FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89  
90   91   92   93   94   95   96   >>  
ad thrown her name recklessly to the winds and who, to-morrow, would be a byword. . . . These thoughts ached in her with her bruised flesh. Meanwhile Barry Elder had been making quick trips about the room and now he threw down an armful of garments beside her and knelt at her feet, tugging at her sopping shoes. "Let me get these off--there, that's better. Now the other one. . . . Lordy, child, those footies. . . . Now you'd better get into these dry things as quick as you can. Not a perfect fit, but the best I can do. I'll take a turn in the woods and be back in ten minutes. So you hurry up." He closed the door upon the words that Maria Angelina was beginning to frame and left her looking helplessly at a pair of corduroy knickerbockers, a blue flannel shirt, a strange undergarment, plaid golf stockings and a pair of fringed moccasins. They were in an untouched heap when her host returned, letting in a cold rush of the night with him. "What's this?" he flung out in mock severity. "See here, young lady, you must get into those clothes whether they happen to be the style or not! Little girls who get wet can't go to sleep in their clothes. Now I'll give you just ten minutes more and then if you are not a good girl----" To her own dismay and to his Maria Angelina burst into tears. "Oh, come now," said Barry helplessly. "You poor little dud----" The sudden gentleness of his voice undid the last of the girl's control. She sobbed harder and harder as he sat down beside her and began to pat her shaking shoulders. "You shan't do anything you don't want to," he comforted. "You're tired out, I know. But you'd be so much more comfy in these dry togs----" "Oh, please, Signor, not those things. Do not make me. I will get dry----" "You don't have to if you don't want to," he told her gently, looking down in a puzzled way at her distress. Her face was buried in a crook of her arm; her black hair streamed tempestuously over her heaving shoulders. "Come closer to the fire, then, and dry out." He threw more wood upon the flames and piled on brush that shed a swift, crackling heat. "Give that a chance at those wet clothes of yours," he advised. "Meanwhile we'd better wring this out," and with businesslike despatch he began gathering that dripping black hair into the folds of a Turkish towel. Very strenuously he wrung it. "That's what I do for my kid sister when she's been in swimming," he mentioned. "She's
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89  
90   91   92   93   94   95   96   >>  



Top keywords:
clothes
 

things

 

Angelina

 

minutes

 

harder

 
helplessly
 
shoulders
 

Meanwhile

 
mentioned
 

shaking


comforted

 

sister

 
swimming
 

sudden

 
gentleness
 

sobbed

 
Signor
 
control
 

despatch

 

businesslike


flames

 

closer

 

gathering

 

heaving

 

chance

 

crackling

 

advised

 

tempestuously

 

streamed

 

distress


puzzled

 
gently
 

Turkish

 

dismay

 

dripping

 
buried
 

strenuously

 
happen
 

recklessly

 
perfect

footies
 

morrow

 
beginning
 
closed
 

armful

 

garments

 
making
 

thoughts

 
byword
 

tugging