored poetry of a wildwood nature, whose young timidity was trembling and steadying into the placating, magnetic assurance of a boy, fresh-hearted as a berry. Steering had encountered the same sort of poetry in other unspoiled boys, splendid child-men whom he had known in other walks of life, and he had a quick affection for it. It was always as though on its crystal clearness a man might see the white sails of his own youth set back toward him. "Yes," he answered, "I think you are right about that. They do talk, the hills and the woods and the quiet,--only a fellow grows dull, gets his ears full of electric gongs and push-bells, and forgets to listen." The boy looked up with quick-witted question. "Y'aint f'm this part of the kentry, air you?" he asked. "No. I am from--well, from Bessietown last. Where are you from?" The boy laughed and glanced gaily at his briar-torn clothes. "F'm the woods," he said. "My name is Bruce Steering." "Mine's Piney." They fell then to talking of many things, as they rode toward Poetical, but inevitably they spoke chiefly of the great State of Missouri. On the subject of Missouri the boy talked, as old Bernique had talked, with expansive naivete. In his roamings he had ridden the State up and down, and had found much to love in it. "You'll like her, too, all righty," he told Bruce confidently, "whend you git broke to her." On one of youth's candid impulses to speak up for the life on the inside, the cherished desire, the gallant ideal, the buoyant fancy, he made a supple, sudden
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35  
36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
looked
 

Missouri

 

Steering

 

Bernique

 
talked
 
poetry
 

lonely

 
glanced
 

laughed

 

Bessietown


answered

 

kentry

 
listen
 

electric

 
forgets
 
witted
 

question

 

fellow

 
things
 

confidently


righty

 

candid

 

impulses

 
buoyant
 

supple

 
sudden
 

gallant

 

inside

 

cherished

 

desire


talking

 

clothes

 
Poetical
 

naivete

 

expansive

 

roamings

 
ridden
 
subject
 

inevitably

 

chiefly


extensive

 

twisted

 

instant

 

Simlike

 
inspiration
 

swelling

 
comradeship
 

showed

 
sufficed
 

turned