FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   >>  
th of the dream fire was a blaze of sunlight that fell across it. The fire itself a charred mass of embers upon a mound of gray ashes. Upon the hearth stood the disreputable remnants of her sodden shoes. For a few moments she lay still, her consciousness invaded with its rush of memories. She felt very direfully stiff when she thought about it, but after the first moment she did not think about it. She sat up and looked eagerly about. There were no shadows now; the sunlight was streaming in through the cabin's three windows and through the door that stood open into a world of forest green. She heard birds singing and the sound of running water. Barry Elder was nowhere to be seen. The cabin was one room, an amazing room, its unconcealed simplicities blazoning themselves cheerfully in the light. There were rustic tables and comfortable chairs; there was a couch untouched, apparently, save that it had been denuded of the cushions that lay now about her. There was a small black stove and pans on it and dishes on a stand. There was a chest of drawers and along the walls were low open shelves of books, the shelves topped with a miscellany of pipes and pictures and playing cards. Between two windows stood a large table buried in books and papers with a typewriter poking its head above the confusion. So he really was writing a play--another play. She hoped, remembering Cousin Jim's remark, that he would not put too much Harvard in. She got to her feet--with wincing reluctance for every muscle in her small person made its lameness felt, and she limped when she began to walk. The rejected pile of clothing had disappeared from her side, but the fringed moccasins were left, and very humbly she drew them on. Her stockings were not those in which a Santonini desires to be discovered! Uncertainly she moved towards the door, her stiffly dried white skirt rattling at each move. It was a battleground of a skirt where black mud and green grass stains struggled for preeminence, and her poor middy blouse, she thought, was in little better plight. She had a sudden, half hysterical thought of Lucia's face, if Lucia could see her now, and a queer little gulp of laughter caught in the lump in her throat! "Morning, Signorina! A merry morning to you." Up the grassy bank before the cabin Barry Elder came swinging towards her, a lithe figure in brown knickers and white shirt rolling loosely open at the throat. His face was f
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   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:

thought

 
shelves
 

windows

 

throat

 

sunlight

 

rolling

 

disappeared

 

rejected

 

clothing

 

fringed


moccasins

 

stockings

 

knickers

 

humbly

 

limped

 

Harvard

 

Cousin

 

remark

 

wincing

 

reluctance


Santonini

 

loosely

 

lameness

 

person

 

muscle

 

remembering

 

Uncertainly

 

blouse

 

Morning

 

Signorina


morning

 

preeminence

 
caught
 
laughter
 

hysterical

 

sudden

 

plight

 

struggled

 

stains

 

swinging


rattling

 

figure

 

discovered

 

stiffly

 

battleground

 

grassy

 

desires

 

looked

 

moment

 
memories