He got no further. The big man sprang forward to face him with a look that made the dandy shrink with fear. “Protect Sammy Lane from me! Protect her, you! You know what I feel toward her? You!” He fairly choked with his wild rage.
The frightened Ollie drew a weapon from his pocket, but, with a snarling laugh, the big fellow reached out his great hand and the shining toy went whirling through the air. “Go home,” said the giant. “Damn you, go home! Don’t you hear? For God’s sake get out o’ my sight ’fore I forget again!”
Ollie went.
CHAPTER XXVI.
OLLIE’S DILEMMA.
As “Preachin’ Bill” used to say, “Every hound has hits strong pints, but some has more of ’em.”
Young Stewart was not without graces pleasing to the girl whom he hoped to make his wife. He seemed to know instinctively all those little attentions in which women so delight, and he could talk, too, very entertainingly of the things he had seen. To the simple girl of the backwoods, he succeeded in making the life in the city appear very wonderful, indeed. Neither was Sammy insensible to the influence of his position, and his prospective wealth, with the advantages that these things offered. Then, with all this, he loved her dearly; and when, if you please, was ever a woman wholly unmoved by the knowledge that she held first place in a man’s heart?
For two weeks they were together nearly every day, sometimes spending the afternoon at the girl’s home on the side of Dewey, or roving over the nearby hills; sometimes going for long rides through the great woods to pass the day with friends, returning in the evening to find Jim smoking in the doorway of the darkened cabin.
When Mr. Lane, at the end of the first week, asked his daughter, in his point blank fashion, what she was going to do with young Stewart, the girl answered, “He must have his chance, Daddy. He mast have a good fair chance. I—I don’t know what it is, but there is—I—I don’t know, Daddy. I am sure I loved him when he want away, that is, I think I am sure.” And Jim, looking into her eyes, agreed heartily; then he took down his violin to make joyful music far into the night.
Ollie did not see Young Matt after their meeting on the Lookout. The big fellow, too, avoided the couple, and Sammy, for some reason, carefully planned their rides so that they would not be likely to meet their neighbor an the ridge. Once, indeed, they called at the Matthews place, walking over in the evening, but that was when Sammy knew that Young Matt was not at home.
Day after day as they talked together, the girl tried honestly to enter into the life of the man she had promised to marry. But always there was that feeling of something lacking. Just what that something was, or why she could not feel completely satisfied, Sammy did not understand. But the day was soon to come when she would know the real impulses of her heart.