FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104  
105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   >>  
very certain that there is nothing quite definite as yet. Indeed, I'm not quite sure that Laura really knows her own mind as yet." Soon after that, Miss Meade requested to be conducted back into the ballroom, to find Greg, who was to be her next partner. "Now, good gracious, I hope I've really given Cadet Slowpoke a broad enough hint," thought Belle. "If he doesn't go ahead and speak to Laura now, it'll be because he doesn't care. And Leonard Cameron isn't a bad fellow, even if he does prefer the yardstick to a sword!" As for Dick, his evening was spoiled. His sense of honor prevented his "speaking" to Laura until he felt that his future in the Army was assured. Yet spoiled as his evening was, Prescott did his best to make it a bright occasion for Laura Bentley. The next morning, while the members of the cadet corps were grinding at recitations, or boning over study desks in barracks, Mrs. Bentley and the girls rode down the slope in the stage and boarded a train for New York. Dick had not "spoken." CHAPTER XVIII THE ENEMIES HAVE AN UNDERSTANDING After that February hop, Cadet Prescott appeared to give himself over to one dominating ambition. That ambition was to secure higher standing in his class. He became a "bone," and tried so hard to delight his instructors that he was suspected of boning bootlick with the Academic Board. For Prescott had dropped Laura out of his mind. That is to say, he had tried to do it, and Prescott was a young man with a strong will. Belle's words, instead of spurring him on to do something that his own peculiar sense of honor forbade, had killed his vague dream. After all, Dick reasoned, it was Laura's own good and greatest happiness that must be considered. Leonard Cameron, a rising and prosperous young merchant in Gridley, would doubtless be able to give Laura a much better place in the world. In the matter of income, Cameron doubtless enjoyed three or four times as much as the annual pay of a second lieutenant ($1,700) amounts to. Besides, Cameron was not much in the way of risking his life, while an Army officer may be killed at any time, even in an ordinary riot. A lieutenants widow received only her pension of a comparatively few dollars a month. "It would have been almost criminal for me to have thought of tying Laura's future up to mine," Dick told himself savagely, as he took a lonely stroll one March afternoon. "I'll have n
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104  
105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   >>  



Top keywords:

Cameron

 

Prescott

 

spoiled

 
thought
 
evening
 

killed

 
Leonard
 

boning

 

ambition

 

doubtless


Bentley
 

future

 

Gridley

 

considered

 

happiness

 
prosperous
 

rising

 

greatest

 

merchant

 
spurring

dropped

 
Academic
 

bootlick

 

delight

 

instructors

 

suspected

 

strong

 
forbade
 

peculiar

 

reasoned


dollars

 

comparatively

 

lieutenants

 

received

 

pension

 

criminal

 

stroll

 

lonely

 

afternoon

 

savagely


annual

 

enjoyed

 

income

 

matter

 

lieutenant

 

officer

 
ordinary
 

risking

 

amounts

 

Besides