Luther considered at some length.
“She’ll be lonesome, not knowin’ anybody here,” he said with almost equal reluctance. “I—I want t’ see you start in right. You’ve got t’ live in th’ house with ’er.”
The last clause of his argument was not exactly in line with the impression he wished to produce; in fact, it was only a weak repetition of what he had begun the argument with, but somehow, like Elizabeth, that was the main fact in the case which absorbed his attention. He was dissatisfied with it, but could think of no way to state it better; so to turn the subject to something foreign to the hated topic, he remarked on a hayfield they were passing.
“Them windrows ought t’ ’a’ been shocked up,” he said, casting his eye up at the northwest to measure the clouds. “Jimminy!” he exclaimed, slapping the team with the lines. “I wonder if I’ve brought you out here t’ get you wet?”
He glanced apprehensively at Elizabeth’s thin print dress as the startled team jerked the old lumber wagon over the rough road, and half wished he had not brought her with him, for the signs were ominous. The breeze, which had been fitful when they had started, had died away altogether. Not a breath of air was stirring; even the birds and crickets were silent.
The storm was gathering rapidly.
They rounded the corner, near his building place, on a full trot, and plunged into the grove of cottonwoods which surrounded the “shanty,” with a consciousness that if they were to avoid a wetting, haste was necessary.
The faded coat, which was the object of the journey, hung on the handle of the windlass at the newly sunk well. The dried lumps of blue clay heaped themselves about the new pine curb and the young man stumbled awkwardly over the sunbaked clods as he reached for his coat. As he turned back toward the wagon an exclamation of dismay escaped him. The storm had gathered so rapidly that the boiling clouds could be plainly seen now above the tops of the ragged trees which surrounded the place. Instead of waiting to put the coat on, Luther flung it into the back of the wagon, and, climbing hastily over the hub, turned the horses and drove them into the open road. One glance after they were free from the grove was enough. With a shout, he stood up, urging the horses into a gallop.
Boiling like smoke from the stack of a rapidly moving locomotive, the storm bore down upon the level Kansas prairie. Not a sound was heard except a dull roar from the north. Urging the horses to their utmost efforts with voice and threatening gestures, Luther looked back at the girl on the spring seat reassuringly.
“We’re makin’ good time, Lizzie,” he shouted, “but I’m afraid You’ll get th’ starch took out of that purty dress. I never thought of this when I brought you.”